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• Pithecanthropus
  Pithecanthropus

  noun

  a former genus of extinct hominins whose members have now been assigned to the proposed species Homo erectus.
• pithecanthropus
  pithecanthropus

  noun

  any primitive apelike man of the former genus Pithecanthropus, now included in the genus Homo See Java man Peking man

Pithecanthropus

American  

[pith-i-kan-thruh-puhs, -kuhn-throh-puhs] / ˌpɪθ ɪˈkæn θrə pəs, -kənˈθroʊ pəs /

noun

1. a former genus of extinct hominins whose members have now been assigned to the proposed species Homo erectus.

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pithecanthropus British  

/ ˌpɪθɪkænˈθrəʊpəs, -ˈkænθrə- /

noun

1. any primitive apelike man of the former genus Pithecanthropus, now included in the genus Homo See Java man Peking man

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pithecanthropus Scientific  

/ pĭth′ĭ-kăn′thrə-pəs,-kăn-thrō′pəs /

1. An extinct hominid postulated from bones found in Java in 1891 and originally designated Pithecanthropus erectus because it was thought to represent a species evolutionarily between apes and humans. Pithecanthropus is now classified as Homo erectus.

2. Also called Java man

3. See more at Homo erectus

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Other Word Forms

• pithecanthropine
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of Pithecanthropus

First recorded in 1870–75; from New Latin: literally “ape-man”; from Greek píthēk(os) “ape” + Greek ánthrōpos “human being”

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Pithecanthropus pithecanthropus

But after further inspection, he changed the name to Pithecanthropus erectus, an upright “ape-man.”

From New York Times ● Apr. 10, 2019

The original Pithecanthropus consisted of an apish skull, a very human thighbone, a few "ambiguous" teeth.

From Time Magazine Archive

Britain's Sir Arthur Keith, however, world's greatest authority on fossil man, considers Pithecanthropus the earliest known form of man.

From Time Magazine Archive

First Pithecanthropus relics were found in Java by a Dutchman, Eugene Dubois, in 1892.

From Time Magazine Archive

The Pithecanthropus of Java alone shows perhaps more affinity to the apes.

From The Antiquity of Man by Sir Charles Lyell

In the museum, the clergyman remarks: "It is not certain that there has been much change in our intellectual and moral attainments since pithecanthropus dropped the first half of his name."

From Time Magazine Archive

The early haunt of the pithecanthropus was in the south of France, at Aix.

From Time Magazine Archive

If, on the other hand, the pithecanthropus really lived 750,000 years ago, what, with normal development, should have been its skull capacity, if life began 60,000,000 ago?

From The Evolution of Man Scientifically Disproved In 50 Arguments by William A. (William Asbury) Williams

The great cat, flattened upon its belly, remained motionless except for twitching tail and snarling lips where it lay perhaps fifty feet beyond the body of the pithecanthropus.

From Tarzan the Terrible by Edgar Rice Burroughs

In his "Men of the Old Stone Age," Dr. Osborn puts the pithecanthropus, the Heidelberg man, the Piltdown man, and the Neanderthal man, on limbs which terminate abruptly as extinct races.

From The Evolution of Man Scientifically Disproved In 50 Arguments by William A. (William Asbury) Williams