What kind of hominin first left Africa?

Author(s)

Scardia, Giancarlo ^[1] ; Neves, Walter A. ^[2] ; Tattersall, Ian ^[3] ; Blumrich, Lukas ^[2]

Affiliation

^[1] Univ Estadual Paulista Unesp, Inst Geociencias & Ciencias Exatas, BR-13506900 Rio Claro, SP - Brazil

^[2] Univ Sao Paulo, Inst Estudos Avancados, Sao Paulo - Brazil

^[3] Amer Museum Nat Hist, Div Anthropol, New York, NY - USA

• Document type: Journal article
• Source: EVOLUTIONARY ANTHROPOLOGY; v. 30, n. 2, p. 122-127, MAR 2021.
• Web of Science Citations: 0

Abstract

Recent discoveries of stone tools from Jordan (2.5 Ma) and China (2.1 Ma) document hominin presence in Asia at the beginning of the Pleistocene, well before the conventional Dmanisi datum at 1.8 Ma. Although no fossil hominins documenting this earliest Out of Africa phase have been found, on chronological grounds a pre-Homo erectus hominin must be considered the most likely maker of those artifacts. If so, this sheds new light on at least two disputed subjects in paleoanthropology, namely the remarkable variation among the five Dmanisi skulls, and the ancestry of Homo floresiensis. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 13/22631-2 - Hominin biocultural evolution at Zarqa river valley, Jordan: a paleoanthropological approach
• Grantee: Walter Alves Neves
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• FAPESP's process: 16/04809-7 - Magnetostratigraphy of volcanic and sedimentary succession of the Zarqa river, Jordan
• Grantee: Giovana Oliveira Pimentel
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation