Chris Stringer
United Kingdom
Tweets my own; likes/retweets do not necessarily signify agreement with content.
Is this you? As a journalist, you can create a free Muck Rack account to customize your profile, list your contact preferences, and upload a portfolio of your best work.
Claim your profile
Articles by Chris Stringer
Unlocking the secrets of the ‘Dragon Man’ skull – and what it reveals about human evolution
What we got right and wrong Most of what I’ve talked about here, we’ve only learnt in the last 16 years. For my PhD more than 50 years ago I was testing the then widespread idea that modern humans evolved directly from Neanderthals. I spent my time measuring and comparing fossil skulls, using the primitive measuring techniques and limited computing power available at the time. I concluded that we did not evolve from them.
Unlocking secrets of ‘Dragon Man’ skull – and what it reveals about human evolution
Home > INTERNATIONAL > Unlocking secrets of ‘Dragon Man’ skull..... Back By Chris Stringer, Natural History Museum LONDON: (Oct 24) In September 2018, China Daily ran a story that found its way to my desk. It featured the photograph of a beautifully preserved fossil skull with huge brow-ridges, with a caption speculating – wrongly, as it would turn out – that it belonged to a species of human known as Homo heidelbergensis.
Unlocking the secrets of the ‘Dragon Man’ skull – and what it reveals about human evolution
© 2026 Tolerance.ca ® Inc. All reproduction rights reserved. All information reproduced on the Web pages of www.tolerance.ca (including articles, images, photographs, and logos) is protected by intellectual property rights owned by Tolerance.ca ® Inc. or, in certain cases, by its author. Any reproduction of the information for use other than personal use is prohibited.
Unlocking the secrets of the ‘Dragon Man’ skull – and what it reveals about human evolution Original
In September 2018, China Daily ran a story that found its way to my desk. It featured the photograph of a beautifully preserved fossil skull with huge brow-ridges, with a caption speculating – wrongly, as it would turn out – that it belonged to a species of human known as Homo heidelbergensis. The article told a remarkable story about the discovery of this fossil some 85 years earlier. Japanese forces had been occupying the city of Harbin in north-eastern China in 1933.
Unlocking the secrets of the ‘Dragon Man’ skull – and what it reveals about human evolution
Mita Stock Images In September 2018, China Daily ran a story that found its way to my desk. It featured the photograph of a beautifully preserved fossil skull with huge brow-ridges, with a caption speculating – wrongly, as it would turn out – that it belonged to a species of human known as Homo heidelbergensis. The article told a remarkable story about the discovery of this fossil some 85 years earlier. Japanese forces had been occupying the city of Harbin in north-eastern China in 1933.
Reassessment of the morphological evidence for hominin hybrids in the Levant
Introduction There is a long history of suggestions of hybridization in human evolution (e.g., Coon 1939; Dobzhansky 1944). Interbreeding has even been suggested to have played a central role in the origin and evolution of our species (Ackermann, Mackay & Arnold 2016; Weckler 1954). Most suggestions of hybridization have been between Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis), as the first fossil human species recognized as distinct from our own (King 1864), and Homo sapiens.
Utilising virtual environments to assess the visibility of fallow deer to human hunters
Abstract Visual detection of prey is a critical element of human hunting behaviour. We examine how factors such as prey coat colouration, distance to the observer and orientation influence the ability of humans to visually locate fallow deer in simulated virtual environments. The simulated environment is a deciduous broad-leaved woodland that corresponds to the vegetation in interglacial Northwest Europe during the middle to late Pleistocene.
The Swanscombe fossil at 90: revisiting its phylogeny, taxonomy, and place in human origins
Introduction While lithic remains are found in Britain from around 900 thousand years ago (ka), human remains of Early-to-Middle Pleistocene age are rare, consisting only of the fossils from Boxgrove, Swanscombe, and Pontnewydd (Ashton 2017; Parfitt et al. 2010). Thus, although they are isolated and often fragmented, the British human remains from this period are critical to understanding hominin diversity during this period.
