Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Evolutionary Asiacentrism, Peking Man, and the Origins of␣Sinocentric Ethno-Nationalism

  • Published:
Journal of the History of Biology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This paper discusses how the theory of evolutionary Asiacentrism and the Peking Man findings at the Zhoukoudian site stimulated Chinese intellectuals to construct Sinocentric ethno-nationalism during the period from the late 1920s to the early 1940s. It shows that the theory was first popularized by foreign scientists in Beijing, and the Peking man discoveries further provided strong evidence for the idea that Central Asia, or to be more specific, Tibet, Xinjiang, and Mongolia, was the original cradle of humans. Chinese scholars in the late 1930s and 1940s appropriated the findings to construct the monogenesis theory of the Chinese, which designated that all the diverse ethnic groups within the territory of China shared a common ancestor back to antiquity.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Andersson, J.G. 1923. “An Early Chinese Culture.” Bulletin of the Geological Survey of China 5(1): 32.

    Google Scholar 

  • Andersson, J.G. 1925. “Preliminary Report on the Archaeological Research in Kansu.” Memoir of the Geological Survey of China, Series A 5: 41.

    Google Scholar 

  • Andersson, J.G. 1934. Children of the Yellow Earth. London: Kegan Paul.

    Google Scholar 

  • Andersson, J.G. 1943. “Researches into the Prehistory of the Chinese.” Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities 15: 287.

    Google Scholar 

  • Arne, T.J. 1925. “Painted Stone Age Pottery from the Province of Honan, China.” Palaeontologia Sinica, Series D 1(2): 1–34.

    Google Scholar 

  • Black, Davidson. 1925a. Asia and the Dispersal of Primates. Reprint from the Bulletin of the Geological Society of China 4(2): 133–183.

  • Black, Davidson. 1925b. “A Note on the Physical Characters of the Prehistoric Kansu Race.” Memoirs of the Geological Survey of China, Series A 5: 52–56.

    Google Scholar 

  • Black, Davidson. 1925c. “The Human Skeletal Remains from the Sha Kuo Tun Cave Deposit in Comparison with Those from Yang Shao Tsun and with Recent North China Skeletal Material.” Palaeontologia Sinica and Geological Survey of China, Series D 1(3): 1–148.

    Google Scholar 

  • Black, Davidson. 1927. “On a Lower Molar Hominid Tooth from the Chou Kou Tien Deposit.” Palaeontologia Sinica, Series D 7(1): 22.

    Google Scholar 

  • Black, Davidson. 1928. “Study of Kansu and Honan Aeneolithic Skulls and Specimens from Later Kansu Prehistoric Sites in Comparison with North China and Other Recent Crania.” Palaeontologia Sinica and Geological Survey of China, Series D 6(1): 1–83.

    Google Scholar 

  • Black, Davidson. 1934. “The Croonian Lecture – On the Discovery, Morphology, and Environment of Sinanthrous pekinensis.” Philosophical Transaction of the Royal Society, London 123: 113–115.

    Google Scholar 

  • Black, Davidson, Teilhard de Chardin, P., Young, C.C., and Pei, W.C. 1933. Fossil Man in China. Beijing: Geological Survey of China.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bowler, Peter. 1986. Theories of Human Evolution: A Century of Debate, 1844–1944. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bowler, Peter. 1992. “Comment ‘Piltdown: An Appraisal of the Case against Sir Arthur Keith’.” Current Anthropology 33(3): 261.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cann, R.L., Stoneking, M., and Wilson, A.C. 1987. “Mitochondrial DNA and Human evolution.” Nature 325: 31–36.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chalmers, John. 1866. The Origin of Chinese: An Attempt to Trace the Connection of the Chinese with the Western Nations in their Religion, Superstitions, Arts, Languages, and Traditions. Hong Kong: De Souza and Co.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chen, Zhengmo. 1943. “Zhonghua minzu yiyou wushiwan nian zhi lishi [The Chinese Has a History of 500,000 Years].” Xin Zhonghua, New Series 1(10): 24.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chow, Kai-wing. 1997. “Imagining Boundaries of Blood: Zhang Bingling and the Invention of the Han ‘Race’ in Modern China.” Frank Dikötter (ed.), The Construction of Racial Identities in China and Japan. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

  • Cordier, Henri. 1920. Histoire Générale de la Chine. Paris:Librairie Paul Geuthner.

