Reiner Rudolph Robert Protsch (von Zieten)
Professor Reiner Protsch von Zieten (b. 1939) was a professor of anthropology at
Frankfurt University for 30 years before he was forced to resign in
disgrace. A university committee revealed that throughout his career Protsch
had plagiarized the work of colleagues and had systematically falsified
dates on numerous "stone age" fossils, including a skull fragment
- dubbed Hahnhöfersand Man - that allegedly linked humans and Neanderthals.
Protsch (the von Zieten honorific title appears to be bogus
(Harding 2005))
dated the skull fragment at 36,000 years. He claimed it was found in a peat
bog and was a vital missing link between modern humans and Neanderthals. The
fragment is actually about 7,500 years old, according to Oxford University's
radiocarbon dating unit. (Harding)
Several fossils had been sent to Oxford in 2001 for testing of dates
and it was then that the "dating disaster" was discovered. Protsch
identified a female skeleton as a Neanderthal who died near the south-west
German town of Speyer about 19,300 B.C. (the "Bischof-Speyer" skeleton). The
lady actually lived around 1,300 B.C. Protsch also dated a skull discovered
near Paderborn in 1976 at 27,400 years old and was considered the oldest
human remain ever found in the region. The skull is now believed to date
from the mid-18th century.
"The new data from Oxford is all wrong," Protsch told
Der Spiegel (August 18, 2004). The Oxford scientists didn't remove shellac
preservative from the specimens, he said. That's why the fossils dated as
much younger. "Unfortunately, archaeologists and most anthropologists do not
study physics or chemistry and therefore they cannot make judgments on
carbon dating," he said. "Wrong measurements are made in all laboratories"
(Paterson 2004).
Apparently, Protsch didn't get the irony in his claim.
Frankfurt University's investigation of Protsch, who was suspended from
the university in April 2004*
and later forced to retire, was led by Professor Ulrich Brandt. During their
investigation, the university discovered that Protsch was unable to
work his own carbon-dating machine (Harding).
Thomas Terberger, the archaeologist who discovered Protsch's frauds, said
that "Anthropology is going to have to completely revise its picture of
modern man between 40,000 and 10,000 years ago. Professor Protsch's work
appeared to prove that anatomically modern humans and Neanderthals had
co-existed, and perhaps even had children together. This now appears to be
rubbish."
On the other hand, Professor
Chris Stringer of the Department of Palaeontology at London's
Natural History Museum, says that Hahnhöfersand
Man
was never regarded as a Neanderthal and was briefly important in the
1980s to people like Gunter Brauer, who were arguing for gene flow between
Neanderthals and modern humans. However, as anyone who is familiar with the
palaeoanthropological literature over the last 20 years would know, the find
has been of negligible significance to recent debate. It has to be said that
this is also a reflection of Dr. Protsch's low reputation in the field, as
anyone familiar with the recent literature would also know (personal
correspondence).*
Protsch seems to have returned to Germany after getting a doctorate from
UCLA
and then proceeded to spend much of his career faking discoveries and
stealing from the work of others. His doctoral dissertation was titled "The
dating of Upper-Pleistocene Subsaharan fossil hominids and their place in
human evolution: with morphological and archaeological implications." The
degree was awarded in 1973, the same year that the same UCLA department of
anthropology awarded a doctorate to Carlos
Castaneda.
According to the Guardian,
In one case he had claimed that a 50 million-year-old "half-ape" called
Adapis had been found in Switzerland, an archaeological sensation. In
reality, the ape had been dug up in France, where several other examples
had already been found.
In addition to being forced to retire, Protsch is under police
investigation for allegedly trying to sell 278 chimpanzee skulls that
belonged to the university to a U.S. dealer. Protsch claims that that he got
the skulls from a Heidelberg ethnologist in 1975 and denies any wrongdoing
(Paterson).
It was also reported by
Der Spiegel that Protsch, the son of a Nazi MP, is under
investigation by Frankfurt University for ordering the shredding of
documents housed in the anthropology department relating to gruesome
scientific experiments done by the Nazis in the 1930s.
One might wonder how he got away with his deceptions for so long, but the
important thing is that his fraud was discovered by scientists, reported by
scientists, and it will be scientists who will work to correct the record.
This is how science works. Sometimes the discovery is quick as in the case
of Archaeoraptor. Sometimes it is slow as
in the case of Piltdown. But eventually the
correction occurs.
Frankfurt University's president, Rudolf Steinberg, apologized to "all
those harmed by" Protsch and acknowledged that the institution's
administration had ignored the professor's misconduct for decades despite
existing proof for his mistakes. "A lot of people looked the other way," he
said. In the future, he said, students and new employees will be instructed
in what constitutes appropriate scientific research behavior.
One would hope that the anthropological community would learn from this
episode as well. No single scientist, regardless of his or her status,
should be taken at his or her word about the dating of a fossil that has
significant implications for the discipline. That lesson should have been
learned from the Piltdown hoax. It will not be surprising if it is
discovered that German nationalism played a role in Protsch's success, as
English nationalism did in Piltdown's.
*note In an article dated August 22,
2004, Tony Paterson in the
Telegraph quoted Professor Stringer as saying "What was considered a
major piece of evidence showing that the Neanderthals once lived in northern
Europe has fallen by the wayside. We are having to rewrite prehistory."
Stringer denies having made the statement: "I remember talking to the
reporter concerned, and from what I remember the words in question were what
he said to me, with him asking whether I agreed with the statement."
Stringer also says the Paterson quote "is a made-up quote, as I never placed
great weight on the significance of the Hahnofersand find in the first
place. It was never called a Neanderthal as far as I know, but certain
people saw "mixed" features in its morphology. Its removal is certainly not
rewriting anything I have ever said about the Neanderthals, let alone
rewriting prehistory!" (personal correspondence)
See also Piltdown hoax and
Carlos Castaneda.
further reading
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Protocols of the Elders of Zion