FOSSILS ATTRIBUTED TO GENUS HOMO: SOME GENERAL NoTEs 593
comfortable morphological fit with the Trinilhangi-
ran materials, or even with any of the Kenyan fossils
just discussed, although it may be a match for the
newly described Daka lLHomo erectus” cranium from
Ethiopia.
It is tantalizing that, although we have a clear
indication of morphological diversity in the east
African record, the lack of definitive association
among cranial and mandibular elements in this as-
semblage leaves us with an incomplete picture.
Nonetheless, it is clear that all of the morphologies
enumerated above will need to be addressed in fu-
ture studies; and it will be hard to do this if all of
these specimens are brushed, together with the en-
tire spectrum of Indonesian hominids, under the en-
compassing rug of erectus/ergaster. Once again, the
matter of potential taxic diversity will inevitably
have to be broached, beyond questions of pure mor-
phology.
Before leaving this group, we should note that
the two recently described crania from Dmanisi,
Georgia, have been closely compared to Homo
ergaster from Kenya by Gabunia et al. (2000)) while
the original mandible from the site was referred to
Homo erectus (Gabunia and Vekua, 1995). These
Dmanisi materials together make an extremely in-
teresting assemblage, not least for its heterogeneity,
which has been yet further enlarged (extremely in-
terestingly!) by more recent discoveries. For it is
hard to match the published lower jaw with either
of the crania on the grounds of size or shape, while
the two crania themselves show mutual differences
on the order of those that separate KNM-ER 3733
and 3883. Furthermore, the lower jaw is clearly not
Homo ergaster as represented by the type specimen
KNM-ER 992, and neither does it fit with Homo
erectus material from Java (Schwartz, 2000). As
pointed out by their describers, the two crania show
substantial morphological differences from each
other in the supraorbital, mastoid, and nuchal re-
gions, as well as in their various profiles (Gabunia
et al., 2000). The degree of such distinctions may
well suggest taxic difference (Schwartz, 2000).
Whatever the eventual consensus on the affinities of
these important fossils, these distinctions are factors
that will need to be considered in arriving at it.
Interestingly, a third cranium from Dmanisi,
announced just as this volume goes to press, ap-
parently bears a broad resemblance to the 1813/
15000 Morph.
EXTINCT EUROPEAN HOMO AND
POTENTIAL RELATIVESThe post-Dmanisi European record of fossil ho-
minids-already substantial-has expanded gratify-
ingly in recent years, both in numbers of fossils and in
the time period represented. It is now time to consider
this enlarged record in terms of the radiation of an
indigenous European hominid clade.VERY EARLY EUROPEAN HOMINID FOSSILS
It was thought until quite recently that hominids
might not have penetrated Europe until about 500
Ka, a point in time represented by the type mandible
of Homo heidelbergensis from Mauer, Germany. Poten-
tial earlier hominid occurrences in the subcontinent
back to ca. 1 Ma or even 2.4 Ma were (and are) be-
deviled by questionable dating or by uncertain identi-
fication of artifacts and fossils. New finds in Spain
and Italy have, however, now pushed unquestioned
European hominid fossils back to about 800 Ka, no-
tably in the guise of Homo antecessor from the Gran
Dolina site at Atapuerca in Spain, and the Ceprano
calvaria from Italy. Homo antecessor remains dentally
quite primitive; and it has been argued by Bermudez
de Castro et al. (1997), on the basis of midfacial
morphology, that this form may have been ancestral to
both Neanderthals and Homo sapiens. However, to
demonstrate this conclusively would require that H.
antecessor be shown to constitute the primitive sister of
a Neanderthal-sapiens clade that is united by demon-
strable synapomorphies. This primitive species could
obviously not have possessed autapomorphies of its
own. These conditions are hard to fulfill on the basis
of the available fragmentary evidence. For example,
the one (juvenile) H. antecessor midfacial specimen
known already has huge frontal sinuses, which would
rule it out of the ancestry of both Homo sapiens and
Homo neanderthalensis (if not of Homo heidelbergensis).
Moreover, among other features of H. antecessor in-
voked by Bermudez de Castro et al. (1997) as resem-
bling Homo sapiens, is an upwardly arcing inferior
margin of the anterior root of the zygomatic arch that
is delineated laterally by a blunt maxillary tuberosity.
However, while this conformation is indeed seen in
Homo sapiens, it is also present in various Chinese
specimens from Zhoukoudian Lower Cave and, to