DALI
Lo CATION
Terrace gravels of the Lohe river, near the village of
Jiefang, Dali county, Shaanxi, China.
DISCOVERY
Liu Shuntang and companions, March 1978.MATERIAL
Fairly complete but edentulous cranium; face crushed.DATING AND STRATIGRAPHIC CONTEXT
The fossil was recovered in Level 3 of the lower gravels
of the third terrace of the Lohe river, together with
fauna indicating a late Middle Pleistocene date (Wu,
1981; Wu and Wu, 1985). The hominid-yieding
sediments are of normal (Brunhes) polarity, and TL
analysis of an overlying layer produced a limiting
date of 71-41 Ka (Wang et al., 1979). More recent
U-series dating places Level 3 at 230-180 Ka.ARCHAEOLOGICAL CONTEXT
Level 3 yielded a quantity of rather nondescript Mid-
dle Paleolithic stone tools, mostly scrapers and other
retouched tools on small flakes of quartz, quartzite
and flint (Qu, 1985).PREVIOUS DESCRIPTIONS AND ANALYSES
The initial report on this specimen by Wang et al.
(1979) found it to be transitional between Homo erectusand Neanderthals, albeit closer to the former. In con-
trast, Wu (1981) considered it to represent “archaic
Homo sapiens,” a notion followed by most more recent
authors. Proponents of multiregional evolution for
some reason find the Dali hominid to be intermediate
between Homo erectus and modern Chinese (e.g.,
Wolpoff et al., 1984). Holloway (2000) quotes a cranial
capacity of 1120 ml.MORPHOLOGY
Description of interior and photographs of all sides
were not permitted. Basic description was done on a
cast, supplemented with some refinements possible
during a short viewing of the original.
Specimen is most of a cranium, missing large por-
tion of R occipitoparietotemporal region, area around
foramen magnum, both zygomatic arches, and entire
alveolar region. Neurocranium appears undistorted;
palatal region has been displaced upward and to the L.
Cranial bone moderately to very thick. Depression
(apparently evidence of healed wound) on posterior
portion of L parietal.
Braincase relatively long and low. In profile, very
short frontal dome sits quite close behind glabellar re-
gion; curves strongly back into a long, very flatly
curved plane that begins to curve more markedly only
behind region of asterion. This posterior curve runs
continuously across lambda into the relatively short,
vertical occipital plane. Nuchal plane almost flat, very
long; forms rounded quasi-right angle with occipital
plane. No distinct torus; only a rounded corner407