First published account of the discovery of the first anthropomorphic fossil ape. Lartet's discovery, made in 1836 at Sansan, was the first to challenge Cuvier’s assertion that both humans and apes were products of the present geological epoch; it opened Lartet’s mind to the possibility of discovering “antediluvian” human remains. The fossil was named Pithecus Antiquus by de Blainville in 1840 and later placed in the new genus Pliopithecus by Paul Gervais.