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Seven Skeletons: The Evolution of the World's Most Famous Human Fossils
An irresistible journey of discovery, science, history, and myth making, told through the lives and afterlives of seven famous human ancestors
Over the last century, the search for human ancestors has spanned four continents and resulted in the discovery of hundreds of fossils. While most of these discoveries live quietly in museum collections, there are a few that have become world-renowned celebrity personas—ambassadors of science that speak to public audiences. In Seven Skeletons, historian of science Lydia Pyne explores how seven such famous fossils of our ancestors have the social cachet they enjoy today.
Drawing from archives, museums, and interviews, Pyne builds a cultural history for each celebrity fossil—from its discovery to its afterlife in museum exhibits to its legacy in popular culture. These seven include the three-foot tall “hobbit” from Flores, the Neanderthal of La Chapelle, the Taung Child, the Piltdown Man hoax, Peking Man, Australopithecus sediba, and Lucy—each embraced and celebrated by generations, and vivid examples of how discoveries of how our ancestors have been received, remembered, and immortalized.
With wit and insight, Pyne brings to life each fossil, and how it is described, put on display, and shared among scientific communities and the broader public. This fascinating, endlessly entertaining book puts the impact of paleoanthropology into new context, a reminder of how our past as a species continues to affect, in astounding ways, our present culture and imagination.
Over the last century, the search for human ancestors has spanned four continents and resulted in the discovery of hundreds of fossils. While most of these discoveries live quietly in museum collections, there are a few that have become world-renowned celebrity personas—ambassadors of science that speak to public audiences. In Seven Skeletons, historian of science Lydia Pyne explores how seven such famous fossils of our ancestors have the social cachet they enjoy today.
Drawing from archives, museums, and interviews, Pyne builds a cultural history for each celebrity fossil—from its discovery to its afterlife in museum exhibits to its legacy in popular culture. These seven include the three-foot tall “hobbit” from Flores, the Neanderthal of La Chapelle, the Taung Child, the Piltdown Man hoax, Peking Man, Australopithecus sediba, and Lucy—each embraced and celebrated by generations, and vivid examples of how discoveries of how our ancestors have been received, remembered, and immortalized.
With wit and insight, Pyne brings to life each fossil, and how it is described, put on display, and shared among scientific communities and the broader public. This fascinating, endlessly entertaining book puts the impact of paleoanthropology into new context, a reminder of how our past as a species continues to affect, in astounding ways, our present culture and imagination.
276 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2016
56 people are currently reading
1493 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 117 reviews
January 5, 2017
3.5 rating. Fascinating look into 6 fossil studies and the history/science behind them. It also covers the controversy surrounding the discovery of Sediba.
Love this subject matter and it was informative - and I really enjoyed the chapter on the Peking man-just at times, I felt it was a little dull.
Love this subject matter and it was informative - and I really enjoyed the chapter on the Peking man-just at times, I felt it was a little dull.
July 15, 2022
The Old Man, Piltdown, Taung Child, Peking Man, Lucy, Flo, and Sediba; Anthropological icons. Through textbooks and lectures, and the occasional article in National Geographic, I thought I had a grip on their scientific significance and place in human prehistory. 'Turns out, I had only an inkling of their socio-political importance and knew almost nothing of their textured and fascinating provenance. I was captivated by Dr. Pyne's obvious enthusiasm and love of the material, so much so that I picked up the audiobook to relive the stories again as I travel.
February 27, 2017
An interesting exploration of the reasons that certain paleo-human fossils achieve the status of icons in popular culture. What makes a fossil catch the interest of everyday people? Firsts are always attention grabbing, as are remains which include skulls or very complete skeletons. A good nickname or discovery story helps too (see Lucy, Australopithecus afarensis). And you can’t beat good old-fashioned controversy either!
When controversy is one of the requirements, it becomes obvious why the author chose Piltdown Man, the English fake, as one of her iconic fossils! Talk about controversial—and people continue to speculate today about who all was in on the hoax and who got fooled. Humans are attracted to good stories, especially mysteries, so I guess Piltdown deserves this position.
Also interesting was the choice of Peking Man, where the actual fossils were lost in the swirling turmoil of WW2 in China. Only casts of the major fossils remain, but once again there is a very noir mystery surrounding the fate of the real McCoy. The mystery is like catnip to puzzle-solving people and the search for the original fossils continues.
I was most interested in the final two chapters, concerning the Flores Island “Hobbit” and Australopithecus sediba. The first I was only familiar with through the original news announcements and the second was unknown to me. I’m not sure that we could label either of them “iconic” just yet, but there is certainly potential.
Interestingly absent were any of the Leakey family’s discoveries, as was any discussion of the personal rivalries between Richard Leakey and Donald Johanson (Lucy’s discoverer). Hearteningly present was the open attitude of the paleoanthropologists who are sharing their data on Australopithecus sediba—instead of hoarding the fossil and the data, they are opening the doors to any researcher with an interest and showing a new, inclusive way of doing paleoanthropological research which gives me great hope for the future.
When controversy is one of the requirements, it becomes obvious why the author chose Piltdown Man, the English fake, as one of her iconic fossils! Talk about controversial—and people continue to speculate today about who all was in on the hoax and who got fooled. Humans are attracted to good stories, especially mysteries, so I guess Piltdown deserves this position.
Also interesting was the choice of Peking Man, where the actual fossils were lost in the swirling turmoil of WW2 in China. Only casts of the major fossils remain, but once again there is a very noir mystery surrounding the fate of the real McCoy. The mystery is like catnip to puzzle-solving people and the search for the original fossils continues.
I was most interested in the final two chapters, concerning the Flores Island “Hobbit” and Australopithecus sediba. The first I was only familiar with through the original news announcements and the second was unknown to me. I’m not sure that we could label either of them “iconic” just yet, but there is certainly potential.
Interestingly absent were any of the Leakey family’s discoveries, as was any discussion of the personal rivalries between Richard Leakey and Donald Johanson (Lucy’s discoverer). Hearteningly present was the open attitude of the paleoanthropologists who are sharing their data on Australopithecus sediba—instead of hoarding the fossil and the data, they are opening the doors to any researcher with an interest and showing a new, inclusive way of doing paleoanthropological research which gives me great hope for the future.
January 21, 2020
Aside from its frequent sociological digressions, this book is worth reading for those with an interest in human evolution and the hominin ancestors that led to us. There is a chapter on each of seven major fossils, explaining how they were discovered, by whom, what scientific questions were answered, and what new questions arose from them. There is also a discussion about the implications of naming fossils and what it means for how they are presented and understood.
The book is at its best as it discusses the discoveries and their discoverers, the slow and painstaking process of preparing, analyzing, and publishing results, and the scientific debates that follow. After presenting the science, each chapter goes into the social and cultural aspects of fossils, how we create narratives that allow us to see them as ancestors with human-like traits on the way to modern man. “All objects – overtly scientific or not – act as cultural signs and symbols that tap into our senses and transfer information from objects to us, communicating the intended meaning wrapped up in those objects.” (p. 178)
This is a valid point, but it gets repeated in slightly different forms in every chapter, again and again. For that reason parts of the book start to sound like inside baseball, of interest primarily to museum curators and paleontology students. At one point the author spends pages describing the negotiations and logistical preparations required to bring the original Lucy fossils to the United States in 2007, and I found myself wondering why she included it.
There is, however, one interesting conclusion that comes out of the discussion of the Lucy fossil tour, but it is made by implication. Many of the top museums in the US, such as the Smithsonian, declined to host the exhibit in order to show their disapproval at having the actual fossils themselves on display, and thereby taking the risk that they might be damaged or lost. This is a valid concern, but it also says something about the mindset of professional paleontologists: they don’t want the great unwashed masses anywhere near their priceless, irreplaceable fossils. The implication of this is that if you are looking at old bones in a public museum gallery which hosts mobs of careless, rambunctious kids and bored, vandalous teenagers, if those bones have any scientific value you are probably looking at replicas, painted casts of the originals rather than the bones themselves.
