Two neuroscientists say that a now-extinct race of humans had big eyes, child-like faces, and an average intelligence of around 150, making them geniuses among Homo sapiens.


The following text is an excerpt from the book Big Brain by Gary Lynch and Richard Granger, and it represents their own theory about the Boskops. The theory is a controversial one; see, for instance, paleoanthropologist John Hawks' much different take.


In the autumn of 1913, two farmers were arguing about hominid skull fragments they had uncovered while digging a drainage ditch. The location was Boskop, a small town about 200 miles inland from the east coast of South Africa.

These Afrikaner farmers, to their lasting credit, had the presence of mind to notice that there was something distinctly odd about the bones. They brought the find to Frederick W. Fitz*Simons, director of the Port Elizabeth Museum, in a small town at the tip of South Africa. The scientific community of South Africa was small, and before long the skull came to the attention of S. H. Haughton, one of the country’s few formally trained paleontologists. He reported his findings at a 1915 meeting of the Royal Society of South Africa. “The cranial capacity must have been very large,” he said, and “calculation by the method of Broca gives a minimum figure of 1,832 cc [cubic centimeters].” The Boskop skull, it would seem, housed a brain perhaps 25 percent or more larger than our own.

The idea that giant-brained people were not so long ago walking the dusty plains of South Africa was sufficiently shocking to draw in the luminaries back in England. Two of the most prominent anatomists of the day, both experts in the reconstruction of skulls, weighed in with opinions generally supportive of Haughton’s conclusions.

The Scottish scientist Robert Broom reported that “we get for the corrected cranial capacity of the Boskop skull the very remarkable figure of 1,980 cc.” Remarkable indeed: These measures say that the distance from Boskop to humans is greater than the distance between humans and their Homo erectus predecessors.

Might the very large Boskop skull be an aberration? Might it have been caused by hydrocephalus or some other disease? These questions were quickly preempted by new discoveries of more of these skulls.

As if the Boskop story were not already strange enough, the accumulation of additional remains revealed another bizarre feature: These people had small, childlike faces. Physical anthropologists use the term pedomorphosis to describe the retention of juvenile features into adulthood. This phenomenon is sometimes used to explain rapid evolutionary changes. For example, certain amphibians retain fishlike gills even when fully mature and past their water-inhabiting period. Humans are said by some to be pedomorphic compared with other primates.Our facial structure bears some resemblance to that of an immature ape. Boskop’s appearance may be described in terms of this trait. A typical current European adult, for instance, has a face that takes up roughly one-third of his overall cranium size. Boskop has a face that takes up only about one-fifth of his cranium size, closer to the proportions of a child. Examination of individual bones confirmed that the nose, cheeks, and jaw were all childlike.

The combination of a large cranium and immature face would look decidedly unusual to modern eyes, but not entirely unfamiliar. Such faces peer out from the covers of countless science fiction books and are often attached to “alien abductors” in movies. The naturalist Loren Eiseley made exactly this point in a lyrical and chilling passage from his popular book, The Immense Journey, describing a Boskop fossil:

“There’s just one thing we haven’t quite dared to mention. It’s this, and you won’t believe it. It’s all happened already. Back there in the past, ten thousand years ago. The man of the future, with the big brain, the small teeth. He lived in Africa. His brain was bigger than your brain. His face was straight and small, almost a child’s face.”

Boskops, then, were much talked and written about, by many of the most prominent figures in the fields of paleontology and anthropology.

Yet today, although Neanderthals and Homo erectus are widely known, Boskops are almost entirely forgotten. Some of our ancestors are clearly inferior to us, with smaller brains and apelike countenances. They’re easy to make fun of and easy to accept as our precursors. In contrast, the very fact of an ancient ancestor like Boskop, who appears un-apelike and in fact in most ways seems to have had characteristics superior to ours, was destined never to be popular.

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What Happened to the Hominids Who May Have Been Smarter Than Us? | Human Origins | DISCOVER Magazine

Define Intelligence and you've got your answer

what question would that be the answer to ? certainly not any in this thread lol thats just some vage jiberish

Interesting article. It's something to think about

There is a skull called star child that was found in Mexico next to another skeleton of a woman, normal. It fit what is said in this thread, much higher brain capacity partly due to the thinness of the bone structure which is reinforced by some fibrous material. They are us, or close to it and more than likely left us primitives to survive on our own. lol.

They left early soon the dolphins will to goodbye and thanx for all the fish --- love that four book trilogy

this reminds me of that people on the moon debacle. It's truly terrifying what the government is capable of conciliating

Evolutionary changes occur in alterations of one's environment and of the fittest. If intelligence is evolutionary , then ideal evolution allows you to adapt to one's universal laws i.e space travel, utilization of gravity, ability to disappear, these are all things that the human body is close to.Sorry to be vague,

I agree kind of like necessity is the mother of a invention, we dont change or invent something until we need it, the change in one's environment and needs lead us down our evolutionary path. But unlike the neanderthals this branch of little known homo sapiens may have been smarter than us 1000's of years before us, the survival of the fittest dosent come into it because thay seem to have been the fittest and most intelligent life on earth at the time. Defining intelligence is a hole other debate that dosent answer the earth and bones question of what happended to these strange big brained, baby faced people with an iq of about 150 and where thay fit into the evolutionary timeline of homo sapiens. This book was written by two neuroscientists who understand the brain and the definition of intelligence better than me and you and we still have this question of what happened to this branch of little known homo sapiens who may have been smarter than us. ?

How do you apply an iq when there is nothing to base it on i never heard of this species did they leave behind a civilization to study... 150 is extremely high and the average human is less than 100-120 ... has anyone been given an iq test hear if ur not emabarassed what was it... fabrication or exageration shows a lower iq... one can also tell with what you say... just curious how did they give them an iq of 150 how many were there where are the fossils where did they live? I ask to know

I've had an IQ test done. Mine is 140 ^-^ I certainly don't FEEL that smart, but apparently I have skills in some areas ^-^

The problem is applying that IQ where it needs to be...but is that all part of being eccentric? LOL