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
The two scientists found some differences in the Sinanthropus and Pithecanthropus skull shapes, but also some exact resemblances, even in minor structural details.
From Time Magazine Archive
First Pithecanthropus relics were found in Java by a Dutchman, Eugene Dubois, in 1892.
From Time Magazine Archive
The scientist quickly realized that he had in his hands one of the most important evolutionary finds since the discovery of Pithecanthropus erectus, the ape-man of Java.
From Time Magazine Archive
If an ape, Pithecanthropus had an enormous brain; if a man, he must have verged on what we should consider idiocy.
From Anthropology by Marett, R. R. (Robert Ranulph)
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