    Google Scholar 

  • Da, Yin. 1940. ‘“Zhonghua minzu ji qi wenhua zhi qiyuan” [The Chinese Race and Its Cultural Origins].” Zhongguo wenhua 1(5): 16.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dennell, Robin. 2001.“From Sangiran to Olduvai, 1937–1960: The Quest for ‘Centres’ of Hominid Origins in Asia and Africa.” Raymond Corbey and Wil Roebroeks (eds.), Studying Human Origins: Disciplinary History and Epistemology. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.

  • Dikötter, Frank. 1992. The Discourse of Race in Modern China. California:Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Edkins, Joseph. 1871. China’s Place in Philology: an Attempt to show that the Languages of Europe and Asia have a Common Origin. London:Trübner & Co.

    Google Scholar 

  • Elman, Benjamin. 2007. “New Direction in the History of Modern Science in China: Global Science and Comparative History.” Isis 98: 517–523.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Etler, Dennis. 2004. “Homo erectus in East Asia: Human Ancestor of Evolutionary Dead-End?’ Athena Review 4(1)(1): 55–72.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fan, Fa-ti. 2008. “How Did the Chinese Become Native?: Science and the Search for National Origins in the May Fourth Era.” Kai-Wing Chow, Tze-ki Hon, Hung-yok Ip, and Don C. Price (eds.), Beyond the May Fourth Paradigm: In Search of Chinese Modernity. Lanham: Lexington Books.

  • Ferring, Reid, et al. 2011. “Earliest Human Occupations at Dmanisi (Georgian Caucasus) Dated to 1.85–1.78 Ma.” PNAS 108(26): 10432–10435.

  • Girardot, Norman J. 2002. The Victorian Translation of China: James Legge’s Oriental Pilgrimage. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grabau, A.W. 1930a. “Asia and the Evolution of Man.” The China Journal 12: 152–163.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grabau, A.W. 1930b. “Yaxiya he renlei de jinhua” [Asia and the Evolution of Man]. Ziranjie 5(7): 599–611.

  • Grabau, A.W. 1934. “The Beginnings of the Human Race.” Journal of the North China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 65(7): 1–20.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grabau, A.W. 1935a. “Did Man Originate in Asia?” Asia: 24–27.

  • Grabau, A.W. 1935b. ““Renlei shifou qiyuan yu yazhou” [Did Man Originate in Asia].” Shishi leibian 3(11): 86–90.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grabau, A.W. 1935c. Tibet and the Origin of Man. Stockholm: Centraltryckeriet.

    Google Scholar 

  • Guangming, Li. 1943. ‘“Zhonghua minzu de youjiuxing” [The Antiquity of the Chinese].” Sichuan qingnian 1(2): 14–18.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haeckele, Ernst. 1876. The History of Creation. New York: D. Appleton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hon, Tze-ki. 2010. “From a Hierarchy in Time to a Hierarchy in Space: The Meanings of Sino-Babylonism in Early Twentieth-Century China.” Modern China 36(2): 139–169.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hood, Dora. 1964. Davidson Black: A Biography. Toronto:University of Toronto Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • HUGO Pan-Asian SNP Consortium. 2009. “Mapping Human Genetic Diversity in Asia.” Science 326: 1541–1545.

  • “Indians are Ancestors of Japanese, Chinese.” 2009. Indiaedunews.net (National Network of Education) at http://www.indiaedunews.net/Science/Indians_are_ancestors_of_Japanese,_Chinese_9855/.

  • Huixiang, Lin. 1936. Zhongguo minzushi [History of the Chinese Nation], Vol. 1. Shanghai: Shangwu chubanshe.

  • Hung, Kuang-chi. 2010. “The Place that ‘Offers the Greatest Interest’: Northeast Asia and the Making of the Making of Asia Gray’s Disjunction Thesis.” Harvard Papers in Botany 15(2): 231–276.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jiang, Zhiyou. 1929. Zhongguo renzhong kao [The Study of the Chinese Race]. Shanghai: Huangtong shuju.

  • Jiefei, Li. 1936. “Renlei zuxian yu qi zhudi [Human Ancestors and their Original Home].” Xuefeng 6(6): 7.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lanpo, Jia. 1992. “Gurenleixue yanjiu de yixie wenti” [A Few Questions Concerning the Study of Paleoanthropology]. Chen Guoqiang and Lin Jiahuang (eds.), Renleixue yanjiu zhi si [The Study of Anthropology], Vol. 4. Shanghai: Sanlian chubanshe.

