Image: Homo erectus adult female - head model - Smithsonian Museum of Natural History - 2012-05-17

Description: A model of the face of an adult female Homo erectus, one of the first truly human ancestors of modern humans, on display in the Hall of Human Origins in the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. (humanorigins.si.edu, smithsonianmag.com, gurche.com) Reconstruction based on KNM-ER 3733 and 992. "To recreate the faces of our early ancestors, some of whom have been extinct for millions of years, sculptor John Gurche dissected the heads of modern humans and apes, mapping patterns of soft tissue and bone. He used this information to fill out the features of the fossils. Each sculpture starts with the cast of a fossilized skull; Gurche then adds layers of clay muscle, fat and skin. Seven of his finished hominid busts will be featured at the National Museum of Natural History’s David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins, which opens March 17. They are perhaps the best-researched renderings of their kind." Abigail Tucker, "A Closer Look at Evolutionary Faces", Smithsonian.com, February 25, 2010
Title: Homo erectus adult female - head model - Smithsonian Museum of Natural History - 2012-05-17
Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/23165290@N00/7283200708/
Author: reconstruction by John Gurche; photographed by Tim Evanson
Usage Terms: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0
License: CC BY-SA 2.0
License Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0
Attribution Required?: Yes