Franz Weidenreich, 1873-1948

[originally published in American Anthropologist, 51:85-90, 1949]

W. K. GREGORY
American Museum of Natural History

FRANZ WEIDENREICH, who died at his home assistant he became in 1901. It is known,
in New York City on July 11, 1948 after a however, that he dared to differ from that famous
relatively brief illness, had already contributed authority when he felt that the facts supported
immeasurably to the advancement of the science him, and that he was glad to return to Strassburg
of man and was then engaged in the completion in 1902 as Prosector. There his talents were well
of one of the most significant of all his recognized and he was appointed Professor of
monographs. His imperishable results were Anatomy in 1904. This was also the year of his
accomplished in spite of the anguish and marriage to Mathilde Neuberger, who was his
distractions of two world wars. He, the flower of most faithful and devoted wife and partner
German science and true culture, was rejected by during all the fateful years since then and who,
the monsters that ruled the land of his birth; but with their three daughters, lives to cherish his
he lived to find, in China and in the United memory.
States of America, new and far greater By 1914 he had published 55 papers, mostly
opportunities for his indefatigable energy and in hematology as above noted. As his results in
constructive intellect. hematology were published in the standard
He was born June 7, 1873, in Edenkoben of German journals, they were no doubt well
the Palatinate, Germany, and he was the known to and used by contemporary and later
youngest of four children. His father, Carl workers in that field; but they also gave him a
Weidenreich, was a merchant; his mother was special background and viewpoint; for he went
Frederike (Edesheimer) Weidenreich. After a on from that point to study some of the other
peaceful childhood Franz Weidenreich graduated tissues that are built up and fashioned by the
from the Humanist Gymnasium in Landau, not units carried in the blood stream: such as
far from the Rhine; he then spent six years in the muscular and connective tissues, tendons,
study of medicine and allied science, at four ligaments, cartilage, bone, the dermal and
great German universities, Munich, Kiel, Berlin cuticular system, teeth, dentine, enamel,
and Strassburg, receiving his M.D. from the periodontium, alveolar tissue; passing thence to
latter in 1899. During this period of preparation, jaws, skulls, the skeleton as a whole, the relation
study and travel, he assimilated much of the best of locomotion to body-form and posture, the
of the rich Central European culture and science. significance of the appendages of man, the
One of his hobbies was botany, and he acquired correlation of brain and skull-form with posture;
a precise knowledge of the floras of the field, and to still wider circles, culminating in the
garden, forest and mountainside. Another was differentiation of races and the laws of evolution.
mountain-climbing, especially in the Alps, for In all these subjects his discoveries and
which his short frame and alert agility were no conclusions call for far wider and more careful
less advantageous than his endurance. consideration than they have yet received.
His inaugural dissertation, dealing with the The period of the first world war and its
structure and function of the central nucleus of aftermath is indicated by a hiatus of seven years
the mammalian cerebellum, was the first of some (1914-1921) in his bibliography. Living in the
215 contributions, the last of which is still disputed land of Alsace-Lorraine he served from
unpublished. From 1899 to 1901 he served first 1914 to 1918 as a member of the Municipal
as Assistant and then later as Privatdocent in the Council of the City of Strassburg, and was
Department of Anatomy of the University of president of the Democratic Party of Alsace-
Strassburg, under Professor Gustav Schwalbe. In Lorraine till 1918. When the French took over in
the laboratories of that department he conducted 1918 he was dismissed from his post as
his early investigations on the human spleen and Professor of Anatomy in the University of
its vascular supply, on leucocytes, phagocytes, Strassburg, and it was not until 1921 that he was
and other units of the blood-lymph system. This able to resume his rightful place in university
work attracted the attention of Dr. Paul Ehrlich circles, in that year becoming Professor of
of the University of Frankfurt a. M., whose Anatomy at the University of Heidelberg. His