  • Lanpo, Jia, and Weiwen, Huang. 1990 The Story of Peking Man. Yin Zhiqi (Trans.). Beijing/Hong Kong: Foreign Languages Press: Oxford University Press.

  • Leibold, James. 2007. Reconfiguring Chinese Nationalism: How the Qing Frontier and its Indigenes Became Chinese. New York: Palgrave MacMillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Liu, Shipei. 1975. Liu Shenshu xiansheng Yishu [The Posthumous Work of Liu Shipei], Vol. 1. Taipei: Huashi chubanshe.

  • Lordkipanidze, David, de Len, Marcia S Ponce, Margvelashvili, Ann, Rak, Yoel, Philip Rightmire, G, Vekua, Abesalom, Zollikofer, Christoph PE. 2013. “A Complete Skull from Dmanisi, Georgia, and the Evolutionary Biology of Early Homo.” Science 342(6156): 326–331.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mao, Qijun, and Honghuan, Liu. 1941. Women de guozu [Our Nation]. Chongqing: Duli chubanshe.

  • Marchand, Suzanne. 2009. German Orientalism in the Age of Empire. New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Matthew, William Diller. 1915. “Climate and Evolution.” Annals of New York Academy of Science 14: 171–318.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mazur, Allan Mazur. 2004. A Romance in Natural History. Syracuse, NY: Garret.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mungello, David E. 1985. Curious Land: Jesuit Accommodation and the Origins of Sinology. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag Wiesbaden GMBH.

    Google Scholar 

  • Osborn, Henry Fairfield. 1900. “The Geological and Faunal Relations of Europe and America During the Tertiary Period and the Theory of the Successive Invasions of an African Fauna.” Science, New Series 11(276): 561–574.

    Google Scholar 

  • Osborn, Henry Fairfield. 1922. “Proving Asia the Mother of Continents.” Asia Magazine 12(9): 721–724.

    Google Scholar 

  • 1926. “Why Central Asia?” Natural History 16(3): 263–269.

    Google Scholar 

  • Osborn, Henry Fairfield. 1927. Man Rises to Parnassus: Critical Epochs in the Prehistory of Man. Princeton, NJ:Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Regal, Brian. 2002. Henry Fairfield Osborn: Race and the Search for the Origins of Man. Hants, UK:Ashgate Publishing Limited.

    Google Scholar 

  • “Renlei qiyuandi yanjiu zhengyi” [The Controversy over the Origin of Humans] at http://news.survey.sina.com.cn/voteresult.php?pid=6765.

  • Said, Edward. 1979. Orientalism. New York:Random House.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sautman, Barry. 2001. “Peking Man and the Politics of Paleoanthropological Nationalism in China.” The Journal of Asian Studies 60(1): 95–124.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schmalzer, Sigrid. 2008. The People’s Peking Man: Popular Science and Human Identity in Twentieth-Century China. Chicago:University of Chicago Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Shen, Guanjun, Gao, Xing, Gao, Bin, and Granger, Darryl E. 2009. “Age of Zhoukoudian Homo erectus with 26Al/10Be Burial Dating.” Nature 458: 198–200.

  • Shen, Song-chiao. 1997. “Wo yi wo xue jian Xuanyuan – Huangdi shenhua yu wan Qing de guozu jiangou” [The Myth of Huangdi and the Construction of Chinese Nationhood in Late Qing]. Taiwan shehui jikan 28: 37–38.

  • Sheng, Zhe. 1929. ‘Zhongguo xinde yi ‘renlei yuanshi yazhou’ de shizheng [A New Evidence for ‘Asia as the Origin of Humans’ is Found in China].” Dongfang zazhi 26(11): 81.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shili, Xiong. 2001. Xiong Shili quanji, 2 vols. Wuhan:Hubei jiaoyu chubanshe.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shipman, Pat. 2001. The Man Who Found the Missing Link: the Extraordinary Life of Eugene Dubois. London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson.

  • Shirakawa, Jirō, Tanenori, Kokubu. 1900. Shina bunmei shi. Tokyo:Hakubunkan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Smith, Anthony Smith. 1999. Myths and Memories of the Nation. Oxford:Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stinger, Christopher, McKie, Robin. 1996. African Exodus: The Origins of Modern Humanity. New York:Henry Holt and Company Inc.

