The Wombat File Is Yours to Keep: The Friday Quiz: Scheuzer Says

The Wombat needs sleep, you need your quiz, and so without further ado:

In the Lithographia Helvetica of the celebrated 18th-century scholar Johann Jakob Scheuchzer, the author writes of the discovery of a fossilized skeleton found in Baden. Analyzing it, he claimed that the skeleton was the remains of a human being who perished in the Biblical flood. This account was believed to be the truth for decades, until the French scientist Georges Curvier re-examined the fossilized skeleton, identifying it -- more accurately -- as a prehistoric version of a creature which has descendants now living in China and Japan. By what common name are these descendents known? Bonus question: Scheuchzer's later work proved to be an instrumental source for a politically influential play by Friedrich Schiller in 1804. What was the name of the play's eponymous hero?

First correct answer posted to comments wins something semi-hilariously related to something going on in the news. Please don't Google to get your answer, even though I've failed to make this request in an amusing manner, or elaborated on it in an endearingly shaggy-dog-ish fashion. And just one answer per comment, please, although of course there's no limit on comments. See you in the morning.

Comments

Er, Bob Hope to both.

(I just wanted credit or what have you for being awake now.)

Posted by: herbivorous | January 25, 2008 12:26 AM

hey I'm still awake too and I say GIANT PANDA.

um....Woyzeck?

Posted by: art | January 25, 2008 06:20 AM

Bonobos?

and Pillory Wastrel?

Posted by: boxjam | January 25, 2008 07:37 AM

yak

Posted by: shananan | January 25, 2008 08:18 AM

No and no and no and no.

Posted by: BT | January 25, 2008 09:55 AM

Baboon.

"Atticus Grudge"

Posted by: boxjam | January 25, 2008 10:19 AM

Hello Kitty? (To both?)

Actually, I want to guess some great ape whose name is sort of like Mandible, but not. So here's my softball/red herring to whomever can name that ape. Unless there's no such ape, in which case do mock me.

I hurt my own personal mandible playing indoor soccer last night. If you're going to make a one point landing, there are better points than your chin.

Posted by: herbivorous | January 25, 2008 10:40 AM

Herbivorous, are you talking about "Mandrills"? Which are not technically great apes but the largest of the monkeys.

"Atticus Grudge" is so awesome a name I can't stand it. It should instantly be employed as the title character of a misanthropic graphic novel, set in 1752.

The creature in question is not a primate. Not even close.

Posted by: BT | January 25, 2008 10:54 AM

Ah yes, the monkeys with the big blond hairdos.

Posted by: herbivorous | January 25, 2008 11:29 AM

Walrus.

Posted by: boxjam | January 25, 2008 11:33 AM

Kimodo dragon
(more Mikado-ish than Mandrill-ish)

Posted by: Jonathan | January 25, 2008 11:52 AM

Jonathan is a bit warmer -- though there are no monitor lizards in China or Japan, I think. The Komodo dragon is an Indonesian creature, if I recall.

Posted by: BT | January 25, 2008 12:12 PM

Sorry, I must have been thinking of the Kimono dragon - the one in the housecoat.

The brain fog of a cold leaves me with...condor.

I should go home.

Posted by: Jonathan | January 25, 2008 01:31 PM

Neanderthalis?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | January 25, 2008 02:08 PM

Mastadons?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | January 25, 2008 02:10 PM

Dinosaurs?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | January 25, 2008 02:11 PM

Hannibal's elephants, who later went on to join the japanese circus?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | January 25, 2008 02:17 PM

Garlic?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | January 25, 2008 02:18 PM

Genghis Khan?

Posted by: bootsy3000 | January 25, 2008 02:20 PM

The Hopi Indians?

The living descendants are members of the family Cryptobranchidae.

Posted by: BT | January 25, 2008 02:54 PM

Lung fish.

Posted by: boxjam | January 25, 2008 03:03 PM

No, although that's closer than most of the previous.

Posted by: BT | January 25, 2008 03:09 PM

Nicholas Cage

"I Married a Mandrill"

Posted by: shananan | January 25, 2008 03:37 PM

Blowfish

Zoinks. The play has nothing to do with the critter, right? Or even a Coppola.
Lemme get "stupid" off my forehead

Posted by: shananan | January 25, 2008 03:44 PM

snake fish

"I Married Barbara Mandrell"

Posted by: boxjam | January 25, 2008 04:27 PM

Ayaco says "inoshishi" or wild boar

"Peter Camerzind"

Posted by: art | January 25, 2008 06:39 PM

or "tsuru" (crane)

Posted by: art | January 25, 2008 06:40 PM

Doesn't "shishi" mean "pee pee"?

I'm having a hard time thinking of many animals I strongly associate with Japan or China.

That aren't pandas or primates.

And have bones.

Crane's a good guess. They're even bipedal.

I'll guess Gamera.

Posted by: boxjam | January 25, 2008 09:16 PM

some kind of seal.

Posted by: shananan | January 27, 2008 10:01 PM

They're not bipeds, they're rare, and part of the reason they're threatened in China is that parts of their bodies are prized for medicinal purposes.
Although human-environmental impacts on their riverrine habitats may be even more damaging.

They are set apart from their closest relatives largely by relative size.

The subject of the play indeed has nothing at all to do with this creature -- it's just that Scheuchzer wrote about him too. You know him mostly through a piece of music and a legendary scene

Posted by: BT | January 27, 2008 11:34 PM

riverine froggy. descended from the giant frog of Baden Baden

Posted by: shananan | January 28, 2008 09:16 AM

peer gynt

Posted by: shananan | January 28, 2008 09:17 AM

Crocodile?

Posted by: boxjam | January 28, 2008 11:10 AM

Now that we've had "lung fish" and "frog" I'm going to call it done, and give partial credit to both boxjam and shananan. The answer is "Giant Salamander."

Yes, giant salamander.

I'll let speculation on the bonus continue. It's not Peer Gynt, Baba Yaga or Peter of Peter and the Wolf.

Posted by: BT | January 28, 2008 12:03 PM

Mistaking a salamander skeleton for human. I guess this is why we have refereed journals.

Heironymous Bosch. Not that I even know who that is, but it's fun to try to spell.

Posted by: Jonathan | January 28, 2008 02:30 PM

i'm saying "der fleder-maus" just because it is fun to say it

Posted by: art | January 29, 2008 05:10 AM

there are those ancient german myths too...uh "neibelung" (this no googling is a real disadvantage for foreign words), if that's a person's name and not an epic like the ramayana

Posted by: art | January 29, 2008 05:13 AM

The Wombat File Is Yours to Keep

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The Friday Quiz: Scheuzer Says

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