Some early common ancestors of Homo sapiens (modern humans) Hominid Evolution Some early common ancestors of Homo sapiens (modern humans)

Humans and other primates share a common ancestor

Many fossils are found in Sedimentary Rocks

Australopithecus afarensis (Lucy’s species)

Lucy continued A.afarensis 3-4 million years ago Knee Bones Brain size….430cc (close to a chimpanzee)                             

U-shaped jaw is more apelike (ours is more V-shaped)

A. afarensis footprint Age:3 A. afarensis footprint Age:3.6 million years Date of Discovery 1974-1975 Location:Tanzania

Afarensis Footprints…3.5 mil yrs. old

What “LUCY” may have looked like.

3.3 million years ago 3 year old female A. afarensis Discovered 2000 Made news 9/20/06 Very complete fossil 1.5 feet tall Able to piece together throat structure to infer voice like a chimp Unusual to find something so complete that was a baby Died in flash flood? Found in Ethiopia

Australopithecus africanus…. South Africa

Taung Child…A. africanus 2.5-3.3 million years ago

Another view of the A. africanus child

Australopithecus africanus Brain Size… Australopithecus africanus Brain Size….440 cc Lack of browbridges on skull and less projecting face

A. africanus adult discovered in 1947…. brain = 485 cc, 2 A. africanus adult discovered in 1947…..brain = 485 cc, 2.5 million years old

A. robustus …Discovered by 1994 at the Drimolen cave in South Africa A. robustus …Discovered by 1994 at the Drimolen cave in South Africa. Estimated age is between 1.5 and 2.0 million years. This is an almost complete skull and lower jaw of a female, one of the most complete hominid skulls ever found. A fossil of a male robustus lower jaw, nicknamed Orpheus was found a few inches away

A. boisei Estimated age ~ 1 A. boisei Estimated age ~ 1.7 million years Brain size = 510cc Discovered 1969 Kenya

Homo habilus….Tanzania

“The Handy Man” (Homo habilus) Use of simple stone tools Brain size….600cc 1.8 million years ago

Homo ergaster…..Kenya

Homo erectus

200,000—1 million years ago Brain Size….1000cc Large Browridge Homo erectus 200,000—1 million years ago Brain Size….1000cc Large Browridge

Homo erectus (maybe H.ergaster?) Found 1984 Kenya 9-11 yr. old boy? Brain 880cc Adult 910cc The most striking is that the holes in his vertebrae, through which the spinal cord goes, have only about half the cross-sectional area found in modern humans. One suggested explanation for this is that the boy lacked the fine motor control we have in the thorax to control speech, implying that he wasn't nearly as fluent a speaker as modern humans are.

Teeth similar to ours…but a bit larger Use of FIRE and tools

Homo neanderthalis                                                          

Neanderthals………. Short, strong body Large rounded nasal opening Adapted to cold climates of the Pleistocene Ice Age 30,000-200,000 years ago Some remains found in graves with flowers???

Old man neanderthal skull (30-40 years old at death had a healed broken rib, severe arthritis of the hip, lower neck, back and shoulders, and had lost most of his molar teeth. The fact that he survived as long as he did indicates that Neanderthals must have had a complex social structure. ~50, 000 years old

Cro-magnon 30,000 yrs old Found in France Homo sapiens

Compare neanderthal to cro-magon

H. floresiensis species of dwarf human discovered at the Liang Bua cave on the Indonesian island of Flores in 2003 (lived 95,000 and 13,000 years ago) ~1 m height Brain=417cc

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/flores.html