The Search for a lost relative

What ever happened to the “Missing Link?”

Travel to England has been a popular destination for many reasons. London with its glittering nightlife and its museums attracts large audiences…. enough to keep a visitor busy for weeks on end. Beyond London idyllic sites like the Cotswolds continue to draw hordes of visitors.

As illustrated by Fred Christensen the traveler is never far from ancient England and English archaeology.

But do you know the story of Her majesty’s hoax? The Nineteenth and early twentieth witnessed
a series of remarkable hominid fossil discoveries: Neanderthals, Java and Peking Man and others. Adherents of Charles Darwin’s Origin of the Species 1871 believed that the proof human evolution had become fact.

There was, however, a problem. Final proof required a bridge, a missing link, if you will, to complete the evidentiary chain of savage beast to CroMagnon.

Help was on its way. In 1912 an amateur archaeologist, Charles Dawson, announced his discovery of fossil remains of a human skull, jaw & teeth. Dawson dubbed his discovery “Piltdown Man “and England, momentarily basked in the honor of being home of the oldest hominid and possessing
the fossils of the one and only “Missing Link.”

The hoax of Piltdown Man, for a fake it was, wasn’t disclosed until 1953 fifteen years after the Death of Dawson. As for the malefactor? That name remains lost in time…as does the Missing Link.
For more about this tale lies and deception watch the Nova documentary The Boldest Hoax.

The hoax of Piltdown Man, for a fake it was, wasn’t disclosed until 1953 fifteen years after the Death of Dawson. As for the malefactor? That name remains lost in time…as does the Missing Link. For more about this tale lies and deception watch the Nova documentary The Boldest Hoax.