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The '''Boskop Man''' is an [[anatomically modern human]] fossil of the [[Middle Stone Age]] ([[Late Pleistocene]]) discovered in 1913 in South Africa.<ref>Jeffrey H. Schwartz, Ian Tattersall, ''The Human Fossil Record, Craniodental Morphology of Genus Homo (Africa and Asia)'' (2005), [https://books.google.rs/books?id=EPKGnF7oZXgC&pg=PA40 p. 40].</ref>
The fossil was at first described as ''Homo capensis'' and considered a separate human species by Broom (1918),<ref>
{{cite journal | doi = 10.1038/095615c0 | last1 = FitzSimons | first1 = FW |  year = 1915 | title = Palaeolithic man in South Africa | url = https://zenodo.org/record/1429601| journal = Nature | volume = 95 | issue = 2388| pages = 615–616 }}
{{cite journal | doi = 10.1080/00359191709520168 | last1 = Haughton | first1 = S |name-list-format=vanc | last2 = Thomson | year = 1917 | first2 = R. B. | last3 = Peringuey | first3 = L. | title = Preliminary note on the ancient human skull remains from the Transvaal | url =https://zenodo.org/record/1430391/files/article.pdf | journal = Transactions of the Royal Society of South Africa | volume = 6 | issue = | pages = 1–14 }}
{{cite journal | last1 = Broom | first1 = R |  year = 1918 | title = The Evidence Afforded by the Boskop Skull of a New Species of Primitive Man (''Homo capensis'') | url = | journal = Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History | volume = 23 | issue = | pages = 65–79 }}
{{cite journal | doi = 10.1038/112623a0 | last1 = Dart | first1 = R |  year = 1923 | title = Boskop remains from the south-east African coast | url = | journal = Nature | volume = 112 | issue = 2817| pages = 623–625 }}
{{cite journal | doi = 10.2307/2844198 | last1 = Dart | first1 = R |  year = 1940 | title = Recent discoveries bearing on human history in southern Africa | jstor = 2844198| journal = Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland | volume = 70 | issue = 1| pages = 13–27 }}</ref>
but by the 1970s this "Boskopoid" type was widely recognized as representative of the modern [[Capoid]] populations.<ref>also known collectively as [[Khoi-San]], i.e. the [[Khoi Khoi]] and [[San people|San]] peoples, alternatively known as [[Hottentot (racial term)|Hottentots]] and [[Bushmen]]: "...an isolated cranial fragment found 40 years ago near the surface in a dubious geological horizon, unassociated with implements and fauna, ... there has been developed conjecture after conjecture, speculation on speculation ... the features exhibited by the Boskop skull and those which have been termed 'Boskopoid' are not specific to any 'new' single, African racial group, and in Africa they may be found in varying degrees in the Bushmen, Hottentots or Bush-Hottentot admixtures." 
Singer R. 1958. The Boskop 'Race' Problem. Man. 58:173-178. {{JSTOR|2795854}}.
Tobias (1985): "Galloway (1937) [...] elevated Boskop to a “fundamental human racial strain.” However, the research of L.H. Wells (1950, 1952, 1969); Ronald Singer (1958[)...] Tobias (1959, 1961); Don Brothwell (1963[)...]
Hertha de Villiers (1963, 1968) [...] and G. Philip Rightmire (1970, 1971, 1972, 1976, 1978) [...]
undermined this concept and may be considered to have given the quietus to it."</ref>

==Discovery==
Most theories regarding a "Boskopoid" type were based on the eponymous Boskop cranium, which was found in 1913 by two [[Afrikaner]] farmers. They offered it to [[Frederick William FitzSimons]] for examination and further research. Many similar skulls were subsequently discovered by [[paleontologists]] such as [[Robert Broom]], [[William Pycraft]] and [[Raymond Dart]].

The original skull was incomplete consisting of frontal and parietal bones, with a partial occiput, one temporal and a fragment of mandible. 

