Monday, June 1, 2009, "Were our earliest hominid ancestors European?" by Bob HolmesTiny Fossil AnimalFossil bones of an animal no bigger than a shrew and weighing less than an ounce have been identified as belonging to the earliest known relative in the primate lineage that led to monkeys, apes and humans. The wee animal lived 45 million years ago in a humid rain forest in what is now China... scatterings of fossils point to the earliest primates of any kind appearing about 55 million years ago, mainly in Asia... although the more immediate human forebears arose in Africa, their earliest primate ancestors appeared to come from Asia. Somehow primates then migrated to Africa. Dr. MacPhee said the Euroasian origin of primates was now generally accepted by scientists, "thanks in part to Beard's work," but "why that should be is itself controversial now."
May Link Lower Primates
With Humans
by John Noble Wilford
March 16, 2000
The face, jaw and teeth of a 12-million-year-old hominid named Anoiapithecus brevirostris. The fossil's presence in Spain suggests that hominids migrated from Europe into Africa before the evolution of modern humans (Image: National Academy of Sciences, PNAS)Just 9-thousandths of a square inch in size, the teeth are about 54.5 million years old and suggest these early primates were no larger than modern dwarf lemurs weighing about 2 to 3 ounces...
Previous fossil evidence shows primates were living in North America, Europe and Asia at least 55 million years ago. But, until now, the fossil record of anthropoid primates has extended back only 45 million years...
In addition to stretching the primate timeline, the specimens represent a new genus as well as a new species of anthropoid, which the researchers have named Anthrasimias gujaratensis by drawing from the Greek word for "coal," Latin for "monkey" and the Indian State of Gujarat where the teeth were found.
"Anthrasimias may be the oldest anthropoid in the world," the PNAS report said -- "may" reflecting the fact that some scientists think slightly older fossils found in a Moroccan limestone deposit also could have been anthropoid, Kay said...
The teeth were dated by identifying microscopic marine plankton fossils of known age in nearby rock layers, he added...
Their PNAS report describes tooth structure differences that would separate Anthrasimias from two other ancient lines of primates whose remains have been found at the same level of the Vastan mine. Of the three lines, Williams and Kay believe only Anthrasimias's is part of the anthropoid lineage that evolved into modern monkeys, apes and humans...
"From the tooth size and structure we can say something about the animals' body weight and diet, because teeth have crests that are differentially developed depending on whether they ate primarily insects, leaves or fruit," he said. -- Little teeth suggest big jump in primate timeline
Early humans lived in northern China about 1.66 million years ago, according to research reported in the journal Nature this week. The finding suggests humans -- characterized by their making and use of stone tools -- inhabited upper Asia almost 340,000 years before previous estimates placed them there, surviving in a pretty hostile environment.
The research team, including Richard Potts of the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History, reports the results of excavating four layers of sediments at Majuangou in north China. All the layers contained indisputable stone tools apparently made by early humans, known to researchers as "hominins." -- Out of Africa: Scientists find earliest evidence yet of human presence in Northeast Asia
and...
The Link:
Uncovering Our
Earliest Ancestor
by Colin Tudge
