Is the conservative picture of human origins correct? The amount of fossil hominid, particularly giant
hominid footprints, coming to light across Australia not only demonstrate the presence of human
ancestors here in times comparable to those of Africa, Europe and Asia, they suggest a whole
indigenous variety of races occupied this landmass, not just in Pleistocene, or Pliocene times but much
earlier!
The foregoing statement is heresy to the ears of hard-core university-based scientists
indoctrinated with the ‘holy writ’ of the “Out of Africa” school of human origins. Yet there is plenty of
evidence to overturn this time-honoured dogma.
So what has all this to do with the subject of our book – the Yowie? Indeed it has a great deal
to do with these mysterious hominids, for the authors believe that, in order to learn the true identity of
these beings, it is also very necessary to know their origins which lie in the dim past of humankinds’
beginnings.
In our previous book on the Yowie mystery “Giants from the Dreamtime – The Yowie in Myth
and Reality” [URU Publications 2001] we presented our own up-to-date evidence of that time in the
form of fossil hominid skull-types which prove beyond doubt that these beings, so commonplace to
the ancient folklore of our Aboriginal people, were none other than Homo erectus, our immediate
ancestor.
In the years that have followed the publication of “Giants from the Dreamtime” much new
fossil material has come to light, which not only further confirms the Homo erectus origins of the
traditional Yowie, or “Hairy Man”, but also that the very origins of our ancestor appear to lie firmly in
Australia!
If indeed Homo erectus evolved right here in Australia, then what race did ‘he’ spring from?
Who were ‘his’ parents? We believe that not only can we answer this question, but that certain fossil
evidence now in our possession allows us to look much farther back in time, to reveal an hitherto
unknown Australian primate fossil record [scant though it may be at present] which suggests that more
than one primate species evolved here in Australia, from which, quite independent of Africa, there
arose a group that left the trees for a terrestrial bipedal existence, and who gradually evolved into the
earliest ancestral hominids, long before their African cousins began leaving the trees around 6 million
years ago!
If the authors appear to be more concerned with fossil evidence in this book rather than
modern-day encounters with primitive hairy hominids in the bush, giant or otherwise, which are all too
commonplace to the overseas Yeti and ‘Bigfoot’ literature, this is quite true, for this book is an attempt
to present an intelligent approach to Yowie [relict hominid] research in Australia and also in its near
island neighbours where we find other close relatives of our ‘hairy man’.
There are also other reasons for our ‘scientific’ approach. For one, in order to encourage a
more open-minded view among Australian, and also overseas scientists on the ‘relict hominid’ mystery
it is necessary to present the best SCIENTIFIC evidence. Only this will ever have any chance of
winning this all-important support and this at a time when the subject has suffered considerable
discredit in scientific circles, due to the antics of certain individuals already discussed in the
Introduction.
Another, and very important reason to present scientific evidence, is not only to reveal the “fossil foundations” as it were upon which the Australian relict hominid theory stands, but also to
encourage by our example, future young and enthusiastic, honest relict hominid researchers to
penetrate the Australian bush, forearmed with research findings so as to know what they are truly
searching for and thus know in advance how they are to research these ever elusive, mysterious
survivors of our prehistory.
Besides the scientific evidence to be presented in this book, there will be sightings reports, even
claims of close encounters, and finds of freshly made relict hominid footprints. This circumstantialevidence for modern-day Australian relict hominid survival will largely consist of evidence investigated
by the authors and their field assistants, discarding many suspect cases that we have had to deal with
over the years.
Rex Gilroy
Australian Yowie Research Centre,
Katoomba, NSW
Monday 25th June 2007