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first contributions to the problem of the origin of the Rockefeller Foundation he was appointed in
man date back to 1904 in two short papers on the 1935 to be Visiting Professor of Anatomy at the
formation of the human chin and its significance Peking Union Medical College, and Honorary
for speech. The next dates from 1913 and dealt Director of the Cenozoic Research Laboratory,
with the hip bone and pelvis of primates and Geological Survey of China. Thus to him and to
their transformation through the upright gait. his ever-courageous wife a practically new world
Eight years later, in 1921-1922, appeared his was opened, which he proceeded to explore and
important paper on the human foot and its origin describe with his accustomed thoroughness and
from a grasping ape foot fundamentally like that breadth. For several years he was happily
of the gorilla. However, most of his papers engaged in the following activities: (1)
between 1921 and 1926 were concerned with the cooperating with his Chinese colleagues Drs. C.
microscopic and macroscopic characters of bone C. Young, W. C. Pei, E. Bien, and with his
and related tissues, with the skeleton as a whole, friend Father Teilhard de Chardin in the direction
with the teeth including dentine, enamel and of the extensive excavations at Chou Kou Tien
periodontium, with the relation of the teeth to the near Peking; (2) supervising the freeing of the
jawbones, and with the evolution of the teeth and fossil bones from the matrix, the piecing together
jaws in vertebrates. Thus he laid a wide and of fragments; (3) closely directing the drawing
secure base for his later and more widely known by excellent Chinese artists of every facet of
memoirs on the skull and skeletons of fossil every tooth and the .accurate delineation of all
men. Nor did he ever have occasion to doubt the aspects of the skull; (4) preparing the
essential correctness of the views of Darwin and manuscripts for his imposing series of memoirs
Huxley that man was a derivative of an ancient on Sinanthropus pekinensis; (5) writing and
anthropoid stock but not of any recent genus of seeing through the press a steady stream of
apes. papers dealing chiefly with the anatomy of
In 1926 he published his first paper on the Sinanthropus and Pithecanthropus and with their
fossil human skull found at Weimar-Ehringsdorf relations with each other and with later races.
and this was also the first of his many papers on In 1937 he made a voyage to Java, joining
fossil human skulls. In 1928 he became Dr. G. H. R. von Koenigswald there in order to
Professor of Anthropology at the University of examine the sites of the latter’s great discoveries
Frankfurt a. M., a post which he held until 1935. of new and gigantic relatives of Dubois’
During this period he continued to publish Pithecanthropus. In 1938 von Koenigswald and
occasional papers on blood, bone, dentine, teeth, Weidenreich together announced the discovery
etc., including an article of 129 pages on bone of a new skull of Pithecanthropus (P. robustus),
tissue. But the drift of the times inevitably and the next year they directed attention to the
directed his attention more and more to the close relationship between Sinanthropus and
problems of human races, both fossil and recent, Pithecanthropus and showed that the latter was
and he dealt incisively but surely with this much older and more primitive than the former.
bedeviled topic in numerous papers. With the approach of the Japanese toward
1931 was signalized by another notable Peking the work at Chou Kou Tien was
contribution, on the primarily prehensile suspended and Dr. and Mrs. Weidenreich
character of the human hands and feet and on returned to New York, bringing a valuable
their significance for the problem of human collection of beautifully prepared casts of
origin. Other noteworthy entries were: a brief Sinanthropus and Pithecanthropus fossils,
paper on the reversibility of evolution, contesting including skulls and important skull-fragments,
the misapplication of Dollo’s “law of jaws, teeth, and limb bones. As an honored guest
irreversibility”; and several short studies on of the American Museum of Natural History Dr.
fossil skull fragments from different sites in Weidenreich then entered upon the last period
Europe. (1941-1948) of his amazingly productive life.
With other anthropologists he had followed But this period, gratifying as it was in
closely the discoveries of the fossil Peking man production, was not without its sorrow and
Sinanthropus as described by Davison Black, anguish. During the second world war Mrs.
and he quickly sensed its annectant characters Weidenreich’s mother had fallen as a victim to
between Pithecanthropus, the Neanderthals and the devouring Moloch. One of their three
later men. In 1934 he was Visiting Professor of daughters, Dr. Ruth Piccagli, was in a
Anatomy at the University of Chicago. After concentration camp and her husband, an officer
Davison Black’s death and under the auspices of of the Italian Navy, had been shot for his

