This very fragmented cranium from Yiyuan county in Shandong is another example of H. erectus from northern China. It is significant in being nearly identical in most important features to material excavated from Zhoukoudian, suggesting that Zhoukoudian-like people were spread throughout contiguous areas of northern China during the Middle Pleistocene.

This specimen, recovered from a small cave in Hexian, Anhui in 1980 was, until recently, the most complete skull of H. erectus discovered in China since the excavations at Zhoukoudian. It displays all the major characteristics of H. erectus but differs somewhat from the remains at Zhoukoudian. The most significant differences involve the shape of the supraorbital torus, the lack of a distinct post-toral sulcus (i.e. hollowing out of the region behind the brow ridges), and a lesser degree of post-orbital constriction. In these features the skull-cap is reminiscent of H. erectus specimens from Java.

The superior view of the Hexian skull-cap emphasizes the reduced degree of post-orbital constriction and the great breadth of the cranial vault. The Hexian site was initially dated to approximately 180,00 years ago, suggesting that populations of H. erectus co-existed with early forms of H. sapiens in China. More recent dating of the site suggest that it is somewhat older, in the range of 300,000 years before present, an age more consistent with the skull-cap's morphological character.

The frontal view of the Hexian skull-cap shows more clearly the double-arched structure of the brow-ridges which differ somewhat from the straight-bar seen in specimens from Zhoukoudian. The Hexian site has a mixed fauna, with elements from both northern and southern China. Other human specimens have also been recovered from Hexian, including a partial mandible, fragments of a second skull and a number of isolated teeth. The teeth are distinguished by their large size, far outstripping those known from Zhoukoudian.

The base of the Hexian skull is largely lost. The tympanic plate, which houses the ear tube, is, however, well-preserved. It is very thick and robust and angled perpendicular to the mid-line of the skull, traits which distinguish the specimen from modern humans and ally it to H. erectus as previously known from China and elsewhere.

This oblique view of the Hexian calvaria (i.e. skull-cap) emphasizes the poorly expressed post-toral sulcus and the manner in which the forehead merges smoothly with the supraorbital structures, differing in this respect from similar material from Zhoukoudian. The relationship between various forms of H. erectus now known from China (e.g. Zhoukoudian, Lantian, Yunxian and Hexian) and archaic hominids known from other areas of the world is currently a subject of intense debate in paleoanthropological circles.

The specimen shown here, unearthed in 1992 from cave deposits on Tangshan hill near Nanjing, Jiangsu, is the most recently discovered archaic human fossil from China. The site is only 100 km from and approximately the same age (200,000 to 400,000 years) as Hexian (see above), but the specimen appears to show greater morphological affinities to remains from Zhoukoudian which is considerably further North. The associated fauna also shows strong resemblences to Zhoukoudian, suggesting that the Nanjing remains represent an incursion of northern Chinese Palearctic elements into southern China during a climatic minimum or period of glacial advance.

The Nanjing cranium, thought to represent a female, is well-preserved with minimal distortion and preserves portions of the face not seen in crania of H. erectus from either Hexian or Zhoukoudian. The facial skeleton is of particular interest in that it verifies the reconstruction of the Zhoukoudian female cranium effected by Weidenreich more than half a century ago.