Natural History Museum of Denmark, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
International Research Affiliate, Institute of Human Origins, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, USA.
Evol Anthropol. 2021 Sep;30(5):298-306. doi: 10.1002/evan.21917. Epub 2021 Aug 2.
The announcement of a fossilized child's skull discovered in a quarry in 1924 sub-Saharan Africa might not have seemed destined to be a classic paper. This contribution focuses on anatomist Raymond Dart's 1925 paper in which he designated the Taungs skull the type specimen of Australopithecus africanus. We combine an account of Dart's training and experience, with a telling of the fossil's discovery, analysis, the initial response of a mostly skeptical community, and a review of subsequent discoveries that consolidated the case Dart made for a hitherto unknown human close relative. Dart's paper presented evidence that confirmed the prescience of Charles Darwin's prediction that Africa was the birthplace of modern humans. The Taungs skull's unique mix of great ape and human attributes eventually led to a paradigm shift in our understanding of human evolution.
1924 年，在撒哈拉以南非洲的一个采石场发现了一个儿童的头骨化石，这个消息的宣布可能并不注定成为一篇经典论文。这篇论文主要关注解剖学家雷蒙德·达特（Raymond Dart）在 1925 年发表的一篇论文，他在该论文中将汤恩头骨（Taungs skull）指定为南方古猿非洲种（Australopithecus africanus）的模式标本。我们结合了达特的培训和经验，讲述了化石的发现、分析、最初引起的主要是持怀疑态度的科学界的反应，以及随后的发现的回顾，这些发现巩固了达特提出的一个迄今未知的人类近亲的案例。达特的论文提供了证据，证实了查尔斯·达尔文（Charles Darwin）的预言，即非洲是现代人的发源地。汤恩头骨具有独特的大猩猩和人类特征的混合体，最终导致了我们对人类进化的理解发生了范式转变。
