The Hunt for the Dawn Monkey: Unearthing the Origins of Monkeys, Apes, and Humans [FIRST EDITION, FIRST PRINTING]

Beard, Chris

Published by University of California Press, Berkeley, California, 2004

About this Item

As new condition white cloth boards with black spine lettering contained in a fine condition color photographic dust jacket. Includes Author Dedication; List of Illustrations; Preface; Notes; References Cited; and Index. Illustrated with a section of color photographic plates and numerous additional black-and-white photographs and drawings interspersed throughout the volume. "Beard's book is the Lucy of anthropoid origins - an adventure story of scientific discovery in exotic places that introduces the reader to some interesting personalities of primate paleontology." - John G. Fleagle, author. "The search for our origins does not stop with the first member of our own species or even the first ape that stood upright. Our earliest primate ancestors also bequeathed us many of our most important features. Chris Beard offers a fascinating, personal survey of what we know about these delicate creatures who ultimately gave rise to ourselves." - Carl Zimmer, author. "Chris Beard's exciting fossil discoveries and his bold new ideas show us that our very early origins were in Asia and not, as previously thought, in Africa." - Alan Walker, author. "This could be the ultimate book on our origins. For the first time, Chris Beard sheds light on a hitherto little-known yet highly controversial area of paleontology - the search for the ancestry of monkeys, apes, and ultimately humans." - Henry Gee, author. "Taking us back roughly 45 million years into the Eocene, "The dawn of recent life," Chris Beard, a world-renowned expert on the primate fossil record, offers a tantalizing new perspective on our deepest evolutionary roots. In a fast-paced narrative full of vivid stories from the field, he reconstructs our extended family tree, showing that the first anthropoids - the diverse and successful group that includes monkeys, apes, and humans - first evolved millions of years earlier than was previously suspected and emerged in Asia rather than Africa. The Hunt for the Dawn Monkey chronicles two centuries of scientific exploration in search of anthropoid origins, from the early work of Georges Cuvier, the father of paleontology, to the latest discoveries in Asia, Africa, and North America's Rocky Mountains. Against this historical backdrop, Chris Beard weaves the story of how his own expeditions have unearthed crucial fossils - including the controversial primate Eosimias - that support his compelling new vision of anthropoid evolution. The only book written for a wide audience that explores this remote phase of our own evolutionary history, The Hunt for the Dawn Monkey adds a fascinating new chapter to our understanding of humanity's relation to the rest of life on Earth." - from the inner front jacket flap. Seller Inventory # 007805

Bibliographic Details

Title: The Hunt for the Dawn Monkey: Unearthing the...

Publisher: University of California Press, Berkeley, California

Publication Date: 2004

Binding: Hardcover

Illustrator: Klingler, Mark (illustrations); Grunwald, Jessica (jacket design)

Condition: As New

Dust Jacket Condition: Fine

Edition: 1st Edition