万物简史 第628期:神秘的两足动物(6)

Broom was an accomplished¹ paleontologist, and since he was also resident in South Africa he was able to examine the Taung skull² at first hand. He could see at once that it was as important as Dart³ supposed and spoke⁴ out vigorously on Dart's behalf, but to no effect. For the next fifty years the received wisdom was that the Taung child was an ape and nothing more. Most textbooks didn't even mention it. Dart spent five years working up a monograph⁶, but could find no one to publish it. Eventually he gave up the quest to publish altogether (though he did continue hunting for fossils). For years, the skull—today recognized as one of the supreme⁷ treasures of anthropology—sat as a paperweight on a colleague's desk.

布罗姆是一个颇有造诣的古生物学家，又居住在南非，因此有机会亲自审视塔翁头骨。他立刻意识到它确实具有达特所认为的那种重要意义，并不遗余力地为达特辩护，可是毫无效果。在以后的50年里，人们一致的看法是塔翁男孩只不过是猿，仅此而已。大多数教科书甚至都没有提到它。达特用5年时间撰写了一篇论文，却找不到发表的地方。最后他彻底放弃了寻求发表的努力（虽然他还在继续寻找化石）。这块头骨——今天被认为是人类学最珍贵的东西之一——在达特一位同事的办公桌上被当做镇纸用了好多年。

At the time Dart made his announcement in 1924, only four categories of ancient hominid were known—Homo heidelbergensis, Homo rhodesiensis, Neandertals, and Dubois's Java Man—but all that was about to change in a very big way.

1924年，当达特公布他的发现的时候，人们已知的古人类只有4种：海德尔堡人、罗德西亚人、尼安德特人，以及杜布瓦的爪哇人——但是很快，这一切就将发生根本性改观。

First, in China, a gifted Canadian amateur named Davidson Black began to poke⁵ around at a place, Dragon Bone Hill, that was locally famous as a hunting ground for old bones. Unfortunately, rather than preserving the bones for study, the Chinese ground them up to make medicines. We can only guess how many priceless Homo erectus bones ended up as a sort of Chinese equivalent of bicarbonate of soda⁸. The site had been much denuded⁹ by the time Black arrived, but he found a single fossilized molar and on the basis of that alone quite brilliantly announced the discovery of Sinanthropus pekinensis, which quickly became known as Peking Man.

先是在中国，一位名叫戴维森·步达生的加拿大业余考古爱好者开始在一处名为龙骨山的地方进行挖掘工作。这座小山在当地无人不知，因为人们在那里发现了古化石。不幸的是，当地人并没有把这些化石保存下来供科学研究用，却把它们磨成粉当成了一种制药材料。我们不知道有多少无价的直立人化石被当地人当做制作中药材的材料。当步达生来到那里的时候，那个地方已经被挖得不成样子，但是他还是发现了一颗臼齿化石。据此他很英明地得出结论，他发现了一种新的化石人类型：北京中国猿人，很快他就被称为北京人。

1 accomplished   

adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的

参考例句：

• Thanks to your help,we accomplished the task ahead of schedule.亏得你们帮忙,我们才提前完成了任务。
• Removal of excess heat is accomplished by means of a radiator.通过散热器完成多余热量的排出。

2 skull   

n.头骨；颅骨

参考例句：

• The skull bones fuse between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five.头骨在15至25岁之间长合。
• He fell out of the window and cracked his skull.他从窗子摔了出去，跌裂了颅骨。

3 dart   

v.猛冲，投掷；n.飞镖，猛冲

参考例句：

• The child made a sudden dart across the road.那小孩突然冲过马路。
• Markov died after being struck by a poison dart.马尔科夫身中毒镖而亡。

4 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

5 poke   

n.刺，戳，袋；vt.拨开，刺，戳；vi.戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢

参考例句：

• We never thought she would poke her nose into this.想不到她会插上一手。
• Don't poke fun at me.别拿我凑趣儿。

6 monograph   

n.专题文章，专题著作

参考例句：

• This monograph belongs to the category of serious popular books.这本专著是一本较高深的普及读物。
• It's a monograph you wrote six years ago.这是你六年前写的的专论。

7 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

8 soda   

n.苏打水；汽水

参考例句：

• She doesn't enjoy drinking chocolate soda.她不喜欢喝巧克力汽水。
• I will freshen your drink with more soda and ice cubes.我给你的饮料重加一些苏打水和冰块。

9 denuded   

adj.[医]变光的，裸露的v.使赤裸( denude的过去式和过去分词 )；剥光覆盖物

参考例句：

• hillsides denuded of trees 光秃秃没有树的山坡
• In such areas we see villages denuded of young people. 在这些地区，我们在村子里根本看不到年轻人。 来自辞典例句