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An ancient human ancestor whose name honours Cecil Rhodes should be renamed in an effort to decolonise science, experts have argued. The species homo rhodesiensis, named after Rhodesia – which in turn took the name of the British imperialist – should be called homo bodoensis, scientists say. The reclassification is partly a bid to shed colonial associations – as well bring clarity to a confusing chapter of human evolution.... ...Rhodes was an imperialist, businessman and politician who played a dominant role in southern Africa in the late 19th century, driving the annexation of vast swathes of land. The long-running Rhodes...

Archaeologists from the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, the Leibniz Zentrum für Archäologie and Leiden University say they have found cut marks on the bones of two beaver species from the 400,000-year-old hominin open air site of Bilzingsleben in central Germany. Their results demonstrate a greater diversity of prey choice by Middle Pleistocene hominins than commonly acknowledged, and a much deeper history of broad-spectrum subsistence than commonly assumed, already visible in prey choices 400,000 years ago...They used magnifying glasses and digital microscopes to analyze 2,496 remains (1,963 teeth and 533 cranial and postcranial bones and bone fragments) of two beaver species:...

A team of paleontologists... analyzed the fossilized jawbone, partial skull and some leg bones of a hominin dated to 300,000 years ago.The fossils were excavated at a site in Hualongdong, in what is now a part of East China. They were subsequently subjected to both a morphological and a geometric assessment, with the initial focus on the jawbone, which exhibited unique features—a triangular lower edge and a unique bend.The research team suggests that the unique features of the jawbone resemble those of both modern humans and Late Pleistocene hominids. But they also found that it did not have a chin,...

Entombed in a limestone shelf of South Africa’s Rising Star Cave, the fragmented skull of a Homo naledi child has suggested that the prehistoric species may have been more similar to modern humans than previously thought. Two new studies, published this week in the journal PaleoAnthropology, have revealed new details about the mysterious Homo naledi people, based on a set of fossils first discovered in 2017, which are believed to be that of a young Homo naledi of 4- to 6-years-old. An international team of researchers has estimated the child would have lived between 236,000 and 335,000 years ago, before...

The remains were found in a remote part of the cave that suggests the body had been placed there on purpose, said Professor Guy Berger. JOHANNESBURG — The fossil remains of an early hominid child who died almost 250,000 years ago have been discovered in a cave in South Africa by a team of international and South African researchers. The team announced the discovery of a partial skull and teeth of a Homo naledi child who died when it was approximately four to six years old. The remains were found in a remote part of the cave that suggests the...

Artist rendering of H. bodoensis. (Ettore Mazza) Scientists have named a new species that may have been the direct ancestor of modern humans. The newly proposed species, Homo bodoensis – which lived more than half a million years ago in Africa – may help to untangle how human lineages moved and interacted across the globe. Although modern humans, Homo sapiens, are the only surviving human lineage, other human species once roamed Earth. For example, scientists recently discovered that the Indonesian island Flores was once home to the extinct species Homo floresiensis, often known as "the hobbit" for its miniature body....

Scientists said on Thursday (June 24) they had discovered a new kind of early human after studying pieces of fossilised bone dug up at a site used by a cement plant in central Israel. The fragments of a skull and a lower jaw with teeth were about 130,000 years old and could force a rethinkof parts of the human family tree, the researchers from Tel Aviv University and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem said. Nesher Ramla Homo - named after the place southeast of Tel Aviv where it was found - may have lived alongside our species, Homo sapiens, for...

The Nesher Ramla bones. (Avi Levin and Ilan Theiler, Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University) ================================================================================== More than 120,000 years ago in the Levant, Homo sapiens lived side-by-side with a type of ancient human we didn't know about - until now. That's according to new fossil evidence of this human uncovered by archaeologists - fragments of ancient skull and jaw bones, and teeth, which seem to fit both Neanderthal and Homo sapiens, but also... neither. This newly discovered hominin type could be the ancestor to Neanderthal populations in Europe, answering the mystery of how these populations were infiltrated with...