At only about 240 pages this is a quick read, and there is good information about human ancestors. It is remarkable how much can be reconstructed from a few bits of bone and teeth, about their place in the family of man, their gait, their diet, their hunting and gathering techniques, and even some things about their social lives. However, the book also spends too much time navel gazing about “the evidence used to talk about ‘how to know’ about the species [which] reflects our cultural backgrounds and assumptions as well. How we talk about the species and how we name it conveys how we ground that scientific discovery within our own cultures.” (p. 205-6) Okay, fine, I get it, you don’t have to tell me a dozen times.
Assigning the fossils to Homo rather than Australopithecus offers a different narrative about hominin mobility and dispersal in the Pleistocene. Assigning the species to Homo erectus would have had a different implications for how much variation was acceptable with a single species. A completely new genus and species name would have meant that the fossils’ morphology was so different that there wasn’t an evolutionary narrative thread that could offer continuity between previous discoveries and the Flores discovery. (p. 195-6)One of the chapters covers the Piltdown Man hoax, included not for its usefulness to science but what it says about the scientific process and how and why certain artifacts get incorporated into the accepted narrative of human evolution. At the time of the “discovery” in 1912 the general consensus was that human evolution began with an enlarged brain, and that is what Piltdown appeared to show: a large cranium with an ape-like jaw. Although some scientists had doubts from the beginning, it was not until 1953 that the bones were conclusively shown to be fakes. During that time they exerted a baneful influence on paleoanthropology, so that actual hominin fossils, which showed upright postures and bipedal locomotion in creatures with small brains, were dismissed as part of the ape family.
The book is at its best as it discusses the discoveries and their discoverers, the slow and painstaking process of preparing, analyzing, and publishing results, and the scientific debates that follow. After presenting the science, each chapter goes into the social and cultural aspects of fossils, how we create narratives that allow us to see them as ancestors with human-like traits on the way to modern man. “All objects – overtly scientific or not – act as cultural signs and symbols that tap into our senses and transfer information from objects to us, communicating the intended meaning wrapped up in those objects.” (p. 178)
This is a valid point, but it gets repeated in slightly different forms in every chapter, again and again. For that reason parts of the book start to sound like inside baseball, of interest primarily to museum curators and paleontology students. At one point the author spends pages describing the negotiations and logistical preparations required to bring the original Lucy fossils to the United States in 2007, and I found myself wondering why she included it.
There is, however, one interesting conclusion that comes out of the discussion of the Lucy fossil tour, but it is made by implication. Many of the top museums in the US, such as the Smithsonian, declined to host the exhibit in order to show their disapproval at having the actual fossils themselves on display, and thereby taking the risk that they might be damaged or lost. This is a valid concern, but it also says something about the mindset of professional paleontologists: they don’t want the great unwashed masses anywhere near their priceless, irreplaceable fossils. The implication of this is that if you are looking at old bones in a public museum gallery which hosts mobs of careless, rambunctious kids and bored, vandalous teenagers, if those bones have any scientific value you are probably looking at replicas, painted casts of the originals rather than the bones themselves.
At only about 240 pages this is a quick read, and there is good information about human ancestors. It is remarkable how much can be reconstructed from a few bits of bone and teeth, about their place in the family of man, their gait, their diet, their hunting and gathering techniques, and even some things about their social lives. However, the book also spends too much time navel gazing about “the evidence used to talk about ‘how to know’ about the species [which] reflects our cultural backgrounds and assumptions as well. How we talk about the species and how we name it conveys how we ground that scientific discovery within our own cultures.” (p. 205-6) Okay, fine, I get it, you don’t have to tell me a dozen times.
July 8, 2016
I received this book through "First to Read" program.
I woke up this morning and learned about new Pokemon Go app game and rushed out of the bed, where I, usually, spend at least 30 mins trying to get up, in order to play that new exciting game. But as soon as I left my bed I dropped on my couch to finish "Seven Skeletons". Because this book is so interesting!
When I was in the 6th grade, that was the first thorough encounter with the oldest human ancestors. I memorized Lucy, neanderthals and a female fossil somewhere from Siberia. Recently, in the news I learned about the hobbit-like huminids... So, I wasn't too well acquainted with our possible ancestors. And if you're in the same category - this book will give you plenty of knowledge about most famous seven prehistoric human fossils.
I've been following news on evolution science like every educated person is expected to. And in just a short time I've noticed how, for example, view on neanderthals have changed. They were introduced to me as inferior species who failed and therefore are extinct; now we face a question - what if they were as good as homo sapiens or even better and we simply killed them all? If in the past we were trying to draw a very straight line of how we evolved from one to another huminid, today we start asking ourselves - what if we were unique but not connected species, and homo sapiens triggered the extinction of them all (while migrating)? We are, after all, very destructive species, no one can't deny it. And sometimes political correctness is more acceptable than harsh truth.
This book is very well written and even if it's from a scientific category, anyone not involved in paleoanthropology will be able to enjoy this book. It doesn't bother us with long history and hypothesis of what those fossils could have been like in their times, but it gives us an anthropological point of view how these fossils have lived their afterlives: some became icons, some were faked, some were lost, some were forgotten... What you can clearly see throughout this short paleoanthropology's history through fossils is that people from early days had the agenda to draw a clear line between these fossils in order to make "sense" out of them. Which was even heightened by famous Piltdown forgery (but British were always anglo-centered, alas!). And every time they thought they made a perfect summary, a new fossil would pop out, which would destroy all that perfect alignment (haha!); and puts everybody at another search for "missing link".
I met quite a few intelligent and scientific people who dropped belief in evolution just because of that constant failure in finding a "missing link". If we stopped looking for "missing link", perhaps we would be able to see something new; not to be afraid to break the rules and perhaps even rewrite the whole human evolution...
I woke up this morning and learned about new Pokemon Go app game and rushed out of the bed, where I, usually, spend at least 30 mins trying to get up, in order to play that new exciting game. But as soon as I left my bed I dropped on my couch to finish "Seven Skeletons". Because this book is so interesting!
When I was in the 6th grade, that was the first thorough encounter with the oldest human ancestors. I memorized Lucy, neanderthals and a female fossil somewhere from Siberia. Recently, in the news I learned about the hobbit-like huminids... So, I wasn't too well acquainted with our possible ancestors. And if you're in the same category - this book will give you plenty of knowledge about most famous seven prehistoric human fossils.
I've been following news on evolution science like every educated person is expected to. And in just a short time I've noticed how, for example, view on neanderthals have changed. They were introduced to me as inferior species who failed and therefore are extinct; now we face a question - what if they were as good as homo sapiens or even better and we simply killed them all? If in the past we were trying to draw a very straight line of how we evolved from one to another huminid, today we start asking ourselves - what if we were unique but not connected species, and homo sapiens triggered the extinction of them all (while migrating)? We are, after all, very destructive species, no one can't deny it. And sometimes political correctness is more acceptable than harsh truth.
This book is very well written and even if it's from a scientific category, anyone not involved in paleoanthropology will be able to enjoy this book. It doesn't bother us with long history and hypothesis of what those fossils could have been like in their times, but it gives us an anthropological point of view how these fossils have lived their afterlives: some became icons, some were faked, some were lost, some were forgotten... What you can clearly see throughout this short paleoanthropology's history through fossils is that people from early days had the agenda to draw a clear line between these fossils in order to make "sense" out of them. Which was even heightened by famous Piltdown forgery (but British were always anglo-centered, alas!). And every time they thought they made a perfect summary, a new fossil would pop out, which would destroy all that perfect alignment (haha!); and puts everybody at another search for "missing link".
I met quite a few intelligent and scientific people who dropped belief in evolution just because of that constant failure in finding a "missing link". If we stopped looking for "missing link", perhaps we would be able to see something new; not to be afraid to break the rules and perhaps even rewrite the whole human evolution...
January 27, 2018
Marvelous. Most of us have heard of these skeletons before, if we frequent museums or took an anthro course in college, but this book is the perfect amount of in-depth without getting tedious. (Also, a very soothing and fun audiobook to fall asleep to).
