William Diller Matthew FRS (February 19, 1871 – September 24, 1930) was a vertebrate paleontologist who worked primarily on

mammal Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur or ...

fossils A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved in ...

, although he also published a few early papers on mineralogy, petrological geology, one on botany, one on

trilobites Trilobites (; meaning "three lobes") are extinct marine arthropods that form the class Trilobita. Trilobites form one of the earliest-known groups of arthropods. The first appearance of trilobites in the fossil record defines the base of the At ...

, and he described '' Tetraceratops insignis'', which was much later suggested to be the oldest known (

Early Permian 01 or '01 may refer to: * The year 2001, or any year ending with 01 * The month of January * 1 (number) Music * '01 (Richard Müller album), 01'' (Richard Müller album), 2001 * 01 (Son of Dave album), ''01'' (Son of Dave album), 2000 * 01 (Urban ...

) therapsid. Matthew was born in Saint John, New Brunswick, the son of

George Frederic Matthew George Frederick Matthew (August 12, 1837 – April 14, 1923) was a Canadian botanist and geologist. Described as an amateur geologist, he is nevertheless recognized for his work in the then-nascent field of ichnology. His work grew from study of ...

and Katherine (Diller) Matthew. His father was an amateur geologist and paleontologist who instilled his son with an abiding interest in the earth sciences. Matthew received an A.B. at the University of New Brunswick in 1889 and then earned his Ph.D. at Columbia University in 1894. Matthew was curator of the

American Museum of Natural History The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...

from the mid-1890s to 1927, and director of the University of California Museum of Paleontology from 1927 to 1930. He was the father of Margaret Matthew, a noted artist, illustrator, and sculptor who specialized in visualizing extinct species.

Asia hypothesis

Matthew believed that the first humans had originated in Asia, he visited Asia by taking part in the Central Asiatic expeditions. Matthew was also well known for his deeply influential 1915 article "Climate and evolution", Matthews theory was that climate change was how organisms came to live where we find them today in opposition to the theory of continental drift. His basic premise was that cyclical changes in global climate along with the prevailing tendency for mammals to disperse from north to south account for the odd geographic patterns of living mammals, he believed that humans and many other groups of modern mammals first evolved in the northern areas of the globe, especially central Asia because of the shifting climatic circumstances, Matthew firmly placed

hominid The Hominidae (), whose members are known as the great apes or hominids (), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: '' Pongo'' (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); ''Gorilla'' (the east ...

origins in central Asia as he thought that the high plateau of Tibet was the forcing ground of mammalian evolution.

Selected works

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References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Matthew, William Diller 1871 births 1930 deaths Canadian paleontologists People associated with the American Museum of Natural History Canadian Fellows of the Royal Society University of New Brunswick alumni Columbia University alumni Paleontology in New Brunswick