Dogs were widely distributed across western Eurasia during the Palaeolithic
|
Abstract Archaeological evidence suggests that dogs diverged from wolves during the Palaeolithic, more than 15,000 years ago1,2,3,4,5,6,7. The earliest unequivocal genetic evidence, however, is associated with dog remains from Mesolithic archaeological contexts approximately 10,900 years ago8,9.
By William Marsh, Lachie Scarsbrook, Eren Yüncü, Lizzie Hodgson, Audrey Lin, Maria De Iorio, Olaf Thalmann, Mark Thomas Verified, Mahaut Goor, Anders Bergström, Angela Noseda, Sarieh Amiri, Fereidoun Biglari, Dušan Borić, Katia Bougiouri, Alberto Carmagnini, Maddalena Giannì, Tom Higham, Ophélie Lebrasseur, Anna Linderholm, Marcello A. Mannino, Caroline Middleton, Gökhan Mustafaoğlu, Angela Perri, Joris Peters, Mike Richards, Özlem Sarıtaş, Pontus Skoglund, Rhiannon Stevens, Chris Stringer, Kristina Tabbada, Helen M. Talbot, Laura G. Van der Sluis, Silvia M. Bello, Vesna Dimitrijevic, Louise Martin, Marjan Mashkour, Simon A. Parfitt, Sonja Vukovic, Selina Brace, Oliver E. Craig, Douglas Baird, Sophy Charlton, Greger Larson, Ian Barnes, Laurent A. F. Frantz
|
Nature
Verified
And then there was us
Introduction Throughout the early twentieth century, numerous theories on the origins of Homo sapiens rose and fell from prominence. The ‘Presapiens’ theory was highly influential during the early part of the century; it suggested that H. sapiens arose in Europe alongside, but entirely separate from, Neanderthals (Boule 1921; Vallois 1954). By the middle of the century, it was largely replaced in popularity by the theory that Neanderthals were direct ancestors of H. sapiens.
Earliest evidence of making fire
|
Abstract Fire-making is a uniquely human innovation that stands apart from other complex behaviours such as tool production, symbolic culture and social communication. Controlled fire use provided adaptive opportunities that had profound effects on human evolution. Benefits included warmth, protection from predators, cooking and creation of illuminated spaces that became focal points for social interaction1,2,3.
By Rob Davis Verified, Marcus Hatch, Sally Hoare, Simon Lewis Verified, Claire Lucas, Simon A. Parfitt, Silvia M. Bello, Mark Lewis Verified, Jordan Mansfield, Jens Najorka, Simon O’Connor, Sylvia M Peglar, Andrew Sorensen, Chris Stringer, Nick Ashton
|
Nature
Verified
“We want clean sheets” - Keith Curle discusses Northampton defence
Keith Curle is calling on his players to improve their defensive quality, as the Cobblers have made a shaky start to the 2019/20 season. Seven games in and Northampton Town sit in 18th place. With an immense level of player turnover during the summer transfer window, the side has yet to fully settle and this has shown in their perfoirmances thus far. That being said, there are some glimmers of promise within the squad.
Port Vale boss responds to criticism from an agent
Port Vale manager has responded to criticism from Ben Whitfield’s agent, following the midfielder’s move to Torquay United. Whitfield joined the National League side on Tuesday and his agent, Dan Fletcher, said he was delighted to have negotiated the deal. He said: “Delighted to have negotiated the transfer of Ben Whitfield from Port Vale to Torquay United. “Sometimes you have to do everything to get a player away from a manager, even if it means taking a step back to go several steps forward.
Human evolution: The lonely Neanderthal?
Main text The Neanderthals evolved and lived in western and central Eurasia from at least 430,000 years ago until they disappeared about 40,000 years ago1. Originally known from fossil remains and their characteristic Mousterian stone tools, our knowledge of these ancient relatives has increased dramatically since the publication of the first high-coverage Neanderthal genome in 20102.