Snaps to the author for comparing the Piltdown Man hoax to Milli Vanilli. Didn’t see that coming.
Snaps to the author for comparing the Piltdown Man hoax to Milli Vanilli. Didn’t see that coming.
September 20, 2016
I won a copy of this book through the Goodreads Giveaways and was so looking forward to read it! Since I got it before the publication day, I made sure to clear enough days in reading "schedule" so I could post my review the day the book was officially out. Turned out I didn't set aside enough time, this reading took me more than a month instead of a usual week for 200-300 pages.
I was anticipating eagerly. Science and scientists desperately need that popularization element. We all need books that explain current research, make it a part of the paradigm the society lives in, inspire people to ask questions and seek answers. Unfortunately, lame attempts at all these things hurt the science more than no attempts at all.
My disenchantment started with a feeling that I'm reading a scientific paper - as if I don't read enough of them - and not a good paper at that. The same style, the same jumping thoughts and sloppy writing characteristic of bad papers that nobody wants to read, but everyone in the field has to, because (ten different reasons here). After page 25, where "the stereoscope expanded [research possibilities] in the same way that telescopes and microscopes expanded the visual possibilities for other sciences centuries before", my reading slowed down significantly. Because no, it didn't. The CT scan expanded possibilities for paleoanthropology the same way microscopes did, not stereoscopes. Could the author really not see the difference? How? Why? Should I read it?
By the end of chapter One, I resorted to highlighting, which I never do with books, only with papers. The last three pages of this chapter in my advanced copy was a jumble of several sentences repeated over and over again (at least 4 times) in different order. Very surprised, I decided to wait for the release date and continued reading the hard cover. At least this mess at the end of the Old Man chapter was fixed, which is a huge relief.
The part I liked best was a heroic saga "Australopithecus" by Dr. Walet Rose on the page 104. It is simply the best part of the book. Can you imagine my disappointment, when the reference given at the end turned out to be "Raymond Dart Archive", which basically means that there is no way I can read the whole saga?
I have lots of remarks about the content of this book, thanks to "scientific paper mode" of reading - I kept notes, highlighted, and wrote on margins, but each one of them is small and insignificant, untill you see them all together. The overall conclusion is depressing. What was it? A dissertation published as a book? It's written in worst possible way for the genre. The author gives bits and pieces. The moment writing turns into a story and becomes interesting, she changes the topic and keeps jumping the whole book. She doesn't give any conclusions, just piles up little facts in a way that suggests she waits for the reader to make the "right" conclusion, the one she has in mind. But the piled facts are too small to be interesting and the whole pile is not comprehensive enough to draw any conclusions. They are just hanging there, a messy pile of facts.
I'm very upset after reading this book, but give it three stars nevertheless, for the effort of popularizing paleoanthropology.
I was anticipating eagerly. Science and scientists desperately need that popularization element. We all need books that explain current research, make it a part of the paradigm the society lives in, inspire people to ask questions and seek answers. Unfortunately, lame attempts at all these things hurt the science more than no attempts at all.
My disenchantment started with a feeling that I'm reading a scientific paper - as if I don't read enough of them - and not a good paper at that. The same style, the same jumping thoughts and sloppy writing characteristic of bad papers that nobody wants to read, but everyone in the field has to, because (ten different reasons here). After page 25, where "the stereoscope expanded [research possibilities] in the same way that telescopes and microscopes expanded the visual possibilities for other sciences centuries before", my reading slowed down significantly. Because no, it didn't. The CT scan expanded possibilities for paleoanthropology the same way microscopes did, not stereoscopes. Could the author really not see the difference? How? Why? Should I read it?
By the end of chapter One, I resorted to highlighting, which I never do with books, only with papers. The last three pages of this chapter in my advanced copy was a jumble of several sentences repeated over and over again (at least 4 times) in different order. Very surprised, I decided to wait for the release date and continued reading the hard cover. At least this mess at the end of the Old Man chapter was fixed, which is a huge relief.
The part I liked best was a heroic saga "Australopithecus" by Dr. Walet Rose on the page 104. It is simply the best part of the book. Can you imagine my disappointment, when the reference given at the end turned out to be "Raymond Dart Archive", which basically means that there is no way I can read the whole saga?
I have lots of remarks about the content of this book, thanks to "scientific paper mode" of reading - I kept notes, highlighted, and wrote on margins, but each one of them is small and insignificant, untill you see them all together. The overall conclusion is depressing. What was it? A dissertation published as a book? It's written in worst possible way for the genre. The author gives bits and pieces. The moment writing turns into a story and becomes interesting, she changes the topic and keeps jumping the whole book. She doesn't give any conclusions, just piles up little facts in a way that suggests she waits for the reader to make the "right" conclusion, the one she has in mind. But the piled facts are too small to be interesting and the whole pile is not comprehensive enough to draw any conclusions. They are just hanging there, a messy pile of facts.
I'm very upset after reading this book, but give it three stars nevertheless, for the effort of popularizing paleoanthropology.
October 10, 2016
Received to review via Netgalley
Seven Skeletons is a very readable survey of some of the most famous hominid skeletons ever discovered. The choice of skeletons to discuss is interesting: it includes the known hoax, Piltdown Man, because like or not, that alleged find had a massive effect on the field for far too long. It’s not solely a discussion of each skeleton’s merits as part of the hominid ancestry, but also of their part in our culture and history. Indeed, the most important aspect is that it places each skeleton in context, viewing them as a part of a larger picture as well.
If you’re very familiar with the stories of hominid finds around the world, you may not find much new here. What I enjoyed was the contextualising, even to the extent of discussing speculative fiction based on the finds. That context is far too often ignored, considering speculative fiction is often right on the cutting edge. For a detailed analysis of each skeleton’s importance on an anatomical level, I’d look elsewhere, and it’d be a heavier read. This is more cultural and thus, for me, easier (though not necessarily more fun!).
Some of the formatting was awkward, but I put that down to reading an advance copy on my Kindle. I imagine those issues will be smoothed out for the published version, especially the print edition.
Originally posted here.
Seven Skeletons is a very readable survey of some of the most famous hominid skeletons ever discovered. The choice of skeletons to discuss is interesting: it includes the known hoax, Piltdown Man, because like or not, that alleged find had a massive effect on the field for far too long. It’s not solely a discussion of each skeleton’s merits as part of the hominid ancestry, but also of their part in our culture and history. Indeed, the most important aspect is that it places each skeleton in context, viewing them as a part of a larger picture as well.
If you’re very familiar with the stories of hominid finds around the world, you may not find much new here. What I enjoyed was the contextualising, even to the extent of discussing speculative fiction based on the finds. That context is far too often ignored, considering speculative fiction is often right on the cutting edge. For a detailed analysis of each skeleton’s importance on an anatomical level, I’d look elsewhere, and it’d be a heavier read. This is more cultural and thus, for me, easier (though not necessarily more fun!).
Some of the formatting was awkward, but I put that down to reading an advance copy on my Kindle. I imagine those issues will be smoothed out for the published version, especially the print edition.
Originally posted here.
August 16, 2016
Seven Skeletons takes a look at what makes a fossil famous, what helps connect it to the public's consciousness. Pyne looks at seven archaeological finds - including one hoax - and how they came to life once again upon their discovery.
I wish that the author spent more time on the revitalization of the fossils as they became part of the conversation, and less on some of the specifics, like the taxonomy of each name. I knew that I was in for some science with this book, of course. But I was hoping for more of the cultural impact. It's in there, but to varying degrees for each skeleton.
The chapter on Lucy was my favorite, for it captured the best of both sides of the story. I went to see Lucy when she was exhibited at the Pacific Science Center, and the way the author describes the event was spot-on: there was a reverence to seeing her, an awe in standing before this human ancestor six million years later. The author uses the popularity of Lucy's tour to argue for more access to fossils for all of us.
There is a lot to learn here, so if you're interested, it's worth your time to pick this up. If this isn't your usual fare, it probably won't turn you into a fan. Try something else first, and then come back to this.
My thanks to the publisher for an ARC of this book through the First to Read program.
