Piltdown man

American  

[pilt-doun] / ˈpɪltˌdaʊn /

noun

1. a hypothetical early modern human, assigned to the genus Eoanthropus, whose existence was inferred from skull fragments that were allegedly found at Piltdown, England, in 1912 but were exposed as fraudulent through chemical analysis in 1953.

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Piltdown man British  

/ ˈpɪltˌdaʊn /

noun

1. an advanced hominid postulated from fossil bones found in Sussex in 1912, but shown by modern dating methods in 1953 to be a hoax, which was perpetrated by a student museum assistant who was refused a wage

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Piltdown man Scientific  

/ pĭlt′doun′ /

1. A presumed early species of human, Eoanthropus dawsoni, postulated from a skull supposedly found in a gravel bed in about 1912 but determined in 1953 to be a fake constructed from a human cranium and the jawbone of an ape.

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Example Sentences

If the charges are proved true, said Science magazine last week, "the forgery may rank with that of the Piltdown man."

From Time Magazine Archive

You know, of course, of the 1912 Piltdown man, the 'fossil' that was purported to be the missing link between man and ape and was found to be an outrageous fraud some 40 years later.

From Time Magazine Archive

Charles Beck Dover Air Force Base, Del. Stephen Jay Gould appears to accept the popular charge that Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was involved in the conspiracy behind the Piltdown man forgery.

From Time Magazine Archive

Others, like the work of the fictional bard Ossian and the skull of Piltdown man, have had deep cultural ones.

From Time Magazine Archive

Birmingham, 1913, he is inclined to regard "Piltdown man, or some close relative" as "on the direct line of descent with ourselves."

From Man, Past and Present by Haddon, Alfred Court