La historia de Homo naledi: incógnitas de un insólito y controvertido humano arcaico
En 2013 se dio a conocer un hallazgo singular en relación a la evolución y orígenes humanos. Uno de aquellos que se producen una o dos veces cada década: los restos de una nueva especie completamente desconocida hasta entonces. Sus descubridores la denominaron Homo naledi, en referencia a la cueva sudafricana donde fueron encontrados los restos: la cueva Rising star (estrella naciente). 'Naledi' significa estrella en sesoto, lengua bantú hablada en Sudáfrica y Lesoto, entre otros países.
Mapping Interactions of H. neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens from the Fossil and Genetic Records
Abstract Evidence suggests that the Neanderthal and Homo sapiens lineages began diverging about 600,000 years ago, evolving largely separately in Eurasia and Africa after that time. Around 60,000 years ago H. sapiens began a significant emergence from Africa that would lead to a near-global distribution by 10,000 years ago.
Dual ancestries and ecologies of the Late Glacial Palaeolithic in Britain - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Abstract Genetic investigations of Upper Palaeolithic Europe have revealed a complex and transformative history of human population movements and ancestries, with evidence of several instances of genetic change across the European continent in the period following the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Concurrent with these genetic shifts, the post-LGM period is characterized by a series of significant climatic changes, population expansions and cultural diversification.
Britain: One Million Years of the Human Story
Description / Britain: One Million Years of the Human Story When did the first humans arrive in Britain? Where did they come from? And what did they look like? Find the answers to questions about our ancestors in this comprehensive, thought-provoking study of the human past of Britain. It begins nearly one million years ago, during the earliest known human occupation, and reveals how humans have periodically lived there ever since.
Widespread Denisovan ancestry in Island Southeast Asia but no evidence of substantial super-archaic hominin admixture
Abstract The hominin fossil record of Island Southeast Asia (ISEA) indicates that at least two endemic ‘super-archaic’ species—Homo luzonensis and H. floresiensis—were present around the time anatomically modern humans arrived in the region >50,000 years ago. Intriguingly, contemporary human populations across ISEA carry distinct genomic traces of ancient interbreeding events with Denisovans—a separate hominin lineage that currently lacks a fossil record in ISEA.
Origins of modern human ancestry
Abstract New finds in the palaeoanthropological and genomic records have changed our view of the origins of modern human ancestry. Here we review our current understanding of how the ancestry of modern humans around the globe can be traced into the deep past, and which ancestors it passes through during our journey back in time. We identify three key phases that are surrounded by major questions, and which will be at the frontiers of future research.
A rich locality in South Kensington: the fossil hominin collections of the Natural History Museum, London
Academia.edu no longer supports Internet Explorer. To browse Academia.edu and the wider internet faster and more securely, please take a few seconds to upgrade your browser.
Deciphering the Denisovans
Denisova Cave in the Altai region of Siberia had been known to Russian scientists for some 40 y, but the site only achieved wide attention in 2010 with the publication of a very distinctive mtDNA sequence (dubbed “Lineage X”) from a human finger bone fragment [Denisova 3 (1)]. The sequence suggested that “Denisovans” diverged from the lineages of modern humans and Neanderthals close to 1 Mya ago.
Human Evolution: The many mysteries of Homo naledi
Abstract More than 1500 fossils from the Rising Star cave system in South Africa have been assigned to a new human species, Homo naledi, which displays a unique combination of primitive and derived traits throughout the skeleton. Main text When the recovery of fossil hominin remains from the Rising Star cave system near Johannesburg in South Africa was widely publicised in 2013 and 2014, I'm sure I wasn't the only one who thought that the coverage had more hype than substance.
Are you part Neanderthal?
Lucky Chris Stringer, to have spent the last forty years immersed in new discoveries about the origin of our species. I don’t suppose that when he began his PhD research in 1970, setting off on a tour around the museums of Europe to measure as many skulls as he could get his hands on, he imagined that today he would need to be as conversant with mutations on the Y chromosome as he is with the shape of the pubic ramus (part of the pelvis).
Podcast: Why some of the most iconic images and stories depicting evolution are wrong
Geneticist Kat Arney tackles the myths and misconceptions around two of the most iconic images in evolutionary biology: the ‘March of Progress’ and Darwin’s finches. Where did these infamous images come from, and do they really show what everyone seems to think they do? First published in 1965, artist Rudolph Zallinger’s March of Progress depicts a series of ancient human ancestors walking across the page, portraying the inexorable journey from monkey to man.
