The recent discovery of an 8.7 million year old fossil ape is contesting the generally accepted belief that the early human ancestors evolved in Africa.
The ape, called Anadoluvius turkae, was unearthed by a group of international researchers at a fossil site in the Çankırı province in Türkiye and suggests that hominins, the early form of humans, developed outside of Africa.
“Our findings further suggest that hominines not only evolved in western and central Europe but spent over five million years evolving there and spreading to the eastern Mediterranean before eventually dispersing into Africa, probably as a consequence of changing environments and diminishing forests,” said David Begun, professor in the Department of Anthropology in the Faculty of Arts & Science at the University of Toronto.
Leading the research alongside Professor Begun, Professor Ayla Serim Evol at Ankara University, said: “We have no limb bones but judging from its jaws and teeth, the animals found alongside it, and the geological indicators of the environment, Anadoluvius probably lived in relatively open conditions, unlike the forest settings of living great apes.”
Researchers were able to conclude this in the scientific journal Communications Biology thanks to a well-preserved partial cranium that was uncovered in 2015, and along with mirror imaging, can estimate that Anadoluvius lived in a dry forest & weighed between 50-60 kgs.
They were also able to group Anadoluvius with the chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and humans that make up the hominines family, which researchers can conclude originate from Europe and the eastern Mediterranean.
“This new evidence supports the hypothesis that hominines originated in Europe and dispersed into Africa along with many other mammals between nine and seven million years ago, though it does not definitively prove it,” said Professor Begun.
Image credit: Sevim-Erol, A., Begun, D.R., Sözer, Ç.S.