Piltdown man skull reconstruction
Maker
R. F. Damon and Co (estab. 1850)
Date
1914-1953
Description
Plaster cast of Arthur Smith Woodward's reconstruction of Eoanthopus dawsonii, referred to as 'Piltdown man'. The reconstruction is based on the skull fragments and jaw. Piltdown man was an infamous hoax, the reconstruction turning out to be the jaw bone of an orangutan combined with some historic human skull fragments. The fossil elements are coloured different colours on the reconstruction with the missing elments indicated in white plaster. The specimen has been sagittally bisected to facilitate mounting on a wall, and was displayed at the 'Man and His Ancestors' public exhibition in the Melbourne Herald offices in 1932. The reconstruction was made by Frank Barlow, a model maker at London's Natural History Museum at the time of the Piltdown man discovery, and mass produced by R. F. Damon and Co. This specimen was featured in this article in University of Melbourne Collections magazine: https://museumsandcollections.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/2957609/03_Long_Piltdown-Man-23.pdf
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