Franz Weidenreich (7 June 1873 – 11 July 1948) was a Jewish German
anatomist
Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having its ...
and
physical anthropologist
Biological anthropology, also known as physical anthropology, is a scientific discipline concerned with the biological and behavioral aspects of human beings, their extinct hominin ancestors, and related non-human primates, particularly from an e ...
who studied
evolution
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
.
Life and career
Weidenreich studied at the
Kaiser-Wilhelm-Universität in
Strasbourg
Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...
where he earned a medical degree in 1899. From 1921 to 1924 he served as a Professor of anthropology at the
University of Heidelberg
}
Heidelberg University, officially the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg, (german: Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg; la, Universitas Ruperto Carola Heidelbergensis) is a public research university in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, ...
and was a visiting professor at the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
in 1934. In 1935 he succeeded
Canadian
Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...
paleoanthropologist
Paleoanthropology or paleo-anthropology is a branch of paleontology and anthropology which seeks to understand the early development of anatomically modern humans, a process known as hominization, through the reconstruction of evolutionary kinship ...
Davidson Black
Davidson Black, FRS (July 25, 1884 – March 15, 1934) was a Canadian paleoanthropologist, best known for his naming of ''Sinanthropus pekinensis'' (now ''Homo erectus pekinensis''). He was Chairman of the Geological Survey of China and a ...
as honorary director of the
Cenozoic Research Laboratory The Cenozoic Research Laboratory () of the Geological Survey of China was established within the Peking Union Medical College in 1928 by Canadian paleoanthropologist Davidson Black and Chinese geologists Ding Wenjing and Weng Wenhao for the rese ...
of the
Geological Survey of China
The China Geological Survey (CGS) () is a government-owned, not-for-profit, Chinese organization researching China's mineral resources. It is a public institution managed by the State Council’s ministries and commissions responsible for geologi ...
. Weidenreich was among the scientists to claim that
Piltdown Man
The Piltdown Man was a paleoanthropological fraud in which bone fragments were presented as the fossilised remains of a previously unknown early human. Although there were doubts about its authenticity virtually from the beginning, the remains ...
was a "chimera", a composite between two unrelated species, long before
fluoride
Fluoride (). According to this source, is a possible pronunciation in British English. is an inorganic, monatomic anion of fluorine, with the chemical formula (also written ), whose salts are typically white or colorless. Fluoride salts typ ...
analyses proved that Piltdown Man was a
hoax
A hoax is a widely publicized falsehood so fashioned as to invite reflexive, unthinking acceptance by the greatest number of people of the most varied social identities and of the highest possible social pretensions to gull its victims into pu ...
. Weidenreich also renamed ''
Gigantopithecus
''Gigantopithecus'' ( ; ) is an extinct genus of ape from roughly 2 million to 350,000 years ago during the Early Pleistocene, Early to Middle Pleistocene of southern China, represented by one species, ''Gigantopithecus blacki''. Potential identi ...
blacki'' to ''Giganthropus blacki'', based on a theory that primitive forms of man were much larger than the more recent ones. However, as this theory is contradictory to the
Cope-Depéret rule
Cope's rule, named after American paleontologist Edward Drinker Cope, postulates that population lineages tend to increase in body size over evolutionary time. It was never actually stated by Cope, although he favoured the occurrence of linear e ...
(which states that in straight evolution lines of non-flying animals the size of species increases, not the other way round), it was rejected by Professor Dr.
von Koenigswald when he returned from the Japanese concentration camp after the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
.
As honorary director of the Cenozoic Research Laboratory he also studied fossils of the
Peking Man
Peking Man (''Homo erectus pekinensis'') is a subspecies of ''Homo erectus, H. erectus'' which inhabited the Zhoukoudian Cave of northern China during the Middle Pleistocene. The first fossil, a tooth, was discovered in 1921, and the Zhoukoudi ...
, then known as ''Sinanthropus pekinensis'', unearthed at
Zhoukoudian
Zhoukoudian Area () is a town and an area located on the east Fangshan District, Beijing, China. It borders Nanjiao and Fozizhuang Townships to its north, Xiangyang, Chengguan and Yingfeng Subdistricts to its east, Shilou and Hangcunhe Towns to ...
, China. Weidenreich originated the "Weidenreich Theory of Human Evolution" based on his examination of Peking Man. Being an anatomist, Weidenreich observed numerous anatomical characteristics that Peking Man had in common with modern
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of va ...
, this led to his Polycentric evolution model of human origins.
Peter H. Wyden, American journalist and writer, was one of his nephews and U.S. Senator
Ron Wyden
Ronald Lee Wyden (; born May 3, 1949) is an American politician and retired educator serving as the Seniority in the United States Senate, senior United States Senate, United States senator from Oregon, a seat he has held since 1996 United Stat ...
is a grandnephew.
Polycentric evolution
Weidenreich pioneered the Polycentric (
multiregional) hypothesis, which proposed that human populations have evolved independently in the
Old World
The "Old World" is a term for Afro-Eurasia that originated in Europe , after Europeans became aware of the existence of the Americas. It is used to contrast the continents of Africa, Europe, and Asia, which were previously thought of by the ...
from ''
Homo erectus
''Homo erectus'' (; meaning "upright man") is an extinct species of archaic human from the Pleistocene, with its earliest occurrence about 2 million years ago. Several human species, such as '' H. heidelbergensis'' and '' H. antecessor' ...
'' to
''Homo sapiens sapiens'', while at the same time there was
gene flow
In population genetics, gene flow (also known as gene migration or geneflow and allele flow) is the transfer of genetic material from one population to another. If the rate of gene flow is high enough, then two populations will have equivalent a ...
between the various populations.
A vocal proponent of the Weidenreich Theory was
Carleton Coon
Carleton Stevens Coon (June 23, 1904 – June 3, 1981) was an American anthropologist. A professor of anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, lecturer and professor at Harvard University, he was president of the American Association of ...
; however, Coon modified Weidenreich's Polycentric view of evolution, since he stressed far less on gene flow.
[Multiregional Evolution, R. B. Eckhardt, M. H. Wolpoff, A. G. Thorne, Science, New Series, Vol. 262, No. 5136 (Nov. 12, 1993), pp. 973-974.]
References
Further reading
*
External links
Franz Weidenreich and ''Gigantopithecus''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Weidenreich, Franz
1873 births
1948 deaths
People from Edenkoben
19th-century German Jews
German anthropologists
German anatomists
German paleoanthropologists
Human evolution theorists
University of Strasbourg alumni
University of Strasbourg faculty
Jewish Chinese history
German expatriates in China
People from the Palatinate (region)