Also known as Lion Hill; Maba

Where: Guangdong, China (24.7° N, 113.6° E: paleocoordinates 24.7° N, 113.6° E)

• coordinate stated in text

• small collection-level geographic resolution

When: Middle Pleistocene (0.8 - 0.1 Ma)

• "The cave contained three strata... filling a complex of fissures and openings. Maba 1 and a diversity of mammalian fossils were found in the second level. These deposits extended as much as 10 m above the first level and were ∼8 m in length, ∼7 m in width, and ∼6 m in total height... The associated faunal remains... indicate a later Middle or Late Pleistocene age for the Maba cranium (9– 11). A uranium series date on associated vertebrate teeth yielded an age of 129,000–135,000 y before present (yBP) (12), but it is not clear whether this determination accurately dates the cranium" because of possible analytical biases; "More recent 230Th/234U dating of capping flowstone samples from Southern Branch Cave, another chamber in Lion Head Mountain, suggests that some of the Maba deposits may be as old as 237,000 yBP"

• group of beds-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: cave; unlithified, brown claystone

Size class: macrofossils

Collected in 1958; reposited in the IVPP

Primary reference: X.-J. Wu, L. A. Schepartz, W. Liu and E. Trinkaus. 2011. Antemortem trauma and survival in the late Middle Pleistocene human cranium from Maba, South China. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [J. Alroy/J. Alroy]more details

Purpose of describing collection: paleoecologic analysis

PaleoDB collection 120834: authorized by John Alroy, entered by John Alroy on 22.11.2011

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)