I wish that the author spent more time on the revitalization of the fossils as they became part of the conversation, and less on some of the specifics, like the taxonomy of each name. I knew that I was in for some science with this book, of course. But I was hoping for more of the cultural impact. It's in there, but to varying degrees for each skeleton.
The chapter on Lucy was my favorite, for it captured the best of both sides of the story. I went to see Lucy when she was exhibited at the Pacific Science Center, and the way the author describes the event was spot-on: there was a reverence to seeing her, an awe in standing before this human ancestor six million years later. The author uses the popularity of Lucy's tour to argue for more access to fossils for all of us.
There is a lot to learn here, so if you're interested, it's worth your time to pick this up. If this isn't your usual fare, it probably won't turn you into a fan. Try something else first, and then come back to this.
My thanks to the publisher for an ARC of this book through the First to Read program.
May 20, 2021
3.5 stars. A book about human evolution but told in 7 famous fossils and what they have meant for the modern world. Very interesting to listen to and it have sparked an interest in finding more books about human evolution. But its quite tricky to find books in this subject I feel, but very compelling part of the history and I think the book did a good job telling parts of that history in an easy digestible way
August 28, 2016
Way behind on my reviews, gotta catch up before school starts! Prepare for short and choppy...
Okay, this one was a mixed bag. The content completely carried the book, so it's a good thing this was nonfiction instead of fiction. I've been fascinated by early homonids since my biological anthropology class back in freshman year of college (my ideal major would have been English-History-Anthropology-Psychology with minors in Creative Writing and Women's studies, but alas, there is only so much time in the day). I'd actually learned about all but the last of the described skeletons before, though of course not in the detail that Pyne goes into here. If anything, I may have wanted more detail: How could scientists know from just a few bones of a single example of a different species that homonid was male or female? How can they tell that they're different species with only partial skeletons? How do scientists decide what makes a new species (except in the obvious case of homo floresiensis)? How did they preserve the spongy, not-actually-fossilized homo floresiensis bones? I would have liked to know more about the frequently-mentioned Java Man, but that would have ruined the title's alliteration and the book's symmetry.
What's fascinating about this book, though, is that these questions aren't neglected by negligence but by choice. It's remarkable that this book isn't just about human evolution but, in fact, about how modern homo sapiens react to these skeletons: it's not just the scientific story, but the story of the media, the cultural impact. This actually would have made the book more appealing to me up front, since I'm very interested in how humans relate to each other and to the world around them. I would have made this much more obvious up front by slipping another word into the subtitle: "The Cultural Evolution of the World's Most Famous Human Fossils." But that might be the scholarly side of my publishing experience coming through--I can't exactly say that I know better than a trade editor about what titles catch attention. Probably that subtitle sounds too academic and stuffy for the educated, non-specialist reader.
I can definitely tell the writer has potential, but there should have been a lot more editing in this. Granted, I was reading an ARC, so I have no idea how far ahead of the pub date this particular review copy was printed--it's quite possible it did get a lot more editorial help after this point. Some points:
> In the space of three pages, three paragraphs begin, "Today, the Old Man..."
> Three paragraphs are exactly repeated--I seriously hope this is something that was caught before the book went to print!
> I could never figure out why some words were defined but not others. We're told that a scapula is "part of the shoulder" but we don't get a definition of paleoanthropology. I would guess that readers, even if they know what the separate parts mean, might want to know before diving into the text how, exactly, we can extrapolate about human species from fossilized bones. Dinosaurs are guesses enough, and it seems like we have far more of them than we have homonids. (Hey, that would have been a useful factoid to include! But I'm not docking points for that).
> Puns, oh my heck. Here and there they're fun, but for some reason they were almost exclusively concentrated in a single chapter and involved repeated use of the phrase, "no bones about it." Ha flipping ha. You can't use that more than about twice without it becoming a groaner.
Okay, this is picky, but Pyne hinted at a potentially fascinating point in the chapter on homo floresiensis before dropping it like a hot potato: the contemporary local legends of the ebu gogo, small human-like creatures that live in the forest (205). This is a ready-made opening for an interesting sentence or two here about the possibility of overlap between two species of homonid and the length of cultural memory, but Pyne doesn't follow it up. To be clear, the only reason I'm complaining about this is because I did a paper on it in college and because I'm fascinated by the ways some fairy tales are shaped by reality.
Okay, on to quotes--not as many as usual, for which you're probably thankful.
Quote Roundup
74) I just love that the British Museum is saving satire, poetry, and cartoons about Piltdown Man along with the bones. This is exactly the kind of archival work I fantasize about.
97) I must admit, I found it interesting how little Pyne mentioned religious opponents of human evolution. Here's one page where it is addressed. This was also the page where I really understood that this wasn't just a story about the skeletons, but public investment in their discovery and interpretation.
220) Here's where there was an opportunity to discuss how scientists determine sexual dimorphism versus individual variation.
222) I felt a little warm inside knowing that as far back as the 1920s/30s, a male archaeologist tried to nickname a fossil "Nelly" to combat what he saw as explicit sexism by referring to particular hominin discoveries as "man."
Wow, almost none of my quotes were actually quotes. Don't think that's ever happened before...
Overall, I recommend the book for its fascinating content, but not for structural or stylistic execution. But this recommendation is made with the caveat that I have no idea how close to final this ARC draft was when it was printed. And I'm a grumpy fan of continuous narrative who unfairly doesn't cut nonfiction writers a little slack.
Okay, this one was a mixed bag. The content completely carried the book, so it's a good thing this was nonfiction instead of fiction. I've been fascinated by early homonids since my biological anthropology class back in freshman year of college (my ideal major would have been English-History-Anthropology-Psychology with minors in Creative Writing and Women's studies, but alas, there is only so much time in the day). I'd actually learned about all but the last of the described skeletons before, though of course not in the detail that Pyne goes into here. If anything, I may have wanted more detail: How could scientists know from just a few bones of a single example of a different species that homonid was male or female? How can they tell that they're different species with only partial skeletons? How do scientists decide what makes a new species (except in the obvious case of homo floresiensis)? How did they preserve the spongy, not-actually-fossilized homo floresiensis bones? I would have liked to know more about the frequently-mentioned Java Man, but that would have ruined the title's alliteration and the book's symmetry.
What's fascinating about this book, though, is that these questions aren't neglected by negligence but by choice. It's remarkable that this book isn't just about human evolution but, in fact, about how modern homo sapiens react to these skeletons: it's not just the scientific story, but the story of the media, the cultural impact. This actually would have made the book more appealing to me up front, since I'm very interested in how humans relate to each other and to the world around them. I would have made this much more obvious up front by slipping another word into the subtitle: "The Cultural Evolution of the World's Most Famous Human Fossils." But that might be the scholarly side of my publishing experience coming through--I can't exactly say that I know better than a trade editor about what titles catch attention. Probably that subtitle sounds too academic and stuffy for the educated, non-specialist reader.
I can definitely tell the writer has potential, but there should have been a lot more editing in this. Granted, I was reading an ARC, so I have no idea how far ahead of the pub date this particular review copy was printed--it's quite possible it did get a lot more editorial help after this point. Some points:
> In the space of three pages, three paragraphs begin, "Today, the Old Man..."
> Three paragraphs are exactly repeated--I seriously hope this is something that was caught before the book went to print!
> I could never figure out why some words were defined but not others. We're told that a scapula is "part of the shoulder" but we don't get a definition of paleoanthropology. I would guess that readers, even if they know what the separate parts mean, might want to know before diving into the text how, exactly, we can extrapolate about human species from fossilized bones. Dinosaurs are guesses enough, and it seems like we have far more of them than we have homonids. (Hey, that would have been a useful factoid to include! But I'm not docking points for that).
> Puns, oh my heck. Here and there they're fun, but for some reason they were almost exclusively concentrated in a single chapter and involved repeated use of the phrase, "no bones about it." Ha flipping ha. You can't use that more than about twice without it becoming a groaner.
