page_title: Dmanisi skull 5
section_title: Description of the skull
hierarchical_section_title: Dmanisi skull 5 / Description of the skull
caption_attribution_description: English: Ambassador John Bass and David Lordkipanidze, Director of the Georgian National Museum, study a hominid humerus found at the research site at Dmanisi.
context_page_description: The Dmanisi skull, also known as Skull 5 or D4500, is one of five skulls discovered in Dmanisi, Georgia and classified as early Homo erectus. Described in a publication in October 2013, it is estimated to be about 1.8 million years old and is the most complete skull of a Pleistocene Homo species, and the first complete adult hominin skull of that degree of antiquity. According to researchers, the discovery "provides the first evidence that early Homo comprised adult individuals with small brains but body mass, stature and limb proportions reaching the lower range limit of modern variation."
  The skull has been the cause of a paleontological controversy that is still ongoing as of 2017: many hominin fossils thought to be from different species such as Homo rudolfensis or Homo habilis may not have been separate species at all. Rather, they may have been a single evolving lineage.
context_section_description: Despite a brain volume the size of a large Australopithecus male, (546 cubic centimetres (33.3 in³)) all the characteristics of Homo erectus are clearly visible on Skull 5. The braincase sizes of the other Dmanisi skulls are between 601 cubic centimetres (36.7 in³) and 730 cubic centimetres (45 in³).
  The cranial superstructures of Skull 5, which are prominent and massive, suggest that it was probably a male. Its face is one of the largest of any human ancestor discovered to date. The zygomatic arches are massive with the right one displaying many traces of deformations, probably due to fractures and injuries. Researchers estimate that the height of the individual was between 146 centimetres (4.79 ft) and 166 centimetres (5.45 ft) and his weight between 47 kilograms (104 lb) and 50 kilograms (110 lb).
caption: David Lordkipanidze (centre) on the archeological site at Dmanisi, 2010
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