Taung Skull Fossil Site

A Component Of The UNESCO Fossil Hominid Sites Of South Africa Inscription (1999, Extended 2005) The Same Listing As The Cradle Of Humankind And The Limeworks Where The Taung Child Was Found In 1924: The First Australopithecus Africanus Ever Described, The Fossil That Began The Argument Humanity Started In Africa, And A Site Where Very Little Has Been Built · Taung, North West

In 1924 a lime quarry worker near Taung handed over a fossil skull in a block of breccia, and Raymond Dart spent months picking it out with a knitting needle. What emerged was the skull of a child of about three with a brain too small for a human and a foramen magnum positioned like one, and Dart named it Australopithecus africanus - the southern ape of Africa. The scientific establishment of the day dismissed it for twenty years, because in 1925 the accepted story was that humanity had begun in Asia or Europe, and a fossil from a South African limeworks did not fit. It was eventually accepted, and the argument that the human lineage began in Africa starts here. The site is a UNESCO component of the same inscription as the Cradle of Humankind. Be clear what is there now: a quarry face, a viewing area, very little built at all, and the fossil itself held two provinces away in Johannesburg.

In the Buxton limeworks near Taung in North West, 150 km north of Kimberley off the N18, Taung, North West, South Africa

The site sits in the old Buxton limeworks near Taung and VERY LITTLE IS BUILT THERE - there is a declared heritage site, a viewing area over the quarry and an interpretive centre that HAS BEEN TROUBLED AND SOMETIMES CLOSED, so confirm before driving out rather than arriving on spec. THE TAUNG CHILD ITSELF IS IN JOHANNESBURG at the University of the Witwatersrand and is not on display here, which the row states because visitors travel expecting to see it. Access is by a gravel road off the N18 and a local guide or caretaker is usually the practical way in. There are no facilities to speak of - no shop, no restaurant and limited shade. Taung village and Vryburg have fuel and basic supplies. It is about two hours from Kimberley and the whole area is MALARIA-FREE and very hot in summer.

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