关键词: 湖北; 步氏巨猿; 龋齿病

Abstract: The material all together consists of 297 isolated postcanine teeth of Gigantopithecus blacki, which were collected from the west part of Hubei province of China. According to the mammal fossils associated with the Gigantopithecus, the geological age of Gigantopithecus seems to belong to the early Pleistocene. It is very interesting to note that those Gigantopithecus teeth from Hubei province show very high incidence of caries.
Caries are diagnosed by the presence of marked pits or cavities. Among 297 teeth (molars and premolars), there are 52 cases of authentic caries (i.e. 19.5 %). It is a rather high incidence, much higher than that of early hominids such as australopithecines (1 % or so), ancient Chinese from Shang Dynasty (4.3 %), also higher than that of Gigantopithecus teeth from Guangxi province (9.8 %) of China. Among the Gigantopithecus teeth from Hubei, we found that the incidence of dental caries increases from the young-age group (4.9 %) to middle and old age group (29.3 % and 27.1 %), and that the large type presents higher incidence (22.5 -32.8 %) than small one (8.3 -11.4 %). The differentiation of large and small types seems to show sex difference. The caries of Gigantopithecus from Hubei occur on both the mesio-distal surface (65.4 %) and occusal surface (36.5 %). It is quite different from that of Gigantopithecus from Guangxi, majority of caries in Guangxi material occur on the occlusal surface and very few on the mesio-distal surface.
The high incidence of dental caries in Gigantopithecus is probably due to a diet deficient. Giantoipithecus probably mainly lived on high carbohydrate-containing plant food while it was becoming extinct.

Key words: Gigantopithecus blacki; Hubei Province; Caries