Aspects of human physical and behavioural evolution during the last 1 million years
ABSTRACT This paper reviews some of the main advances in our understanding of human evolution over the last 1 million years, presenting a holistic overview of a field defined by interdisciplinary approaches to studying the origins of our species. We begin by briefly summarizing the climatic context across the Old World for the last 1 million years before directly addressing the fossil and archaeological records.
Are Neanderthals the same species as us?
Read later () Beta During Beta testing articles may only be saved for seven days. Create a list of articles to read later. You will be able to access your list from any article in Discover. You don't have any saved articles. By Chris Stringer Museum human evolution expert Prof Chris Stringer, who has been studying Neanderthals and early modern humans for about 50 years, tackles the big question of whether we belong to the same species.
Aspects of human physical and behavioural evolution during the last 1 million years - Galway‐Witham - - Journal of Quaternary Science - Wiley Online Library
State of the Science Aspects of human physical and behavioural evolution during the last 1 million years Julia Galway‐Witham Corresponding Author E-mail address: j.galway-witham@nhm.ac.uk Centre for Human Evolution Research (CHER), Department of Earth Sciences, Natural History Museum, London, UK The authors contributed equally to this work Correspondence: Julia Galway‐Witham or James Cole, as above.
Subscribe to read | Financial Times
Gain a global perspective on the US and go beyond with curated news and analysis from 600 journalists in 50+ countries covering politics,...
Subscribe to read | Financial Times
Gain a global perspective on the US and go beyond with curated news and analysis from 600 journalists in 50+ countries covering politics,...
Meet the relatives: the new human story
Today humans are the dominant species on our planet — so much so that some scientists talk of a new geological era, the Anthropocene,...
The evolutionary history of the human face
Abstract The face is the most distinctive feature used to identify others. Modern humans have a short, retracted face beneath a large globular braincase that is distinctively different from that of our closest living relatives. The face is a skeletal complex formed by 14 individual bones that houses parts of the digestive, respiratory, visual and olfactory systems.
Ancient genomes indicate population replacement in Early Neolithic Britain - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Abstract The roles of migration, admixture and acculturation in the European transition to farming have been debated for over 100 years. Genome-wide ancient DNA studies indicate predominantly Aegean ancestry for continental Neolithic farmers, but also variable admixture with local Mesolithic hunter-gatherers. Neolithic cultures first appear in Britain circa 4000 bc, a millennium after they appeared in adjacent areas of continental Europe.
Human evolution | Natural History Museum
Wanting to understand who we are, where we come from and how we evolved is part of what makes us human. This an exciting time to be examining human evolution. Intriguing fossil and archaeological discoveries, combined with innovative techniques and DNA research, are transforming scientists' understanding of our ancient past. We now know of more than 20 hominin species that are part of our family tree. At least half of these species are based on fossils unearthed in the last 30 years.
An early Aurignacian arrival in southwestern Europe
Abstract Westernmost Europe constitutes a key location in determining the timing of the replacement of Neanderthals by anatomically modern humans (AMHs). In this study, the replacement of late Mousterian industries by Aurignacian ones at the site of Bajondillo Cave (Málaga, southern Spain) is reported.
A stranger from Flores
When a new fossil is found it is often claimed that it will rewrite the anthropological textbooks. But in the case of an astonishing new discovery from Indonesia, this claim is fully justified. The conventional view of early human evolution is that the species Homo erectus was our first relative to spread out of Africa, some 2 million years ago. The spread that our cousin achieved is indicated by a 1.8-million-year-old, primitive form of H.
Who Were the First Americans?
Native Americans and the peoples of East Asia share features such as eye shape, hair form, details of tooth shape and significant parts of their DNA, so it has long been recognised that East Asia was probably the source of their ancestry.
How did Homo sapiens evolve?
Download and print this article for your personal scholarly, research, and educational use. Buy a single issue of Science for just $15 USD.
How did Homo sapiens evolve?
