Jia Lanpo (; November 25, 1908 in Yutian,

Hebei Hebei or , (; alternately Hopeh) is a northern province of China. Hebei is China's sixth most populous province, with over 75 million people. Shijiazhuang is the capital city. The province is 96% Han Chinese, 3% Manchu, 0.8% Hui, an ...

– July 8, 2001 in

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...

) was a Chinese

palaeoanthropologist 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 kinsh ...

, considered a founder of Chinese

anthropology Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavi ...

. He graduated from the Huiwen Academy in Beijing in 1929 and went on to work as a trainee at 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 ...

. In April 1931 he joined the excavations 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 ...

where fossils of

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 ...

were discovered in 1921 and where he worked with many of the most renowned figures in paleoanthropology of his era, including

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin Pierre Teilhard de Chardin ( (); 1 May 1881 – 10 April 1955) was a French Jesuit priest, scientist, paleontologist, theologian, philosopher and teacher. He was Darwinian in outlook and the author of several influential theological and phil ...

Henri Breuil Henri Édouard Prosper Breuil (28 February 1877 – 14 August 1961), often referred to as Abbé Breuil, was a French Catholic priest, archaeologist, anthropologist, ethnologist and geologist. He is noted for his studies of cave art in the Somme an ...

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 ...

Franz Weidenreich Franz Weidenreich (7 June 1873 – 11 July 1948) was a Jewish German anatomist and physical anthropology, physical anthropologist who studied evolution. Life and career Weidenreich studied at the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Universität in Strasbourg whe ...

and

Pei Wenzhong PEI or Pei may refer to: Places *Matecaña International Airport, Pereira, Colombia, IATA code PEI *Pei County (沛县), Jiangsu, China *Pei Commandery (沛郡), a commandery in Chinese history *Prince Edward Island, a province of Canada * Pei, ...

whom he replaced as the field director of the Zhoukoudian excavations in 1935. After the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, he served in many academic positions as well as working in the field, but he is most closely associated with the Chinese Academy of Sciences'

Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology The Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP; ) of China is a research institution and collections repository for fossils, including many dinosaur and pterosaur specimens (many from the Yixian Formation). As its name suggest ...

(IVPP) in Beijing where Jia played a pivotal role in opening up Chinese paleoanthropological research to foreign scientists beginning in the late 1970s. Jia was elected a Foreign Associate of the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1994. His cremated remains are interred behind the museum at the Zhoukoudian site alongside those of his colleagues,

and

Yang Zhongjian Yang Zhongjian, also Yang Chung-chien (; 1 June 1897 – 15 January 1979), courtesy name Keqiang (), also known as C.C. (Chung Chien) Young, was a Chinese paleontologist and zoologist. He was one of China's foremost vertebrate paleontologists. H ...

Selected bibliography

*''Early Man in China'' *''The Story of Peking Man''

References

External links

* "Jia Lanpo." In ''Biographical Dictionary of the History of Paleoanthropology''. Edited by Matthew R. Goodrum. (2016) available at https://drive.google.com/file/d/12wyqAVZlTkKlrFhAtRcyHqmVzK-ABx9k/view * https://archive.today/20110708145222/http://www.chineseprehistory.com/jia.htm 1908 births 2001 deaths Biologists from Hebei Chinese paleoanthropologists Foreign associates of the National Academy of Sciences Members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Paleontology in Hebei People from Tangshan {{China-scientist-stub