Okay, this is picky, but Pyne hinted at a potentially fascinating point in the chapter on homo floresiensis before dropping it like a hot potato: the contemporary local legends of the ebu gogo, small human-like creatures that live in the forest (205). This is a ready-made opening for an interesting sentence or two here about the possibility of overlap between two species of homonid and the length of cultural memory, but Pyne doesn't follow it up. To be clear, the only reason I'm complaining about this is because I did a paper on it in college and because I'm fascinated by the ways some fairy tales are shaped by reality.
Okay, on to quotes--not as many as usual, for which you're probably thankful.
Quote Roundup
74) I just love that the British Museum is saving satire, poetry, and cartoons about Piltdown Man along with the bones. This is exactly the kind of archival work I fantasize about.
97) I must admit, I found it interesting how little Pyne mentioned religious opponents of human evolution. Here's one page where it is addressed. This was also the page where I really understood that this wasn't just a story about the skeletons, but public investment in their discovery and interpretation.
220) Here's where there was an opportunity to discuss how scientists determine sexual dimorphism versus individual variation.
222) I felt a little warm inside knowing that as far back as the 1920s/30s, a male archaeologist tried to nickname a fossil "Nelly" to combat what he saw as explicit sexism by referring to particular hominin discoveries as "man."
Wow, almost none of my quotes were actually quotes. Don't think that's ever happened before...
Overall, I recommend the book for its fascinating content, but not for structural or stylistic execution. But this recommendation is made with the caveat that I have no idea how close to final this ARC draft was when it was printed. And I'm a grumpy fan of continuous narrative who unfairly doesn't cut nonfiction writers a little slack.
September 8, 2016
From Kindle location 1964 of my free uncorrected advance electronic copy of this book:
I believe that your reaction to this quote will predict your enjoyment of this book. There is a lot of writing like it. If you can read it as you might any other sentence, without strong reaction, then you might enjoy this book. If not, not.
I must admit that sentences like this irritate me. I tell myself, with all seriousness, “Perhaps they shouldn't bother me”. But they do.
Rather than just carping, I'm going to try to write a version which, in my opinion, is an improvement, but still doesn't alter the author's message.
This book is well-researched and about an interesting topic, but sentences like the above did not make reading it more pleasurable.
Although it seems unlikely that the above quote will change, I hope that the final copy of the book will correct several other distracting mistakes in my galley copy. Many of them were noted in an earlier review here at Goodreads. In addition, I'd like to report that “outraged” is misspelled at location 855. Finally, nearly immediately after the misspelling (location 858), a scientist is said to have immortalized the Piltdown Man story in “campy prose”. Immediately afterward follows a long quotation in written in rhyming couplets. This, I think, meets the definition of poetry, not prose.
More generally, I think that this book is OK, but it really missed a great opportunity to be a better book. It just can't seem to decide who its audience is. It seems like it might be aimed at a mass audience, but the author backs away from obvious opportunities to make the book more accessible to the general reader. (Maybe she felt that doing some would “dumb down” the book.) Sometimes technical terms appear without warning or explanation, but other times technical terms are explained. Topics that might be compelling to the non-expert reader (e.g., competing opinions about the identity of the Piltdown hoaxer) are given a cursory once-over, something I found especially strange in a book that purported to be about “fossil as celebrity”. I just think the author didn't have a clear idea what the non-expert reader knew or found interesting.
BTW, hashtag “the rest of the story”, here are two bits of recent news about the fossils mentioned in this book, specifically, Piltdown Man and Lucy. The latter article is especially interesting as it casts serious doubt on the headline-grabbing “Lucy died falling from a tree” narrative of only a few days previous.
Thanks to Penguin Random House and Netgalley for an uncorrected advance electronic copy of this book.
Some of these reconstructions and visual images become culturally coded into the intellectual and public milieu and serve as important signifiers for cultural space.
I believe that your reaction to this quote will predict your enjoyment of this book. There is a lot of writing like it. If you can read it as you might any other sentence, without strong reaction, then you might enjoy this book. If not, not.
I must admit that sentences like this irritate me. I tell myself, with all seriousness, “Perhaps they shouldn't bother me”. But they do.
Rather than just carping, I'm going to try to write a version which, in my opinion, is an improvement, but still doesn't alter the author's message.
Museum dioramas and other visuals used in popular exhibitions sometimes become strong symbols in the public imagination. These symbols take on a life of their own long after the exhibitions close down.
This book is well-researched and about an interesting topic, but sentences like the above did not make reading it more pleasurable.
Although it seems unlikely that the above quote will change, I hope that the final copy of the book will correct several other distracting mistakes in my galley copy. Many of them were noted in an earlier review here at Goodreads. In addition, I'd like to report that “outraged” is misspelled at location 855. Finally, nearly immediately after the misspelling (location 858), a scientist is said to have immortalized the Piltdown Man story in “campy prose”. Immediately afterward follows a long quotation in written in rhyming couplets. This, I think, meets the definition of poetry, not prose.
More generally, I think that this book is OK, but it really missed a great opportunity to be a better book. It just can't seem to decide who its audience is. It seems like it might be aimed at a mass audience, but the author backs away from obvious opportunities to make the book more accessible to the general reader. (Maybe she felt that doing some would “dumb down” the book.) Sometimes technical terms appear without warning or explanation, but other times technical terms are explained. Topics that might be compelling to the non-expert reader (e.g., competing opinions about the identity of the Piltdown hoaxer) are given a cursory once-over, something I found especially strange in a book that purported to be about “fossil as celebrity”. I just think the author didn't have a clear idea what the non-expert reader knew or found interesting.
BTW, hashtag “the rest of the story”, here are two bits of recent news about the fossils mentioned in this book, specifically, Piltdown Man and Lucy. The latter article is especially interesting as it casts serious doubt on the headline-grabbing “Lucy died falling from a tree” narrative of only a few days previous.
Thanks to Penguin Random House and Netgalley for an uncorrected advance electronic copy of this book.
July 27, 2016
Fascinating subject matter and interesting interpretations and ideas put forth by the author, but the writing was often clunky, the sentences convoluted and the language overly academic. Almost sounded like it was written by a lit crit major. Pacing was, perhaps by necessity, slow. Overall a thought-provoking and enjoyable read, laying out these famous fossils in particular and paleoanthropolgy in general for the educated layperson, but not gripping or deeply affecting in the way the best history or science writing is. Really more of a sociology or cultural anthro read than a popular science book.
June 29, 2016
If you have any interest in the history of man's evolution, this is a book you should read. Through the seven fossils discussed Lydia Pyne brings the science of paleoanthropology to the reader while explaining the reasons for the celebrity of these particular fossils.
Thank you Goodreads for allowing me to win this book.
Thank you Goodreads for allowing me to win this book.
October 22, 2016
Factual content but a pretty boring read. I had hoped for a "storylike" quality but, to me, this read like a text book. It's not bad (except for the excessive use of the word "plethora") just not for me.
January 29, 2024
Un libro muy entretenido de arqueologia y paleo-antropologia, que describe la "biografia" de 7 esqueletos emblematicos y, mas interesante, explica porque son famosos. El libro detalla la hisotria de como fueron descubiertos, y las circunstancias que los hicieron conocidos, con muy buena documentacion e historias de como se va construyendo la ciencia en torno a estos restos fosiles.
Es un libro para quienes gustan de la ciencia, muy bien escrito y que discute muchos aspectos relevantes asociados al progreso del conocimiento: la colaboracion, el egoisimo, la comunicacion transparente, las limitaciones cientificas existentes en cada epoca, el significado simbolico de los restos, y como todo esto encaja en la historia evolutiva del homo sapiens. Muy recomendable!
Es un libro para quienes gustan de la ciencia, muy bien escrito y que discute muchos aspectos relevantes asociados al progreso del conocimiento: la colaboracion, el egoisimo, la comunicacion transparente, las limitaciones cientificas existentes en cada epoca, el significado simbolico de los restos, y como todo esto encaja en la historia evolutiva del homo sapiens. Muy recomendable!