Over the past 30 years, understanding of Homo sapiens evolution has advanced greatly. Most research has supported the theory that modern humans had originated in Africa by about 200,000 years ago, but the latest findings reveal more complexity than anticipated. They confirm interbreeding between H. sapiens and other hominin species, provide evidence for H. sapiens in Morocco as early as 300,000 years ago, and reveal a seemingly incremental evolution of H. sapiens cranial shape.
Reconstructing the Neanderthal brain using computational anatomy - Scientific Reports
Abstract The present study attempted to reconstruct 3D brain shape of Neanderthals and early Homo sapiens based on computational neuroanatomy. We found that early Homo sapiens had relatively larger cerebellar hemispheres but a smaller occipital region in the cerebrum than Neanderthals long before the time that Neanderthals disappeared.
When did modern humans leave Africa?
The skeletal features of our species, Homo sapiens, include a globular braincase, brow ridges that are divided into central and side portions, a flat and retracted midface, a chin on the lower jaw, and a narrow pelvis. Fossils showing many of these characteristics have been excavated from the Ethiopian sites of Omo Kibish and Herto, dated at ∼195,000 and ∼160,000 years ago, respectively (1).
When did modern humans leave Africa?
The skeletal features of our species, Homo sapiens, include a globular braincase, brow ridges that are divided into central and side portions, a flat and retracted midface, a chin on the lower jaw, and a narrow pelvis. Fossils showing many of these characteristics have been excavated from the Ethiopian sites of Omo Kibish and Herto, dated at ?195,000 and ?160,000 years ago, respectively (1).
The origin and evolution of Homo sapiens
Log In with FacebookLog In with Google
Human migration: Climate and the peopling of the world
One of the most puzzling questions about the origins of modern humans has been why the dispersal of Homo sapiens out of Africa occurred so long after their first known appearance in east Africa approximately 150,000 to 200,000 years ago1.
Major transitions in human evolution
The word probably most associated with our evolutionary past is ‘origins'. The history of science is awash with books and papers in search of human origins, or the origins of the things that made us human—upright walking or language or culture. Seeking origins is looking for the beginnings of something, finding out why and when something that did not exist before did so afterwards.
The origin and evolution of Homo sapiens
1. Introduction: the big questions in modern human origins The first question which should be addressed in any discussion of the origin and evolution of Homo sapiens is which diagnosis of the species is going to be used. A paper using the classic multiregional concept of H.
Ontogeny of the maxilla in Neanderthals and their ancestors - Nature Communications
Abstract Neanderthals had large and projecting (prognathic) faces similar to those of their putative ancestors from Sima de los Huesos (SH) and different from the retracted modern human face. When such differences arose during development and the morphogenetic modifications involved are unknown.
The many mysteries of Homo naledi
Related research articles Berger LR, Hawks J, de Ruiter DJ, Churchill SE, Schmid P, Delezene LK, Kivell TL, Garvin HM, Williams SA, DeSilva JM, Skinner MM, Musiba CM, Cameron N, Holliday TW, Harcourt-Smith W, Ackermann RR, Bastir M, Bogin B, Bolter D, Brophy J, Cofran ZD, Congdon KA, Deane AS, Dembo M, Drapeau M, Elliott MC, Feuerriegel EM, Garcia-Martinez D, Green DJ, Gurtov A, Irish JD, Kruger A, Laird MF, Marchi D, Meyer MR, Nalla S, Negash EW, Orr CM, Radovcic D, Schroeder L, Scott JE,...
Pigments from the Middle Palaeolithic levels of Es-Skhul (Mount Carmel, Israel)
Before we can start your download, please take a moment to join our community of 23,870,873 academic researchers.
The Neanderthal face is not cold adapted
Before we can start your download, please take a moment to join our community of 23,766,622 academic researchers.
Show More
loading
Actions
Is this you?
As a journalist, you can create a free Muck Rack account to customize your profile, list your contact preferences, and upload a portfolio of your best work.Get in touch with Chris
Contact Chris, search articles and posts on X, monitor coverage, and track replies from one place.
Learn more about Muck Rack