Oct 6 From Early Hominins to Modern Humans

Six million years ago: Our ancestral human line diverged from those of chimps
and gorillas

Hominin: All members of human lineage, after diverging from ancestral apes

Bidepalism: Walking upright on two feet

Key feature differentiating early hominins from apes

Fossil evidence

Fossil record is biased:

-By the environment
Fossils are the exception, not the rule
• Found where sediment can preserve them
• Found where erosion exposes them

-By geological activity

• Blank time periods

-By limited access

• Excavation allowed?
Social, political factors

After burial, conditions have to be just right for fossilization to occur

Dating fossils:
- Relative dating: Date relative to something else
• Stratigraphy: Fossils in lower layers are older

- Absolute dating: Dates in precise numbers

• Carbon 14 dating
• Molecular dating

MYA: Million years ago

BP: Before present
(1950)

What’s important:
How hominins changed
Why?
What are the consequences?
For 75 years, the oldest known hominins were Australopiths, dated at 3 MYA

Oldest hominins now known: Ardipithecus

Ardipithecus kadabba 5.8 MYA

Bipedal

Ardipithecus ramidus 4.4 MYA

Found first, before Ardipithecus kadabba
Ancestral to Australopithecus, so became the oldest hominin at the time
1992 in Ethiopia:
Found only teeth, some fragments of skull and arm. No lower body.
Was it bipedal?

2009: Near-complete Ardipithecus ramidus skeleton: “Ardi”

ARDIPITHECUS KADABBA 5.8 MYA

ARDIPITHECUS RAMIDUS 4.4 MYA

AUSTRALOPITHECUS ANAMENSIS 4.2 MYA

1995: Maeve Leakey Kenya

Earlier than any other Australopithecus found; earliest evidence of bipedality

AUSTRALOPITHECUS AFARENSIS 3.8-3 MYA

Au. Afarensis: East Africa Excavated in the 1970s

•Laetoli 3.8 - 3.6 MYA

Mary Leakey
Teeth, jaws, footprints
•Hadar 3.3-3 MYA
Donald Johanson
Many more specimens at Hadar “Lucy”
MODERN HUMAN LUCY Au. Afarensis

Hominin, with apelike features

It was below the neck that afarensis looked more human than apelike, because it
was bipedal.

Transitional: changing features from apelike to human

Bipedal locomotion (walking upright) changes:

• Pelvis
Bipedal locomotion (walking upright) changes:

•Pelvis

•Spine
Bipedal locomotion (walking upright) changes:

•Pelvis

•Spine

•Foramen magnum: Hole at the base of the skull, through which the spinal
cord enters

HUMAN CHIMP
Last three Australopiths:

Au. Africanus 3.5-2.5 MYA Small, slender

South Africa 1920s:

Raymond Dart
Presumed human ancestry
Disbelieved because: It implied African ancestry, and had a small brain

Paranthropus robustus 1.9-1 MYA

Paranthropus boisei 2.3-1.4 MYA
Both were larger, heavier

Au. Africanus 3.5-2.5 MYA

P. Robustus 1.9-1 MYA
P. Boisei 2.3-1.4 MYA

Homo habilis 2.8-1.4 MYA

Mary and Louis Leakey

Olduvai Gorge Tanzania Oldowan pebble tools

Lower Paleolithic: Homo erectus 1.9 MYA- 500,000 BP

More sophisticated tools
Sociocultural adaptations led to success

Out of Africa 1: H. Erectus moves beyond Africa to Europe and Asia

H. Erectus: Acheulian tools Acheulian hand ax

Olduwan pebble tool à Acheulian hand ax

Combination of culture and biology: Crucially important

• Better tools allowed better use of the environment
• Anatomical changes:
- Modern skeleton allowed long-distance travel to find food
- Bigger brain, bigger skull
Natural selection led to the success of compact pelvis for bipedalism, and
babies born when their heads can still fit through birth canal

Results in immature, highly dependent babies

The biological enhances the social:

Longer learning periods, reliance on kin and cooperation

•Fire
Smaller teeth
Change in diet owing to both tool use and fire

in smaller jaws, big teeth were selected against

Fire and storytelling Ju/’hoansi

Middle Paleolithic
Early Homo Sapiens 300,000 BP

Neandertals 130,000-39,000 BP

Mousterian tools
La Chappelle aux Saints: “Apelike” Neandertal found

Was actually an elderly man with severe arthritis

Out of Africa AMH edition (Out of Africa 2):

Anatomically Modern Humans (AMHs) arose in Africa, spread out, replaced other
populations

Upper Paleolithic 40,000 BP

Anatomically Modern Humans: Homo sapiens sapiens
Major achievements: Tool making and art

•Tool making: Blades

Also many categories of other finely-crafted tools

• Art: Masks, sculpture, engravings

 Cave Art: France and Spain
Walls and ceilings painted with images of big-game animals

Explanations for cave art:

1. Magic or ritual: Caves used for ceremonies

2. Historical record: Calendar to record events, hunting information
3. Attempt to control animal reproduction, promote fertility
4. Response to animal scarcity: Paintings increased as animal herds
decreased

Herds were disappearing owing to climate change

14,000 BP: End of the last ice age
12,000 BP: Sub-arctic game disappeared

Mesolithic: Period of intense ecological change

Warmer environment: New plants and animals
Grasslands replaced by forest
Hunting strategies changed

Broad-spectrum economy: Expanded categories of plants and animals

Development of food production: Plant cultivation and animal domestication

10,000 BP Neolithic