September 2, 2018
This book is not so much about the science of evolution, and more about the culture meaning of the various fossils. I thought it was a good choice to cover the Piltdown hoax, as this gives a good idea of how science is self-correcting, when scientists are allowed to freely pursue their interests.
March 12, 2023
Lydia Pyne
- Siedem szkieletów -
⭐⭐⭐⭐☆
•
Lydia Pyne zaprasza swoich czytelników na podróż przez historię odkryć siedmiu skamielin, które na stałe odcisnęły ślad w paleontologii.
I nie są to byle jakie historie! Oszustwa, zaginięcia, przypadkowe odkrycia i zakłamania są nieodłącznym elementem wielkich odkryć, i nie inaczej jest tutaj.
Pyne przeprowadza nas przez intrygi i ciężką, wieloletnią pracę archeologów, którzy zmienili patrzenie ludzkości na nasz własny gatunek.
•
Jako archeologa jak ćmę do światła przyciągają mnie nowe opowieści o starych rzeczach, więc i ta pozycja musiała znaleźć się na mojej liście to read.
Było naprawdę przyjemnie! Pyne ma lekkie pióro, podaje fakty i anegdoty w bardzo przyjazny sposób, tłumacząc i opowiadając tak, że nawet ktoś, kto słowo "paleontologia" musiał wygooglować po tym, jak napisałam je wyżej, wkręci się w tę książkę i zrozumie ją bez problemu.
Autorka postawiła sobie za główne zadanie próbę odpowiedzi na pytania, które badacze zadają sobie odkąd tylko pierwsza skamielina hominina ujrzała światło dzienne: czym różnili się od nas? Co sprawia, że są tak podobni, a jednocześnie tak różni? Jak wyglądały ich wędrówki, i wreszcie jak wygląda oś czasu ewolucji człowieka współczesnego? W którym jej miejscu znajdą się opisywane przez Pyne skamieliny?
Cała książka zmusza do rozmyślań na te tematy, zachęca do wyciągania własnych wniosków.
Żeby poznać odpowiedzi autorki, musicie sami sięgnąć po tę pozycję. 🦴
- Siedem szkieletów -
⭐⭐⭐⭐☆
•
Lydia Pyne zaprasza swoich czytelników na podróż przez historię odkryć siedmiu skamielin, które na stałe odcisnęły ślad w paleontologii.
I nie są to byle jakie historie! Oszustwa, zaginięcia, przypadkowe odkrycia i zakłamania są nieodłącznym elementem wielkich odkryć, i nie inaczej jest tutaj.
Pyne przeprowadza nas przez intrygi i ciężką, wieloletnią pracę archeologów, którzy zmienili patrzenie ludzkości na nasz własny gatunek.
•
Jako archeologa jak ćmę do światła przyciągają mnie nowe opowieści o starych rzeczach, więc i ta pozycja musiała znaleźć się na mojej liście to read.
Było naprawdę przyjemnie! Pyne ma lekkie pióro, podaje fakty i anegdoty w bardzo przyjazny sposób, tłumacząc i opowiadając tak, że nawet ktoś, kto słowo "paleontologia" musiał wygooglować po tym, jak napisałam je wyżej, wkręci się w tę książkę i zrozumie ją bez problemu.
Autorka postawiła sobie za główne zadanie próbę odpowiedzi na pytania, które badacze zadają sobie odkąd tylko pierwsza skamielina hominina ujrzała światło dzienne: czym różnili się od nas? Co sprawia, że są tak podobni, a jednocześnie tak różni? Jak wyglądały ich wędrówki, i wreszcie jak wygląda oś czasu ewolucji człowieka współczesnego? W którym jej miejscu znajdą się opisywane przez Pyne skamieliny?
Cała książka zmusza do rozmyślań na te tematy, zachęca do wyciągania własnych wniosków.
Żeby poznać odpowiedzi autorki, musicie sami sięgnąć po tę pozycję. 🦴
March 9, 2019
There are books on archaeology, and in particular on the study of fossils and other artifacts of humans and their ancestors from the prehistoric past. In them, you will often see reference to famous fossils such as "Lucy" or the "Taung Child". Then, there are books on the history of archaeology, wherein you are more likely to also see references to "Piltdown Man", the Mordred of the Arthurian Round Table of famous fossils. While any book on archaeology will have to mention a bit of the history, and any book on the history of archaeology will have to speak to what the archaeologists are actually discovering and what it means, they are slightly different perspectives on the same facts, both interesting and valid, but not precisely the same.
Then, there is this book, which entertains to take a third, equally different perspective. It is, I suppose, a bit of a sociology of archaeology, or perhaps of archaeology's place in the general society. For Pyne (in this book anyway), the fame of a fossil like 'Lucy' is only partially explained by its scientific importance. Equally important, perhaps even moreso, is when it was discovered, what it was thought to mean at that time, and how that fit into the general zeitgeist. Decades later, it may seem that 'Lucy' was always destined to be a famous find, but it is not necessarily so. There are fossil skulls that have sat on museum shelves for years, which are now getting a second look, as archaeologists begin to wonder if they might not be Denisovan, neither Neandertal nor Sapien. The fossil did not change, but our all-too-human understanding of archaeology changed, and there may be a spot for it in our minds which did not exist before.
This is perhaps most obvious in the case of Piltdown Man, one of the most infamous scientific frauds in history. Because it seemed to present exactly what we were expecting (a human-like brain with an ape-like posture), it did not get the scrutiny, or public challenge from skeptics, which it deserved. It was only once evidence had come in from other places that our ancestors stood upright before their braincases expanded far beyond other primates, that the fraud was discovered and exposed.
But even in recent, non-fraudulent fossils like 'Flo', aka 'the Hobbit', the state of the modern world can have a big impact on the attention a fossil receives, just as much as its scientific importance. Pyne raises the question of whether Peter Jackson's mega-millions movies about Hobbits was as much a reason for the attention given to homo floresienses, as the very real scientific importance of the fossils.
There were times when Pyne's text strays too far from the archaeology, and too far into what sounded more like social criticism, and my skeptics' instincts began to sound the alarm. I think this is just a Pavlovian association of social criticism with humbug, on my part, rather than any actual humbug on Pyne's part. But, if you have a profound allergy to sentences like "How we talk about the species and how we name it conveys how we ground that scientific discovery within our own cultures", then this may not be the book for you.
On balance, though, Pyne is surely correct in pointing out that the study of famous fossils (and in particular, which fossils get famous) can tell us something, not only about the time in which the fossilized person lived, but about the times in which the archaeologists who discover it live. By seeing how the biases and preconceptions from the time of the Piltdown Man's "discovery", made it harder for the scientists of the day to see it for what it was, we can get a glimpse of how we might be misinterpreting other fossil finds, and not only in the cases (like Piltdown) where fraud is involved. Pyne is using the fossils to turn a microscope, not on them, but on us, and though it may make us squirm, it is surely a study worth undertaking.
Then, there is this book, which entertains to take a third, equally different perspective. It is, I suppose, a bit of a sociology of archaeology, or perhaps of archaeology's place in the general society. For Pyne (in this book anyway), the fame of a fossil like 'Lucy' is only partially explained by its scientific importance. Equally important, perhaps even moreso, is when it was discovered, what it was thought to mean at that time, and how that fit into the general zeitgeist. Decades later, it may seem that 'Lucy' was always destined to be a famous find, but it is not necessarily so. There are fossil skulls that have sat on museum shelves for years, which are now getting a second look, as archaeologists begin to wonder if they might not be Denisovan, neither Neandertal nor Sapien. The fossil did not change, but our all-too-human understanding of archaeology changed, and there may be a spot for it in our minds which did not exist before.
This is perhaps most obvious in the case of Piltdown Man, one of the most infamous scientific frauds in history. Because it seemed to present exactly what we were expecting (a human-like brain with an ape-like posture), it did not get the scrutiny, or public challenge from skeptics, which it deserved. It was only once evidence had come in from other places that our ancestors stood upright before their braincases expanded far beyond other primates, that the fraud was discovered and exposed.
