Bodo - 600,000 years
Bodo, site of paleoanthropological excavation in the Awash River valley of Ethiopia known for the 1976 discovery of a 600,000-year-old cranium that is intermediate in shape between Homo erectus and H. sapiens; many authorities classify it as a separate species called H. heidelbergensis. Bodo has also yielded abundant animal fossils and Stone Age tools of the Oldowan and Acheulean industries.
The Bodo cranium resembles specimens attributed to H. erectus in having prominent brow ridges, a massive face, and thick cranial bones. Its brain size, however, is larger than most H. erectus specimens and is within the range of H. sapiens. There are several other modern traits as well, including the orientation of the lateral borders of the nose. Overall, the skull is most similar to those of Kabwe (Broken Hill), Zambia, and Petralona, Greece, which are also attributed to H. heidelbergensis. Whatever the classification, the Bodo specimen reveals a transitional morphology between early members of the genus Homo and modern humans. One remarkable feature of the Bodo cranium is the presence of cut marks on the face and braincase within the eye socket. These appear to have been made at the time of death by sharp-edged stone tools.
Ndutu 400,000 years
The partial cranium from Lake Ndutu, near Olduvai Gorge in northern Tanzania, has generally been viewed as Homo erectus, although points of similarity to H. sapiens have also been recognized. Bones of the vault are in fact quite thick, and the cranium is small. Length and breadth dimensions are comparable to those of earlier H. erectus from Koobi Fora and Ileret, and the Ndutu individual is more similar in size to O.H. 12 than to O.H. 9. Unfortunately, the facial skeleton and frontal bone are very incomplete, and little useful information can be obtained from these parts of the existing reconstruction. The parietals are also damaged, but the left temporal is more satisfactorily preserved, and the occiput is nearly complete. Occipital morphology, mastoid shape, and characteristics of the glenoid cavity and tympanic plate probably provide the best available guide to affinities of the Ndutu hominid. In many of these features the cranium resembles Broken Hill, Elandsfontein, and other African fossils referred to archaic H. sapiens. There are some similarities to modern humans also, but no ties to the Neanderthals of Europe. Allocation of Ndutu to an African subspecies of H. sapiens seems most appropriate, even if the pattern of relationships between such archaic populations and recent humans is still unclear.
Jebel Irhoud – 300,000 years
New fossils and age for Jebel Irhoud. Jean-Jacques Hublin and colleagues have published new specimens, new analyses, and a new chronology pointing at 300 ka. All their results robustly confirm what we already knew on these populations: modern face, primitive braincase. Two major advances of these new findings are i) the morphology of Irhoud 10 (the new skull) is apparently so similar to Irhoud 1 (the old skull found back in the ’60s), suggesting that such phenoptype was common and representative, and not only the result of individual variation, and ii) the age around 300 ka, that suggests an earlier origin for our lineage. The braincase and endocast of the new skull were not analysed in this study, probably because of some deformation, and there are no photographs of the fossils (in the paper we can only see the virtual reconstruction of the face), so an assessment of its paleo neurological traits is not available yet. But in this article they re-analyse the old specimens (Jebel Irhoud 1 and 2) through shape analysis, confirming a plesiomorph braincase, apparently (Extended Data Figure 4) because of a reduced parietal and frontal size and curvature. Here a 2013 study I co-authored with Osbjorn Pearson on Jebel Irhoud’s endocast, supporting the same conclusion: they were probably modern humans, but without modern brains. If they were our ancestors, something triggered a subsequent change in brain proportions and organization.
Homo naledi 226,000 and 335,000 years
Probing deeper into the South African cave system known as Rising Star, a subterranean maze that last year yielded the largest cache of hominin fossils known to science, an international team of researchers has discovered another chamber with more remains of a newfound human relative, Homo naledi.
The discovery, announced May 9, 2017 with the publication of a series of papers in the journal eLife, helps round out the picture of a creature that scientists now know shared the landscape with modern humans -- and probably other hominin species -- between 226,000 and 335,000 years ago.
Florisbad 260,000
The Florisbad Skull had previously been classified as Homo helmei. This specimen was relatively the same size as modern humans, with a slightly larger brain volume of 1,400 cm3. They are associated with the start of the most important revolutions in human technology.[2] The skull was also found with Middle Stone Age tools.[3]
The Florisbad skull comprises the right side of the face, most of the frontal bone, and some of the maxilla, along with portions of the roof and sidewalls. A single, upper right, third molar was also found with the adult skull. In 1996, enamel samples from the tooth went through the electron spin resonance technique which allowed researchers to date the skull to around 259,000 years old.[4]
The skull also showed extensive porotic hyperostosis as well as a large number of healed lesions, including pathological drainage or vascular tracts. There are also a couple of large puncture marks and scratch-like marks which may reflect carnivore activity[4]
Source: https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/02/0216_050216_omo_2.html
Source: http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/herto_skulls.php
Source: https://www.revolvy.com/main/index.php?s=Kabwe%20Skull&item_type=topic
In 1976, a fossil hominid skull was recovered from the Ngaloba Beds at Laetoli, Northern Tanzania; its morphology is discussed here. The discovery of this skull is of great interest and importance because of its very substantial presumed antiquity and its largely anatomically modern morphology. The discovery has considerable implications for the antiquity and origin of modern Homo sapiens, a subject of longstanding interest and one which has gained renewed attention recently.
