In search of ancestral origin

Sri Wahyuni, The Jakarta Post, Yogyakarta

Becoming a paleoanthropologist, a somewhat rare profession nowadays, had never been Teuku Jacob's childhood dream.

In fact, Jacob did not find anthropology very interesting until he was a college student.

Born in Peureulak, Aceh, on Dec. 6, 1929, Jacob is a professor emeritus of anthropology at Gadjah Mada University. He heads the Laboratory of Bioanthropology and Paleoanthropology at the university's School of Medicine.

Jacob came to terms with anthropology after studying anatomy while he was finishing his studies at Gadjah Mada University's School of Medicine (1950-1956).

He continued his study of anthropology at the University of Arizona in Tucson, Arizona (1957-1958) and at Howard University graduate school in Washington D.C. (1958-1960), where he fell in love with the subject.

"Anthropology is very important for Indonesia, especially because it is one of only few countries in the world where human skeletal remains of early man have been found," Jacob told The Jakarta Post.

His hands on study was done at Sangiran, a famous archeological site in the Central Java town of Sragen, some 15 kilometers north of Surakarta. He began exploration work there in May 1962.

He chose Sangiran because it was the nearest archeological site from Gadjah Mada University, where he was then teaching.

Another reason for the choice was more of a financial one. A financial crisis was crippling Indonesia at that time; inflation was extremely high and transportation was a dire problem.

He later found out that Sangiran, which covers an area of some 6 kilometers by 8 kilometers, was not only the country's widest but also Indonesia's richest archeological site.

Jacob said over 60 of an estimated 70 remains of prehistoric skeletons found in Central and East Java had been unearthed in Sangiran. The rest were discovered elsewhere in the same general area, such as Ngandong, Sambungmacan and Trinil.

Apart from the finds, his team has also discovered hundreds of ancient stone tools and thousands of animal fossils over the last 40 years of excavations.

Before Jacob began his excavation projects in Sangiran, other researchers had found the fossilized remains of 20 individuals but no stone tools had ever been found.

"What we have found proves that Sangiran is the biggest archeological site ever found in the country," said Jacob, who received his doctoral degree in paleoanthropology from the Rijksuniversiteit Utrecht in the Netherlands in 1968.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1996 named Sangiran a world heritage site, essential to the understanding of human evolution.

During the early years of his excavation activities in Sangiran, Jacob usually went to the site once a week, with the university jeep. Sometimes he would spend up to two months on the site from the beginning to the end of a particular dig.

At present, however, he only occasionally returns, usually to select a particular spot for further exploration or to see a new discovery.

"I let the younger people do the physical activities now," said Jacob, who has written more than 20 books on anthropology, culture, medical subjects and countless articles.

The biggest Sangiran excavation project took place in 1964 for almost nine weeks. The most important finding was the discovery of a skull he code-named "Sangiran 10" in 1963. In 1973, he discovered a new archeological site in Sambungmacan village.

"My heartbeat quickened upon realizing that we found the first cheek bone of a prehistoric man in the country," Jacob said, adding that it was, in fact, in Sambungmacan that many remains had been found.

The study of prehistoric people, according to Jacob, is very interesting although many tend to consider this particular science a limited field of study.

"That's not true. The study on prehistoric people covers a wide range of subjects, such as their lifestyle, economy, environment, demography and so forth," he said.

Jacob insists that people need to learn about the history of their origin, their ancestors so as to project their future. What people are facing at present is nothing but the result of the past and it will develop in the future. Only by studying about the past will people become more civilized.

"No one can see exactly what will happen in the future, but we can make a better future by doing good things now," the lecturer said.

"Working in this particular field of study is just like playing detective. We investigate, looking for the missing parts, reconstructing something based on what we have in our hands, and try to reveal what might be behind all the findings. In a criminal investigation a piece of hair can help solve a complicated murder case. In paleoanthropology, similarly, a piece of bone can reveal many things."

On Aug. 15, Jacob received the Bintang Mahaputra Nararya award from the government in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the country's cultural promotion.

In 1993, he received a gold medal from the Indian Boards of Alternative Medicine. He was also a recipient of the 1984 Researchers Award from the of Indonesian Medical Association (IDI) and in 1983 he received Paul Broca Medal from French Center for Scientific Research on anthropology.

His important discoveries of fossils include, Homo erectus, Homo erectus palaeojavanicus, Homo sapien (Sangiran archeological site), Homo erectus soloensis (Ngandong and Sambungmacan), Homo sapien (Trinil and Tamiang).