But even in recent, non-fraudulent fossils like 'Flo', aka 'the Hobbit', the state of the modern world can have a big impact on the attention a fossil receives, just as much as its scientific importance. Pyne raises the question of whether Peter Jackson's mega-millions movies about Hobbits was as much a reason for the attention given to homo floresienses, as the very real scientific importance of the fossils.
There were times when Pyne's text strays too far from the archaeology, and too far into what sounded more like social criticism, and my skeptics' instincts began to sound the alarm. I think this is just a Pavlovian association of social criticism with humbug, on my part, rather than any actual humbug on Pyne's part. But, if you have a profound allergy to sentences like "How we talk about the species and how we name it conveys how we ground that scientific discovery within our own cultures", then this may not be the book for you.
On balance, though, Pyne is surely correct in pointing out that the study of famous fossils (and in particular, which fossils get famous) can tell us something, not only about the time in which the fossilized person lived, but about the times in which the archaeologists who discover it live. By seeing how the biases and preconceptions from the time of the Piltdown Man's "discovery", made it harder for the scientists of the day to see it for what it was, we can get a glimpse of how we might be misinterpreting other fossil finds, and not only in the cases (like Piltdown) where fraud is involved. Pyne is using the fossils to turn a microscope, not on them, but on us, and though it may make us squirm, it is surely a study worth undertaking.
July 21, 2016
I was blessed to have biological anthropology professors who were also good storytellers. Thusly none of the information that Lydia Pyne covers is especially new to me. I have no objections with anything she wrote; only that she could have done so a bit more succinctly. Her main argument is "science is a social activity, set amid its political environs" (159). The idea that quantitative, factual science is in fact conceived, conducted and understood through a particular qualitative lens is something many outside of the social sciences are surprised by. Pyne does an excellent job of unpacking the cultural contextualization of the skulls and fossils those outside of the field of anthropology will be most familiar with. "Since fossils lack any sort of intrinsic agency, their significance comes from the people and cultures that surround them. We shape their stories of fame today, just as historical forces shaped their interpretations in the past. When we understand the stories of these fossils, we see how science, history, and popular culture interact to produce celebrity scientific discoveries" (9). We think we learn about the distant past by uncovering and studying these hominid fossils, but the stories we tell about these fossils- which ones are important, what we call them, their importance in human evolution and in archeological research, tell more about us than the ancient hominids they used to belong to. This is actually an important facet of science that is often taken for granted by social scientists and unknown by both the general public and farther reaching policy makers- the seemingly objective science we take as concrete fact is actually quite subjective and open to interpretation. My only real issue is that the book, while well written, didn't need to be quite so long or repetitive.
November 23, 2016
I enjoyed this! I remember handling casts of these skulls in my undergraduate anthropology classes, memorizing the morphology of each to pass an exam. Pyne brought them back to life for me as she presents, in approximate order of discovery, The Old Man, Peking Man, Piltdown man, the Taung Child, "Lucy," the "Hobbit" (Homo floresiensis), and "Sediba" (Australopithecus sediba) - the last two, and Ardipithecus as well, had not even been discovered in 1992 when I was taking those classes!
Pyne describes being challenged by a colleague to defend why she's writing about seven fossils that are already well-known rather than the important ones that get little public attention. But she focuses on these because her book is about WHY they are famous, and by explaining how each fossil came to have a popular identity she can explore what scientific paradigms and paleoanthropological knowledge were like at the time of their discovery. Her subject is the cross-relationships between science, history, and popular culture. So each chapter describes the discovery and the historical context, then moves on to how it was received by the public and why it's known today. Each chapter expands to a slightly different emphasis, as the culture changes. (I'm making it sound formulaic but it's not.) Piltdown is included because it shows the Euro-centric biases of the scientific establishment in the early 20th century and because the hoax still fascinates today. ~ This book would make great supplementary reading for a paleoanthropology course or a class on science & culture.
Pyne describes being challenged by a colleague to defend why she's writing about seven fossils that are already well-known rather than the important ones that get little public attention. But she focuses on these because her book is about WHY they are famous, and by explaining how each fossil came to have a popular identity she can explore what scientific paradigms and paleoanthropological knowledge were like at the time of their discovery. Her subject is the cross-relationships between science, history, and popular culture. So each chapter describes the discovery and the historical context, then moves on to how it was received by the public and why it's known today. Each chapter expands to a slightly different emphasis, as the culture changes. (I'm making it sound formulaic but it's not.) Piltdown is included because it shows the Euro-centric biases of the scientific establishment in the early 20th century and because the hoax still fascinates today. ~ This book would make great supplementary reading for a paleoanthropology course or a class on science & culture.
June 23, 2017
GNAB I received a free electronic copy of this fine book from Netgalley, Penguin Group Viking, and Lydia Pyne in exchange for an honest review. Thank you, folks, for sharing your work with me.
And this is an exciting and encouraging look at the field of paleoanthropology and access to these marvelous discoveries by both professional and amateur alike. As this field has grown over the last hundred years, the knowledge accrued has escalated in both quantity and speed of revelation to the point where new finds are shared rapidly with the scientific community and the public very quickly. Lydia Pyne does a detailed history of the seven most well-known fossil finds - Lucy, The Old Man of La Chapelle, Piltdown, the Taung Child, Peking Man, Flo and the newest finds, Sediba. She explains in layman's terms why these fossil finds are the seven best known out of thousands of important finds, and what it takes to generate a famous fossil. An important work for all of us interested in archaeology and the evolution of humanity.
pub date Aug 16, 2016
Penguin Group, Viking
And this is an exciting and encouraging look at the field of paleoanthropology and access to these marvelous discoveries by both professional and amateur alike. As this field has grown over the last hundred years, the knowledge accrued has escalated in both quantity and speed of revelation to the point where new finds are shared rapidly with the scientific community and the public very quickly. Lydia Pyne does a detailed history of the seven most well-known fossil finds - Lucy, The Old Man of La Chapelle, Piltdown, the Taung Child, Peking Man, Flo and the newest finds, Sediba. She explains in layman's terms why these fossil finds are the seven best known out of thousands of important finds, and what it takes to generate a famous fossil. An important work for all of us interested in archaeology and the evolution of humanity.
pub date Aug 16, 2016
Penguin Group, Viking
October 5, 2017
Enthralling. Informational. Very fun read.
March 17, 2024
Yes, I started my last review saying I didn't want to rate nonfiction and then rated this nonfiction book. I'll start by saying that as someone with a hobbyist level of interest in anthropology, I enjoyed the content of the book and definitely learned some things about some of these fossils that I didn't previously know. So, on a pure information basis, this book gets a good score.
However, the editor of this book needs a remedial grammar course before editing anything else, and until she takes one I am putting em-dashes (and commas) up on a shelf where she can't reach them. Also, is it so hard to realize if you have words in a sentence that don't belong there or if sentences don't make sense? The most egregious example was a passage stating, "Once the Japanese military attacked Pearl Harbor, [insert explanation of events]... All of this occurred three weeks before the attack on Pearl Harbor." I still don't know whether those events happened before or after Pearl Harbor, and I'm not convinced the author or editor do either. In some places, the writing was also repetitive, crossing the line between referencing things mentioned in earlier chapters and completely rehashing them. This book needed a couple more rounds with a different editor before being printed imo.
My other big complaint was the lack of discussion of the racism that played a role in the controversy surrounding some of these early fossils and the focus on finding human ancestors in Europe and not Africa. It didn't need to be thoroughly explored because the history of paleontology as a field wasn't the point of the book, but it definitely merits bringing up.
However, the editor of this book needs a remedial grammar course before editing anything else, and until she takes one I am putting em-dashes (and commas) up on a shelf where she can't reach them. Also, is it so hard to realize if you have words in a sentence that don't belong there or if sentences don't make sense? The most egregious example was a passage stating, "Once the Japanese military attacked Pearl Harbor, [insert explanation of events]... All of this occurred three weeks before the attack on Pearl Harbor." I still don't know whether those events happened before or after Pearl Harbor, and I'm not convinced the author or editor do either. In some places, the writing was also repetitive, crossing the line between referencing things mentioned in earlier chapters and completely rehashing them. This book needed a couple more rounds with a different editor before being printed imo.