A New Hominid Fossil Skull (L.H. 18) from the Ngaloba Beds, Laetoli, Northern.... Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/16431546_A_New_Hominid_Fossil_Skull_LH_18_from_the_Ngaloba_Beds_Laetoli_Northern_Tanzania [accessed Mar 23 2018].
Omo 1,2 – 195,000 years
Although both Omo I and Omo II were classified as Homo sapiens in 1967, the Omo II remains were considered much more primitive. Finding that the two individuals lived at around the same time in the same location suggests that, when modern humans first appeared, there were other, less modern populations also on the scene. The finding may add some new perspective to how we think about how and when "modern" human anatomy evolved.
Source: https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/02/0216_050216_omo_2.html
Herto 160,000
The oldest known fossils of modern humans have been discovered in Herto, Ethiopia. An international team led by researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, found the skulls of two adults and a child dating from 160,000 years ago - 40,000 years earlier than the previous oldest remains of Homo sapiens.
Source: http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/herto_skulls.php
Kabwe 125,000
Homo rhodesiensis refers to an extinct hominin species of the genus Homo, first described in 1921 by Arthur Smith Woodward in reference to the Kabwe skull fossil recovered from a cave at Broken Hill, or Kabwe, in Zambia (then known as Northern Rhodesia).[1] A number of morphologically-comparable fossil remains came to light in East Africa (Bodo, Ndutu, Eyasi, Ileret) and North Africa (Salé, Rabat, Dar-es-Soltane, Djbel Irhoud, Sidi Aberrahaman, Tighenif) during the 20th century and were classified as Homo rhodesiensis.[2]
Smith Woodward decided the fossils represented an extinct hominin species[3] as the "... thick skull, sloped forehead and giant brow ridges made the species distinct from living people". The finds were dated between 300,000 and 125,000 years BC. "However, this [African] group of fossils has [also] been known by many other now-obscure names",[4] none ever having been accepted universally, including the taxon Homo rhodesiensis.[5] The Saldanha cranium, found in 1953 in South Africa was subject to at least three taxonomic revisions from 1955 to 1996. Consensus is confined to informal taxonomic categories, such as "pre-modern".[6]
Most scientists now regard Homo rhodesiensis as such the direct ancestor of anatomically modern humans.[7] [8] [9] [10]
Ngaloba 120,000
A New Hominid Fossil Skull (L.H. 18) from the Ngaloba Beds, Laetoli, Northern.... Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/16431546_A_New_Hominid_Fossil_Skull_LH_18_from_the_Ngaloba_Beds_Laetoli_Northern_Tanzania [accessed Mar 23 2018].
Qafzeh and Skhul fossils ~100,000 years
The Skhul/Qafzeh hominins or Qafzeh–Skhul early modern humans[1] are hominin fossils discovered in the Qafzeh and Es Skhul Caves in Israel. They are today classified as Homo sapiens, among the earliest of their species in Eurasia. Skhul Cave is on the slopes of Mount Carmel; Qafzeh Cave is a rock shelter in Lower Galilee.
The remains found at Es Skhul, together with those found at the Wadi el-Mughara Caves and Mugharet el-Zuttiyeh, were classified in 1939 by Arthur Keith and Theodore D. McCown as Palaeoanthropus palestinensis, a descendent of Homo heidelbergensis.
The remains exhibit a mix of traits found in archaic and anatomically modern humans. They have been tentatively dated at about 80,000-120,000 years old using electron paramagnetic resonance and thermoluminescence dating techniques.[5] The brain case is similar to modern humans, but they possess brow ridges and a projecting facial profile like Neanderthals. They were initially regarded as transitional from Neanderthals to anatomically modern humans, or as hybrids between Neanderthals and modern humans. Neanderthals remains have been found nearby at Kebara Cave that date to 61,000-48,000 years ago,[6] but it has been hypothesised that the Skhul/Qafzeh hominids had died out by 80,000 years ago because of drying and cooling conditions, favouring a return of a Neanderthal population[7] suggesting that the two types of hominids never made contact in the region. A more recent hypothesis is that Skhul/Qafzeh hominids represent the first exodus of modern humans from Africa around 125,000 years ago, probably via the Sinai Peninsula, and that the robust features exhibited by the Skhul/Qafzeh hominids represent archaic sapiens features rather than Neanderthal features.[7] The discovery of modern human made tools from about 125,000 years ago at Jebel Faya, United Arab Emirates, in the Arabian Peninsula, may be from an even earlier exit of modern humans from Africa.[
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