Paleontology has been very attractive since its inception, which is why many scholars launched into its study, and scientific societies echoed the discoveries. This great interest meant that, as is usual in our species, many people wanted to take advantage of the situation. Sometimes looking for glory, and other times, taking advantage of the situation and the interest of researchers, some cases of fraudulent fossils were born.
The most famous of them date from the beginning of the 20th century. At that time the findings of Human Paleontology were on the rise. In the second half of the 19th century, several Neanderthal specimens had been discovered, and all the countries of the old world were wanting to find fossil remains of the “missing link” within their borders.
In this race to find human ancestors, a “find” occurred in Piltdown , Sussex, England. A worker found ancient bone fragments in a quarry that appeared to be human, and immediately took them to archaeologist Charles Dawson , who presented this find together with paleontologist Smith Woodward at the Geological Society of London: a “missing link” in evolution human, which was also everything that was expected according to the prevailing thinking at the time.
Then it was believed that the origin of humanity had begun with the growth of our brain , so it was expected to find a “link” with a brain cavity similar to that of a modern human, but with primitive features. And this was just what they had found: a skull with features similar to those of a modern human, but with a more ape-like jaw. This finding was named “ Eoanthropus dawsonii ”, and since it was just what was expected to be found, this finding was embraced. In time it was discovered that this “ Piltdown Man ” had been a hoax constructed from a medieval human skull and a more recent orangutan jawbone, both chemically treated to have a similar, “fossiliferous” coloration.
Interestingly, the discovery of real fossils of human ancestors in recent decades has taught us that the hominization process was very different from what the Piltdown remains suggested, with brain augmentation being one of the last steps, starting with posture. bipedal
A more recent case is that of ” Archaeoraptor “, a false dinosaur fossil. This fraud was formed from the body of a bird and the tail of a dromaeosaur (a group of theropods to which Velociraptor and its relatives belong). The announcement of this finding was made in 1999, supposedly after finding the specimen, but before it was properly studied by experts in dinosaur paleontology. Those who were cheated with this purchase were in too much of a hurry!
The over-enthusiasm was fatal, for if it had been thoroughly examined, the deception would have been discovered. The fossil had been bought illegally from one of the farmers collecting fossils in the Liaoning region of China , in places close to the large deposits that have revealed many feathered dinosaurs. In these places where the same rocks outcrop as in very important deposits, it is common for local people to try to make a living selling fossils that they find outside the “official” quarries, and as is common among fossil dealers, they had connected parts of different individuals to increase the price of the piece. In this case, the detailed study of the specimen after a few weeks already revealed that the tail did not belong to the bird. Once the chimera was disassembled, the bird was studied and named Yanornis in 2001, while the tail was identified as belonging to the dromaeosaur species that was described in 2000, Microraptor.
In this case the deception lasted only a few months, until the specimen was studied in detail, revealing how difficult it is for these frauds to go far today . In paleontology we must be very critical and skeptical of any finding. And luckily today we have plenty of techniques to uncover these deceptions. This incident also demonstrates the risk involved in obtaining fossils from the black market , without having control of their specific place of origin or the conditions of their discovery. And it is that the only way to obtain all the information of a fossil is to excavate it in a scientific, methodical, and legal way.
It may be that on the black market they continue to want to deceive paleontologists thirsty for important discoveries with which to boost their careers, but they don’t count on the fact that our science is more about forensic medicine than collecting. Fortunately.
References:
Olive Tree.; Gascó, F. 2018. Paleontology in 100 questions. Nowtilus, 352 pp.
Spencer, F. 1990. The Piltdown papers, 1908–1955: the correspondence and other documents relating to the Piltdown forgery. Natural History Museum Publications.
Zhou, Z. et al. 2002. Archaeoraptor’s better half. Nature, Vol. 420, 285.
