Word: kortlandt
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...short to wield a heavy club effectively. For another million years or so, his brain was not developed enough to conceive of fashioning stone weapons. Yet despite the presence of far more powerful four-legged adversaries on the African savannas, he survived. Now a Dutch zoologist, Adriaan Kortlandt of the University of Amsterdam, has proposed an intriguing answer. In the current Journal of Human Evolution, he suggests that early man was able to use thorny branches to repel the most dangerous predators: large carnivorous cats...
...idea occurred to Kortlandt, 62, in 1976 on a dig in Ethiopia at a prehistoric site. Resting in the shade of a thorny acacia tree, he realized that a short bipedal creature could easily enough break off a branch covered with hooklike thorns, and wave it as a weapon; lions, Kortlandt knew, stay clear of thorns. To test his theory, he journeyed to the Kora National Reserve in Kenya and set large chunks of meat covered with thorn branches near a pride of twelve lions tamed by George Adamson of Born Free fame. The lions approached and batted tentatively...
...Next Kortlandt put a sheep in a wire-mesh cage surrounded by thorn branches. This time, several hungry lionesses began pulling at the branches. But when thorns became lodged in their paw pads, they retreated to lick their wounds. That suggested early man could have protected himself on the savanna by building thorn-branch shelters. But could he survive long sieges? To find out, Kortlandt attached branches to a remote-controlled motor on a framework over chunks of meat. When lions approached, the branches spun as they might had they been brandished by man. The lions darted away...
...lions so wary of thorn branches? Kortlandt's theory: they seem like the flailing tails of animals that lions take great care to avoid-porcupines...
...with embraces and even by shaking hands. When the zoologists repeated their experiment with a different group of rain forest chimps, however, the forest-dwelling animals loped excitedly about on all fours and made threatening noises, but demonstrated no signs of organization and failed to attack the leopard. Concludes Kortlandt: "A forest habitat dehumanizes and a plains habitat humanizes chimpanzee behavior in both fighting technique and bipedal walking. We now can better understand how man as a plains-dwelling biological creature became a real human being, using weapons and cooperating...