In December 1929, in a cave near Peking, a group of anthropologists and archaeologists that included a young French Jesuit priest named Pierre Teilhard de Chardin uncovered a pre-human skull. The find quickly became known around the world as Peking Man and was acclaimed as the missing link between erect hunting apes and our Cro-Magnon ancestors. It also became a provocative piece of evidence in the roiling debate over creationism versus evolution. For Teilhard, both a scientist and man of God, the discovery also exposed a deeply personal conflict between the new science and his faith. He was c... View More...
In the museums of Urumchi, the windswept regional capital of the Uyghur Autonomous Region in Western China -- what we know as Chinese Turkestan -- a collection of ancient mummies lay at the center of an enormous mystery. Some of Urumchi's mummies date back as far as 2,000 years -- contemporary to the famous Egyptian mummies, but even more beautifully preserved, especially their clothing. Surprisingly, these prehistoric people are not Oriental but Caucasian -- tall and large-nosed and blond with round eyes (probably blue). Where did they come from? What were these blonds doing in the foothills ... View More...
Reports on some notable archaeological finds of recent years. The author describes how today's archaeologists use science and technology to recapture the past, for instance, by studying ancient diets from bone collagen and reconstructing lost landscapes from fossilized seeds and grains. View More...