Fossils of similar type are known from Tsitsikamma (1921), Matjes River (1934), [[Fish Hoek]] and Springbok Flats,<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Galloway | first1 = A |  year = 1937 | title = The Characteristics of the Skull of the Boskop Physical Type | url = | journal = American Journal of Physical Anthropology | volume = 23 | issue = | pages = 31–47 | doi = 10.1002/ajpa.1330230105 }}</ref>
[[Skhul remains|Skhul]], Qazeh, [[Border Cave]], [[Brno]], Tuinplaas, and other locations.<ref name="Schwartz">{{cite book|last1=Schwartz |first1=Jeffrey H. |last2=Tattersall |first2=Ian |last3=Holloway |first3=Ralph L. |last4=Broadfield |first4=Douglas C. |last5=Yuan |first5=Michael S. |title=The Human Fossil Record |year=2003 |isbn=978-0-471-67864-9}}</ref>

==Cranial capacity==
The Boskop Man fossils are notable for their unusually large [[cranial capacity]].
Reported cranial capacity ranges between 1,700 and 2,000 cm<sup>3</sup>.<ref name="Hawks"> "The skull is a large one, with an estimated endocranial volume of 1800 ml. But it is hardly complete, and arguments about its overall size -- exacerbated by its thickness, which confuses estimates based on regression from external measurements -- have ranged from 1700 to 2000 ml. It is large, but well within the range of sizes found in recent males." [http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/brain/paleo/lynch-granger-big-brain-boskops-2008.html  The "amazing" Boskops]
[http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/brain/paleo/return-amazing-boskops-lynch-granger-2009.html Return of the "amazing" Boskops]
"The portrayal of 'Boskops' in the Discover excerpt is so out of line with anthropology of the last forty years, that I am amazed the magazine printed it. I am unaware of any credible biological anthropologist or archaeologist who would confirm their description of the 'Boskopoids,' except as an obsolete category from the history of anthropology."  He does note that the web editor at ''Discover'' replied that "the excerpt was intended to run identified as a 'controversial idea, but that context didn't come across as intended.{{' "}}, and that "[t]he web page has been changed to make that context clear".
</ref> 

This was addressed in the book ''Big Brain: The Origins and Future of Human Intelligence'' (2008) by neurologists [[Gary Lynch (neuroscientist)|Gary Lynch]] and  Richard Granger, who claimed the large brain size in Boskop individuals might be indicative of particularly high [[general intelligence]]. Anthropologist [[John D. Hawks|John Hawks]] harshly criticized the depiction of the Boskop fossils in the book and in the book's review article in ''[[Discover (magazine)|Discover]]'' magazine.<ref name="Hawks"/><ref>Gary Lynch, Richard Granger, 
[http://discovermagazine.com/2009/the-brain-2/28-what-happened-to-hominids-who-were-smarter-than-us/article_view?b_start:int=0&-C= What Happened to the Hominids Who Were Smarter Than Us?] (excerpt from ''Big Brain'' 2008), ''Discover'', 28 December 2009.</ref>

==See also==
*[[Wajak Man]]

==References==
{{reflist}}
* {{cite journal | doi = 10.2307/2843700 | last1 = Pycraft | first1 = W |  year = 1925 | title = On the Calvaria Found at Boskop, Transvaal, in 1913, and Its Relationship to Cromagnard and Negroid Skulls | jstor = 2843700| journal = Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland | volume = 55 | issue = | pages = 179–198 }}
*Tobias, P.V. (1959) "The history and metamorphosis of the Boskop concept" in: Galloway (ed.), ''The Skeletal Remains of Bambandyanalo'', 137&ndash;146.
* {{cite journal | doi = 10.1002/ajpa.1330280503 | last1 = Tobias | first1 = P |  year = 1985 | title = History of Physical Anthropology in Southern Africa | url = | journal = Yearbook of Physical Anthropology | volume = 28 | issue = | pages = 1–52 (p. 14)}}

[[Category:Homo sapiens fossils]]
[[Category:Fossils of South Africa]]