The Wisdom of the Bones: in Search of Human Origins by Alan Walker

The Wisdom of the Bones: in Search of Human Origins by Alan Walker

Fascinating. . . . As engaging an explanation of how scientists study fossil bones as any I have ever read. --John R. Alden, Philadelphia Inquirer
In 1984 a team of paleoanthropologists on a dig in northern Kenya found something extraordinary: a nearly complete skeleton of Homo erectus, a creature that lived 1.5 million years ago and is widely thought to be the missing link between apes and humans. The remains belonged to a tall, rangy adolescent male. The researchers called him Nariokotome boy.
In this immensely lively book, Alan Walker, one of the lead researchers, and his wife and fellow scientist Pat Shipman tell the story of that epochal find and reveal what it tells us about our earliest ancestors. We learn that Nariokotome boy was a highly social predator who walked upright but lacked the capacity for speech. In leading us to these conclusions, The Wisdom of the Bones also offers an engaging chronicle of the hundred-year-long search for a missing link, a saga of folly, heroic dedication, and inspired science.
Brilliantly captures [an] intellectual odyssey. . . . One of the finest examples of a practicing scientist writing for a popular audience.
--Portland Oregonian
A vivid insider's perspective on the global efforts to document our own ancestry.
--Richard E. Leakey

ALAN WALKER is Professor Emeritus of Music at McMaster University, Canada. Before settling in North America he was on the staff of the Music Division of the British Broadcasting Corporation in London. He has broadcast for the BBC, for the CBC, and for CJRT - FM (Toronto), and gives regular public
lectures on the music of the Romantic Era, a period in which he specializes. His thirteen published books include A Study in Musical Analysis, An Anatomy of Musical Criticism, and symposia on Chopin, Schumann, and Liszt. Dr. Walker is also author of a three-volume, prize winning biography of Franz
Liszt, a project which took him twenty-five years to complete, and for which the President of Hungary bestowed on him the medal ProCulturaHungarica. The biography also received the Royal Philharmonic Society Prize, presented by HRH The Duke of Kent in London. He is the recipient of the Music
Teachers National Association 2010 Achievement Award and the Knight's Cross of the Order of Merit from Hungary.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780679426240
ISBN 10	0679426248
Title	The Wisdom of the Bones: in Search of Human Origins
Author	Alan Walker
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Hardback
Publisher	Knopf
Year published	1996-04-09
Number of pages	8
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
Note	Unavailable