My other big complaint was the lack of discussion of the racism that played a role in the controversy surrounding some of these early fossils and the focus on finding human ancestors in Europe and not Africa. It didn't need to be thoroughly explored because the history of paleontology as a field wasn't the point of the book, but it definitely merits bringing up.
March 16, 2019
I didn’t really know all that much about the history of the skeletons discussed in this book. While the author does start repeating a little too much toward the end of the book, and some of the discussions digressed a bit, which distracted me as a non-science person, overall I think this is a solid introduction into the conversation of human evolution and paleoanthropology. It made me want to look up new elements of these discussions, which I feel is a sign of an interesting book!
August 24, 2020
While I went into this book thinking that it would be a tour of human evolution, highlighting seven particular species, I got even more than that. This book is also a biography of fossils, true to its subtitle of "the evolution of the world's most famous human fossils." You don't just get to learn about the species themselves, as Pyne charts out the history of how these fossils have been studied and interpreted by both scientists and the public alike, and how these processes of knowledge-building are a two-way street.
For example, without giving too much away, Pyne talks about two fossils found around the same time: Piltdown Man (now a notorious forgery) and the Taung child (a young australopithecine fossil from South Africa). Why did Piltdown Man get so much attention whereas the Taung child was overlooked? Piltdown Man's "discovery" in England attracted so much more attention, placing the origins of humanity closer to a European scientific establishment... and closer to Europe, perhaps in line with certain theories of eugenics and European racial superiority that were starting to gain traction then.
We get to see a second story behind these fossils, the story of how the knowledge of these fossils has been created. If you're interested in the science of paleontology and especially if you're interested in working in natural history museums, this book is mandatory reading.
For example, without giving too much away, Pyne talks about two fossils found around the same time: Piltdown Man (now a notorious forgery) and the Taung child (a young australopithecine fossil from South Africa). Why did Piltdown Man get so much attention whereas the Taung child was overlooked? Piltdown Man's "discovery" in England attracted so much more attention, placing the origins of humanity closer to a European scientific establishment... and closer to Europe, perhaps in line with certain theories of eugenics and European racial superiority that were starting to gain traction then.
We get to see a second story behind these fossils, the story of how the knowledge of these fossils has been created. If you're interested in the science of paleontology and especially if you're interested in working in natural history museums, this book is mandatory reading.
July 10, 2016
When I was eight, I was going to be a paleontologist...I had a book on dinosaurs. When I was nine, I was going to be an anthropologist (I got a new book...), so despite 46 years since, I'm primed to like this book, which I got an early look at via First to Read.
I have more than a passing familiarity with six of the seven - Old Man of La Chapelle (Neanderthal), Piltdown, Taung Child (Australopithicus africanus), Peking, Lucy - of course, and Flo the "Hobbit" (Homo floresiensis). I've devoted reading the past five to eight years to other things, so did not recognize Australopithicus sediba. Thanks to Ms. Pyne, I now do!
Very nicely written, almost in a conversational tone, Ms. Pyne does a great job describing the history of each and why the significance of her chosen "celebrity" fossils. A recommended read.
{A cool thing about reading advanced galleys...sometimes neat artifacts show up: on one page in the margin was an editor's note about needing confirmation of a source, as the article cited didn't have the quote. Bill O'Reilly avoids editors like that.}
I have more than a passing familiarity with six of the seven - Old Man of La Chapelle (Neanderthal), Piltdown, Taung Child (Australopithicus africanus), Peking, Lucy - of course, and Flo the "Hobbit" (Homo floresiensis). I've devoted reading the past five to eight years to other things, so did not recognize Australopithicus sediba. Thanks to Ms. Pyne, I now do!
Very nicely written, almost in a conversational tone, Ms. Pyne does a great job describing the history of each and why the significance of her chosen "celebrity" fossils. A recommended read.
{A cool thing about reading advanced galleys...sometimes neat artifacts show up: on one page in the margin was an editor's note about needing confirmation of a source, as the article cited didn't have the quote. Bill O'Reilly avoids editors like that.}
July 16, 2016
What makes an archaeological find iconic? Why are we fascinated by the Hobbit and Peking Man and why do we love Lucy? Lydia Pyne says it's not just how scientifically important the bones are, it's whether they have a good backstory.
This is true with art -- it's well known that a painting will bring more at auction if there's an intriguing story behind the painting, even an after-the-fact story such as that it was stolen and recovered or that the rich owner accidentally poked a hole in his Picasso while showing it off to friends. So it stands to reason that we want a skeleton with a good story too.
Pyne tells the stories of six famous sets of bones and finishes with a recent discovery that she thinks will climb to iconic status because it is important and has a good story. Time will tell. Meanwhile, we love the story of Peking Man, whose discovery was exciting enough but then the bones disappeared, and are still missing. Quite a mystery. And the story of Piltdown Man, a deliberate hoax that was not figured out until decades after its discovery, and we are still unsure of who was responsible.
Fun and academic at the same time.
This is true with art -- it's well known that a painting will bring more at auction if there's an intriguing story behind the painting, even an after-the-fact story such as that it was stolen and recovered or that the rich owner accidentally poked a hole in his Picasso while showing it off to friends. So it stands to reason that we want a skeleton with a good story too.
Pyne tells the stories of six famous sets of bones and finishes with a recent discovery that she thinks will climb to iconic status because it is important and has a good story. Time will tell. Meanwhile, we love the story of Peking Man, whose discovery was exciting enough but then the bones disappeared, and are still missing. Quite a mystery. And the story of Piltdown Man, a deliberate hoax that was not figured out until decades after its discovery, and we are still unsure of who was responsible.
Fun and academic at the same time.
June 1, 2020
4.5 Stars
When I bought "Seven Skeletons" by Lydia Pyne, I thought I was getting a straightforward book about seven famous human fossils. What I wasn't expected was a discussion of not just the scientific importance of these seven fossils, but also their own histories of how they were discovered and how they became celebrities within the field of paleoanthropology. This cultural aspect, sets this book apart from the more paleoanthropology-focused books you might find.
Pyne manages to weave stories about the fossils themselves, the people who discovered them, the cultural background that made them famous (especially in the case of Flo, the "hobbit" human) and controversies surrounding the fossils. Occasionally the writing drags a little (hence .5 star), but each chapter is independent enough that if you wanted to open it and learn about a single fossil, you easily could. 9/10 would recommend to anyone with an interest in hominin fossils and what separates celebrity fossils from the rest.
When I bought "Seven Skeletons" by Lydia Pyne, I thought I was getting a straightforward book about seven famous human fossils. What I wasn't expected was a discussion of not just the scientific importance of these seven fossils, but also their own histories of how they were discovered and how they became celebrities within the field of paleoanthropology. This cultural aspect, sets this book apart from the more paleoanthropology-focused books you might find.
Pyne manages to weave stories about the fossils themselves, the people who discovered them, the cultural background that made them famous (especially in the case of Flo, the "hobbit" human) and controversies surrounding the fossils. Occasionally the writing drags a little (hence .5 star), but each chapter is independent enough that if you wanted to open it and learn about a single fossil, you easily could. 9/10 would recommend to anyone with an interest in hominin fossils and what separates celebrity fossils from the rest.
August 3, 2016
I should mention that I read this through the "First to Read" program. My opinion of this book is colored by the fact that I read a galley proof rather than the finished original. In my opinion, it needs a final pass by a skilled editor to weed out typos and grammatical errors, and to consolidate some passages that seem to restate the same information repeatedly in slightly altered words. As it stands, it's a quick but rather clumsy read. Payne does a fairly good job in recounting the histories of six sets of hominin remains and one outright fraud. Unfortunately, the first skeleton, the famous Piltdown Man hoax, is the best part of the book. It has an interest and excitement lacking in much of the rest of the book, which sometimes manages to make rather spectacular discoveries seem rather humdrum. With some editing, this could be a nice book for members of the general public who have a casual interest in paleontology.
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