Large fragments of one male and one female skull and a molar tooth were discovered in 1993 in Hulu Cave (Chinese: 葫芦洞; pinyin: Húlu dòng; lit.

[3] In 1992, Mu Xi-nan (穆西南), Xu Hankui (许汉奎), Mu Daocheng (穆道成), and Zhong Shilan (钟石兰) with the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Paleontology (NIGP) identified Hulu Cave near the Tangshan Subdistrict in Jiangning District, Nanjing (roughly 26 km (16 mi) east of the city center of Nanjing) as a mammalian fossil bearing site, and organised further excavations with the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) headquartered in Beijing.

[2][4] The mammal assemblage indicated Huludong was roughly contemporaneous with the Zhoukoudian cave site near Beijing, home of the Peking Man (the reason why the IVPP had joined the excavations).

Researchers proposed that the enamel used to date the tooth may not have the same uranium uptake as the skulls, leading to the discrepancy in estimated age.

[7] The Nanjing Man fossil discovery coincided with the paleoanthropological debate on the population dynamics of modern humans and their relation to other species of the genus Homo.