Bigfoot is real – or at least he was.
Standing at 10 feet tall and weighing up to 300kg (47 stone), the largest primate in history was a towering hairy monster called Gigantopithecus blacki. The beast lived in what is modern-day southern China around 200,000 to two million years ago.
It is the sole representation of the Gigantopithecus genus and is also thought to have possibly lived in Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia.
READ MORE: ‘Lieutenant Dan’ ignores ‘flee or die’ plea and vows to ‘ride out’ Hurricane Milton
Click for more of the latest news from the Daily Star.
Among the discovered remains of the massive beasts are teeth as well as a jaw, now spread across roughly 16 different sites. It was initially thought they were closely related to the line that humans come from, but further thinking is that it is in fact more closely related to orangutans.
The exact size of the beasts remains up in the air because of the challenges presented by the passage of time, but historically it has often been perceived as a giant gorilla-like animal.
In 1946 it was estimated that they were roughly 40% heavier than the average male gorilla, although given the scarcity of remains that have been found the exact scale of the beasts remains up in the air.
But despite its massive stature, the Gigantopithecus blacki is believed to have been a herbivore.
(Image: Mike Floyd/Daily Mail/REX/Shutterstock)
According to Quaternary International , it is thought that, unlike its modern ancestor the orangutan, it ate lower-lying plants like stems, roots and grasses.
However, as per a report in Nature, the demise of the massive beast remains unknown.
For the latest breaking news and stories from across the globe from the Daily Star, sign up for our newsletters.