    Google Scholar 

  • Templeton, Alan. 2007. “Genetics and Recent Human Evolution.” Evolution 61(7): 1507–1519.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Terrien de Lacouperie, Albert. 1894. Western Origin of the Early Chinese Civilization from 2300 B.C. to 200 A.D. London: Asher & Co.

  • Theunissen, Bert. 1989. Eugène Dubois and the Ape-Man from Java. Dordrecht:Kluwer.

    Google Scholar 

  • von Richthofen, Ferdinand. 1877. China: Ergebnisse eigener reisen und darauf gegrundeter studien. Berlin:D. Reimer, pp. 404–428.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weidan, Ye. 1933. Beijing ren [Peking Man]. Shanghai: Liangyou tushu yinshua gongsi.

  • Weidenreich, Franz. 1938–1939. “On the Earliest Representatives of Modern Mankind Recovered on the Soil of East Asia.” Peking Natural History Bulletin 13(3): 170.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weidenreich, Franz. 1939. “Sinanthropus pekinensis and His Significance for the Problem of Human Evolution.” Bulletin of the Geological Society of China 19(1): 12.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weidenreich, Franz. 1943. “The Skull of Sinanthropus pekinensis: A Comparative Study of a Primitive Hominid Skull.” Palaeontologica Sinia, Series D, 10: 127.

  • Weidenreich, Franz. 1946. Apes, Giants and Man. Chicago:University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weidenreich, Franz. 1947a. “Facts and Speculations Concerning the Origin of Homo sapiens.” American Anthropologist 49: 187–203.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Weidenreich, Franz. 1947b. “The Trend of Human Evolution.” Evolution 1: 221–236.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wenzhong, Pei. 1930. ““Zhongguo yuanren huashi zhi fajian” [The Discovery of the Chinese Ape-Man].” Kexue 14(8): 1128.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wolpoff, Milford. 1982. “Ramapithecus and Hominid Origins.” Current Anthropology 23(5): 501–522.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wolpoff, Milford, and Caspari, Rachel. 1997. Race and Human Evolution. New York: Simon & Schuster.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wolpoff, Milford, Xinzhi, Wu, and Thorn, Alan. 1984. “Modern Homo sapiens Origins: A General Theory of Hominid Evolution Involving the Fossil Evidence from East Asia.” Fred H. Smith and F. Spencer (eds.), The Origins of Modern Humans. New York: Alan R. Liss Inc.

  • Xi, Zhu. 1940. Women de zuxian [Our Ancestors]. Shanghai: Wenhua shenghuo chubanshe.

  • Xiaoming, Yan, Jianxin, Wang, and Renqiong, Lai. 2008. “Yige weida de minzu yu yixiang weida yundong de lishixing ronghe.” Renmin ribao (Beijing).

  • Xingcan, Chen. 2007. Zhongguo shiqian kaoguxue shi yanjiu [Study on History of Prehistoric Archaeology in China]. Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe.

  • Xingtang, Liu. 1935. “Zhongguo renzhong de qiyuan” [The Origin of the Chinese].” Wenhua pipan 2: 11.

  • Yen, Hsiao-pei. 2012. “Constructing the Chinese: Paleoanthropology and Anthropology in the Chinese Frontier, 1920–1950.” Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University.

  • Youliang, 1942. “Cong shiqian renlei shuodao Zhonghua minzu [From Prehistoric Humans to the Chinese].” Xinli jianshe 1(5): 10–17.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhaozi, Jin. 1929. “Zhongguo renzhong ji wenhua zhi youlai” [The Origin of the Chinese Race and Culture].” Dongfang zazhi 26(24): 73.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhongjian, Yang. 1931. “Zhongguo yuanren yu renlei jinhua wenti [Chinese Ape-Man and Human Evolution].” Kexue 15(9): 1392.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhongjian, Yang. 1943. “You ‘taohua shi’ shuodao renlei zuxian de zhuixun” [From the “peach fossil” to the Search for Human Origin]. Dagong bao.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC

    Hsiao-pei Yen

Authors
  1. Hsiao-pei Yen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Hsiao-pei Yen.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Yen, Hp. Evolutionary Asiacentrism, Peking Man, and the Origins of␣Sinocentric Ethno-Nationalism. J Hist Biol 47, 585–625 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10739-014-9381-4

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10739-014-9381-4

Keywords

Search

Navigation