Abstract: The direct evidence of the fossil hominid brains evolution comes from the study of skulls and endocranial casts (endocasts). Endocasts of fossil hominids have been a focus of attention and controversy in paleoanthropology for as long as there has been a record of fossil hominids. There have several foci of this attention. The first concerns the evolution of cranial capacity and their relationship to body size. A second area of fossil hominid brains involves the sulcal patterns on endoasts. A third fo- cus of attention concerns right-left asymmetries in the fossil hominid brains. A forth focus concerns the pattern of blood flow to and from the brain. Endocast preserves numernous details of both the meningeal and venous sinus system. Finally, much of the literature has been devoted to speculation the factors that account for the expension of the primitive hominid brain. With the review of fossil hominid brains, the main aim is to get some information in light of the study of the Chinese fossil hominids.

Key words: Brain evolution; Fossil hominid; Endocast; Cranial capacity; Human evolution