Forbidden Archeology_ The Full Unabridged Edition - Michael A. Cremo [384]
Binford and Ho’s theory that the ash deposits are composed mostly of bird droppings has not received unanimous support. But their assertions about the unreliability of the common picture of Peking man drawn from the presence of bones, ashes, and hominid remains at the site are worthy of serious consideration.
For Binford and Ho, the presence of hominid bones in the caves was not a demonstration that Peking man ever permanently lived there. They gave the following information about the Peking man fossils: “It is not uncommon to find hominid remains in direct association with hyena coprolites and adjacent to cave walls, where larger bones tend to end up in animal dens. Smaller hominid bones, such as isolated teeth, already broken cranial fragments, and mandible parts, are more common in contexts that appear to represent areas near the entrances of the cave. The picture one obtains is one in which hominid carcasses or parts thereof were introduced to the active, entrance area of the cave. It is unclear whether hominids died there or parts of hominid carcasses were brought there by scavenging animals. The extreme bias in body parts [mostly skulls and lower limb bones] would favor the latter interpretation. These parts were then further dispersed within the cave, most likely by bone-carrying animals such as hyena or wolf ” (Binford and Ho 1985, p. 428).
The presence of stone tools at Choukoutien is generally taken as confirmation of a picture of Sinanthropus as a hunter sitting around his hearth cutting up deer carcasses. But Binford and Ho felt that the kind of tools found at Choukoutien, mostly primitive scrapers and choppers, were not very well adapted to hunting. Furthermore, they pointed out: “Layers that yield hominid remains only rarely produce stone tools and almost never are they designated as ash layers. In addition, excavations conducted in areas that would have been deep in the interior of the cave, beyond the limits of natural light, may yield hominid remains but only rarely yield tools in any concentration” (Binford and Ho 1985, p. 428). In other words, there is no clear connection between the stone tools and the hominid remains.
The most that can be said of Peking man, if we confine ourselves to the actual evidence at the site, is that he was perhaps a scavenger who may or may not have used primitive stone tools to cut meat from carcasses left by carnivores in a large cave where organic materials sometimes burned for long periods. Or perhaps Peking man was himself prey to the cave’s carnivores, for it seems unlikely he would have voluntarily entered such a cave, even to scavenge.
Binford and Ho did not believe there existed a bone tool industry at Choukoutien. They said Breuil’s recognition of a bone tool industry was founded on “modifications that today we routinely recognize as the by-product of animal gnawing” (Binford and Ho 1985, p. 428).
In making this judgement, Binford and Ho were in agreement with the original assessment made by the members of the Cenozoic Research Laboratory. Black, Teilhard de Chardin, Young (Yang), and Pei (1933, p. 130) believed that the recurring types of broken bones, which Breuil said had been shaped intentionally, may have been shaped by purely accidental forces. They believed, however, that further research would be required before this issue could be definitely resolved.
But a modern authority, Jia Lanpo of the Republic of China’s Institute for Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, reported, like Breuil, numerous tools shaped from deer bones (Jia 1975, p. 31). Jia believed deer antler roots may have served as hammers. Antler tines showing criss-crossed scratches may have been used for digging, and deer skullcaps may have been used as drinking bowls. “Antlers are hard to hack off,” stated Jia (1980, p. 29), “but if a spot is first scorched, the cutting is much easier, and this was what Peking man did, for some of the ends bear signs of