Human Evolution

Human Evolution

Make a Table in your Notebook

Species Morphological characteristics Notes

Pan troglodytes Cranium – 3-400 cm3

First tooth – 3 years oldExtant, simple tools,

Don’t draw your rows until you finish each species, in case you need more space for some than for others.

Primates

• Primates evolved from mammals around 60 million years ago

• With the exception of humans, live primarily in tropical areas

• Subdivided into two main groups, prosimians (similar to original primates), and simians (more advanced primates)

Apes

Pan troglodytes, Pan paniscus, Pan bonobos

(extant)

• Cranial capacity: 300 – 400 cm3

• Knuckle walks and climbs,

• 1st molar tooth 3 years old,

• Uses simple tools

• Longevity 40 years

The First Simian?

Primate Family Tree

Human Phylogeny

Ardipithecus ramidus (ardi)4.4 mya

• Significant fossil reported in Oct 09

• Cranial Capacity: 300-350 cc

• Discovered in the Afar desert in Ethiopia

• Ardi is million years older than Lucy (we will meet Lucy later)

• Ardi was likely bipedal (two legs) when on the ground

Australopithecus afarensis3.9 – 2.9 Ma

• Cranial capacity: 380 – 450 cm3

Height: 1.07m

• Bipedal (footprints 3.6 Ma old) /climber

• U-shaped dental arcade but reduced canines

Australopithecus africanus 3 – 2.25 Ma

• Cranial capacity: 500 cm3

• Bipedal, 20 – 35 kg

• Rounder skull,

• Longevity: 40 years maximum

• Lucy is the most famous A. afarensis skeleton

• Named after the Beetles song “Lucy in the sky with diamonds”

Homo habilis 2.6 -1.4 Ma

• Cranial capacity: 600 – 800 cm3

• Height: 1.20 – 1.35m

• Simple fashioned tools – choppers (Oldowan culture)

Homo erectus1.8 to 0.5 Ma

• Cranial capacity: 850 – 1100 cm3

• Use of fire, Height 1.55 to 1.8 m

• Extended childhood. 1st molar at 4.6 years old.

• Greater longevity 52 years

• Speech?

• Improved tools: Hand axes (Acheulian culture)

Homo ergaster1.8-1.3 Ma

• Cranial Capacity – 700-800 cm3

• Recognized as the ancestor to other homo species (heidelbergensis, neanderthal, sapiens)

• Used more complex tools than habilus

Homo Ergaster

Homo heidelbergensis

• Cranial Capacity:1100-1400cm3

• Height:1.8m (6ft)

• More muscular than modern humans

• Hunters (mammoth lived at the same time)

• May have buried their dead (contested)

• May have had primitive language

Homo neanderthalensis250 000 to 28 000 a

• Cranial capacity: 1400 cm3 (bigger than H.sapiens)

• Brow ridge, long low skull, Height: 1.67m• Stocky build• Improved sophisticated tools: sharp flakes

produced by a single stroke from a core. (Mousterian culture) sometimes buried their dead

• Made simple jewellery

Homo floresiensis

• Cranial Capacity:980 cm3

• Height: 1.06m (3’6”) -1.37m (4’6”)

• Contested as a species

• May have been H. sapiens suffering from microcephaly

• Its rightful place along the homonid lineage is still being debated

Homo denisovans

• Based on a finger bone, toe bone, and tooth discovered in Denisova cave (Siberia)

• May have interbred with H. sapiens

Estimate

Homo sapiens150 000 a to present

• Cranial capacity: 1400 cm3 (range 1000 to 2000 cm3) (18% of the body’s energy consumption for 5% of body mass)

• Speech, Art, Extensive tool kit including new materials (bone, ivory, antler)

• Symbolic thought• 1st molar tooth 5.9 years old• Longevity 66 years (with medical advancements, this longevity has

increased dramatically)