The unassuming little village of SANGIRAN , 18km north of Solo, ranks as one of the most important archeological sites in Central Java. One million years ago, Sangiran was the home of Pithecantropus Erectus , or Java man as he's more commonly known. A few fragments of his jawbone were discovered in 1936 and, until the Rift Valley finds in Kenya, were the oldest hominid remains ever found, and the first to support Darwin's theory of evolution. Many scientists of the day even suggested that Java man might have been the so-called "missing link", the evolutionary connection between the anthropoid apes and modern man. Replicas of Java man's cranium (the real skulls are in Bandung) are housed in Sangiran's single-room museum (daily 8am-5pm; Rp1000), where a life-size diorama tries to bring to life Java man's world, but none of the captions is in English. To get to Sangiran, take a Damri or BERSERI bus from Solo's Jalan Riyadi to Kalijambe (Rp500), then either wait for a yellow angkuta (Rp200) or hire an ojek (Rp1500) to take you to the village.