100,000 Year Old Skull Unearthed in China
A human skull fossil, nearly intact (16 separate pieces in total, plus the forehead), and at least 100,000 years old has been dug up in China in a near miss find.
Archaeologists working in digs in the Chinese province of Henan were getting ready to close shop in the town of Xuchang after two years of rooting around in the dirt there.
"We expect more discoveries of importance," stated Li Zhanyang, an archaeologist with the Henan Cultural Relics and Archaeology Research Institute. "More astonishing than the completeness of the skull is that it still has a fossilized membrane on the inner side, so scientists can track the nerves of the Paleolithic ancestors."
Many are hailing this as the greatest find since the 1920's discovery of the prehistoric Peking Man, who lived upwards of 400,000 years ago.