关键词: 20世纪;展望;中国;人类古生物学

Abstract: 1 Changes o f the position of Chinese fossils in the early history of hominid
Sinanthropus pekinensis had been one of the earliest hominids from 1931 through 1959. In 1931 the artefacts unearthed from Sinanthropus site were admited by Breuil, the authority of the Paleolithic study. In 1959, the discovery of Zinjanthropus and associated artefacts made the historical record o f man-made tool extended to 1. 75M a.
Gigantopithecus had been suggested as the ancestor o f Pithecanthropus erectus and Sina nthropus pekinensis in 1940s by F. Weidenreich. But this proposal has not been commonly accepted in paleoanthropological circle.
In 1965, Simons and Pilbeam proposed the Ramapithecus belonging to hominid and five teeth of Dryopithecus found in 1956 at Kaiyuan, Yunnan, southwestern China were included in the circle of earliest hominid. So China became one of the candidate areas of human cradle. Since 1975 many Ramapithecus fossils including 5 skulls and other pieces of bone have been unearthed from Lufeng , Yunnan. The importance of Chinese fossils in the study of human origin increased. In 1980s, Lufengpithecus was excluded from the human circle, Chinese fossils are no longer considered as a part of human earliest ancestor.
2 Earliest human in China
Sinanthropus is the first one acting as the earliest human in China. In 1964 Gongwangling Homo erectus skull-cap replaced Homo erectus pekinensis fossils as the earliest ancestor in China. In 1965, Yuanmou incisors took this prominent position. Yuanmou is dated by paleomagnetism as of 1. 7M a. A new ESR date of 1. 6 ( LU) — 1. 1 ( EU) Ma w as published recently. By the way, the Longgupo mandible is of an ape, the provenience of the incisor is problematic, so far this site has not yielded any early Pleistocene hominid fossil. Recent discovery of stone and bony artefacts of probably 2Ma from Fanchang , Anhui province is the indirect indicator of the existence of humans in so early period in China.
3 Outline of human evolution in China
3. 1 Consideration at the intercontinental level— Continuous evolution with hybridization Totally more than 60 sites yielding human fossils have been found in China. There are a series of common morphological features shown among these fossils. Between the Homo erectus and Homo sapiens fossils found in China there is mosaic of morphological features which indicates that between these chrono-species the change is transitional. No clear-cut morphological demarcation line could be drawn between them. Among Chinese human fossils there are a few specimens with morphological features inharmonious with other fossils found in China. This phenomenon indicates the result of gene flow from Western world. The inharmonious features are very few so the gene flow is not strong. Therefore the scenario in China is continous evolution with hybridization. This is also supported by the evidence from paleolithic archeology and mammalian faunas. Evidence from all of these aspects strongly supports the Maltiregional Evolution Hypothesis for the origin of modern humans which has different submodels in different regions. e. g. continuity might exist in less extent in Europe than in East Asia.
Comparisons between the fossils from China and those from areas east and south to China indicate that there are communications among the populations of these areas during late Pleistocene.
3. 2 Consideration at the interpopulational level in China— — There are distinct interpopulational differences between different small regions
There are distinct differences between the recent human populations o f North and South China. The difference could be roughly in certain extent traced to Neolithic and late Paleolithic stage. There is no evidence showing that it could be extended to archaic Homo sapiens and Homo erectus. There are distinct interpopulational differences in the latter two stages. These differences might be only the interpopulational difference instead of representing the difference between North and South China.
3. 3 Human evolution in China could be likened to a river network
In the mind o f the present author the human evolution in China could be likened to neither a ladder nor a bush. Species multiplicity of hominid in Plio /Pleistocene could not be extended into early and middle Pleistocene at least in the case of China, because after the appearance of man-made tools the communication between human populations became increasing so that the possibility of formation of new species by isolation was prevented. But there were still distinct intra-species and interpopulational differences in hominid. The ability to resist disaster and diseases of ancient humans was rather low , extinction of small populations could happen. So the human evolution in China could be likened to a river network. There are branches of the river, some branches could be blind ( corresponding to extinction of local populations) , some branches could unite and receive small branches from other river network ( samll amount of immigrants from outside China ). Some could flow to other river( human migration to other area) . In ordinary river the increase of water volume in the lower reach is due to receiving many branches, in human evolution of China the expansion of the population in later time is mainly due to reproduction of the populations in China themselves. The contribution from the immigrants is very samll. Besides, the extinction of some small local populations might be followed by replacement in certain small areas. So the scenario includes continuous evolution with extinction of some small local populations and replacement of them by other populations in certain areas as well as supplementary hybridization with the immigrants from other areas. In short, the continuity is the main process, others are the subsidiary.

Key words: 20th century, Prospect, Human paleontology, China