Peking Man fossils entombed by war

1214

The Jin capital Zhongdu, besieged by Mongol armies, saw its surrounding hills scarred by siege lines and refugee camps. Beneath those hills lay the Zhoukoudian caves with their half-million-year-old hominid fossils, unknown to either side and undisturbed for seven more centuries until modern archaeology arrived. The irony of two civilizations destroying each other above the bones of their common ancestor would await future contemplation.