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.
Also called Java man
See more at Homo erectus
First recorded in 1870–75; from New Latin: literally “ape-man”; from Greek píthēk(os) “ape” + Greek ánthrōpos “human being”
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But after further inspection, he changed the name to Pithecanthropus erectus, an upright “ape-man.”
From New York Times • Apr. 10, 2019
Professor Eugene Dubois, 82, Dutch anthropologist who in 1891 found the first skull of the Java ape man, concluded he had discovered the "missing link," called it Pithecanthropus erectus; in Haelen, Belgium.
From Time Magazine Archive
But for a long time the Dubois find remained the only known Pithecanthropus skull, and comparisons seemed dangerous on the basis of single samples.
From Time Magazine Archive
People talked of Pithecanthropus as of Pitt or Fox or Napoleon .
From Time Magazine Archive
The Pithecanthropus of Java alone shows perhaps more affinity to the apes.
From The Antiquity of Man by Lyell, Charles, Sir
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