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activities against Mussolini. The oldest daughter, supergiant Gigantopithecus. One of the most
Mrs. Elizabeth von Scheven, was also in a important fossils which Dr. von Koenigswald
concentration camp. Fortunately the youngest brought with him, all being on loan from the
daughter, Miss Marion Weidenreich, was safe in Government of Holland, was the superb series of
New York. After the war by incessant efforts skulls of the Solo man (Homo soloensis) which
Dr. Weidenreich at last succeeded in extricating he had also discovered in Java. Another was his
Dr. Piccagli, and Mrs,von Scheven, her husband own collection of hundreds of isolated fossil
and two children, from the toils of red tape, and mammalian teeth, including those of men and
in bringing them all happily together in New apes. These he had gradually secured from South
York. There they all soon found useful ways of Chinese drug stores, where they would otherwise
meeting successfully the problems of living in have been ground up as medicine. Dr. von
the new world. Koenigswald was also welcomed at the
Among the first papers which he prepared at American Museum of Natural History, and he
the Museum were his memoir on “The Brain and and Dr. Weidenreich immediately resumed their
Its Role in the Phylogenetic Transformation of collaboration in the study of this superb material.
the Human Skull” which was published in 1941, The outstanding work of 1946 was his book
also “The Massiveness of the Prehominoid Skull, “Apes, Giants and Man,” based on a series of
a Distinctive Hominoid Character.” This was five lectures delivered by the author at the
followed (1943) by his definitive memoir on University of California in 1945. This brought
“The Skull of Sinanthropus; a Comparative wide publicity to his conclusion, based on fossil
Study on a Primitive Hominoid Skull.” Other evidence, that the ancestors of man, before the
very notable contributions of this period were separation of the modern races, were not
“The Brachycephalization of Modern Mankind” pygmies, as often supposed, but rather, giants, at
and the memoir on “Giant Man from Java and least in respect to the size and massiveness of
South China.” The latter was a continuation of their skulls and jaws, whatever their height may
the studies which he had formerly made in have been. This theory, being quite
partnership with Dr. von Koenigswald, the revolutionary, was received by some of his
discoverer of the giant fossil men of Java and colleagues with slightly raised eyebrows. But in
China. Von Koenigswald however had been his last as yet unpublished work on the Solo
captured by the Japanese and it was feared that skull, he supports this conclusion with extensive
he was dead. After repeated efforts to locate him and detailed morphological and paleontological
Dr. Weidenreich, with the approval of the evidence. Another iconoclastic feature of this
Director of the Geological Survey of Java, book was his showing that broad and narrow
prepared the last-named provisional report on types of cranium and face occur so frequently in
von Koenigswald’s casts of the material, pending all races as to throw doubt on the theory that the
a more thorough study if and when the originals classic races were originally “pure” and only
should become available. Even so, this report acquired their “atypical” characters by
contained a wealth of critical and constructive subsequent mixture.
conclusions on the evolution of the skull, jaws The greater part of the years 1946 and 1947
and teeth of the hominoid primates. Soon were spent in writing the text and supervising the
afterward Dr. Weidenreich received a letter from making of drawings and” photographs of the
Dr. von Koenigswald stating that he had been Solo skulls and their brain casts for his sections.
confined for more than a year in a Japanese During the present year he suffered a not very
prison camp and that he, with his wife and young painful attack of herpes zoster, which compelled
daughter, were then in a city which had been him to cancel his engagement to give a series of
recently bombed by native forces. Dr. lectures at the University of Oregon. A few
Weidenreich began his efforts to bring the von weeks later he was able to return to the Museum
Koenigswalds and the original fossils to this for a few hours each day; but not long afterward
country. At last with the aid of the Viking Fund coronary thrombosis sent him to bed. For some
and the cooperation of the several governments time he appeared to be improving, but the end
he succeeded in bringing the von Koenigswalds came suddenly on July 11.
to New York. Thus died a brave and tenacious man, who
Dr. von Koenigswald brought with him the never gave in to adversities or difficulties. He
priceless original skulls and jaws of was a loving husband and parent and a faithful
Pithecanthropus robustus, the jaw of the gigantic friend. He lived by the light of reason and strove
Meganthropus, and the isolated teeth of the constantly to discover the facts and fundamental

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principles of human evolution; nor did he ever EDITOR’S NOTE
fail to give his own knowledge freely for the
benefit of mankind. It is a safe prediction that in Dr. Gregory also submitted a full
the decades to come the name of Weidenreich bibliography of the publications of Dr.
will rank very high in the annals of Weidenreich, consisting of 215 items from 1899
anthropology. to 1948. As they deal almost exclusively with
anatomy, physical anthropology and kindred
AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY subjects, the bibliography will be published
NEW YORK, N.Y.
during 1949 in a forthcoming number of the
American Journal of Physical Anthropology.
With one exception (No.64, 1923), until 1935 all
of Dr. Weidenreich’s articles were published in
German in Europe (Nos. 1-144) ; since 1938
(Nos. 168-215) all were in English.