Longgupo Site

Longgupo Site

The Longgupo Site is a National Key Cultural Relics Protection Unit.

The Longgupo Site is located in Longgupo, Miaoyu Town, Wushan County, Chongqing, in western China, approximately 57 kilometers from the county seat of Wushan. Also known as the "Wushan Ape Man Site," it is a Pleistocene-era archaeological site.

The Longgupo Site covers an area of about 1,300 square meters. In 1984, Chinese paleoanthropologists and paleolithic experts such as Huang Wanbo and Li Xuanmin first discovered the site. In 1985, archaeologists unearthed a fragmented left mandible of Homo erectus with two molars, along with some bone fragments showing signs of artificial modification, from the early Lower Pleistocene strata at the location. In 1986, three incisors and a fragment of a lower jaw with two teeth were also excavated. Additionally, the site has yielded fossils of 116 mammal species from the early Lower Pleistocene, including Gigantopithecus blacki, Stegodon orientalis, Stegodon preorientalis, Megantereon, Dicerorhinus, and Ailuropoda microta.

According to research by scholars, the artifacts unearthed at the Longgupo Site represent a new subspecies of Homo erectus, later named "Homo erectus wushanensis," commonly referred to as "Wushan Man." These fossils date back approximately 2.01 to 2.04 million years. The "Wushan Man" fossils are the earliest human remains discovered in China to date. This discovery sheds light on the process of human evolution, fills a gap in the fossil record of early humans in China, and holds significant scientific value for the study of human origins and the development history of the Three Gorges Valley. (National Cultural Heritage Administration)

Miaoyu Town: Located in the southwestern part of Wushan County, Miaoyu Town sits at the land junction of Wushan, Fengjie, and Jianshi counties across Chongqing and Hubei provinces. It lies 57 kilometers from the county seat of Wushan and about 60 kilometers from the county seats of both Fengjie and Jianshi. As a key town in the two-province, three-county region, it is an area rich in cultural relics and historic sites. The town is surrounded by mountains and features a flat plain stretching ten li, forming a small basin.

　In 2007, the total agricultural output value of Miaoyu Town reached 99.96 million yuan, marking a 19% increase. Miaoyu Town

By the end of the year, the deposit and loan balances of financial institutions reached 155.20 million yuan and 54.00 million yuan respectively, with one year... Detailed information about Miaoyu Town++

Further reading:

· Fourth Batch of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units