Word: erectus
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...gave rise to the genus Homo, so one species came to stand out among the Homo line and eventually led to modern humans. The fossil record is far too spotty to say how Homo habilis (handy man) and other members of its genus--H. rudolfensis, H. ergaster and H. erectus--were related, to what extent they overlapped or even whether they all represent distinct species. Many scientists believe, though, that it was H. erectus that was the ultimate victor, the direct ancestor of our own species...
...erectus was also the first hominid to emigrate from Africa, at least 1.8 million years ago, spreading all the way to China and Indonesia. Then, at some point--for reasons still mysterious--the lineage diverged, with one branch leading to Neanderthals and another to modern humans...
...happened is unclear. The oldest Neanderthal fossils in hand date only to 200,000 B.P., and the oldest Homo sapiens to about 100,000. But some recent discoveries may help answer those questions. A 1 million-year-old cranium from Buia, Eritrea, for example, has characteristics of both H. erectus and H. sapiens. And what Asfaw and his colleagues call a "spectacular" partial cranium of the same age from Ethiopia should help as well when it's formally unveiled...
...modern human beings. They know about Lucy, the upright-walking proto-human australopithecine that strode the continent some 3.2 million years ago; about Homo habilis, the first known human species, which was making and using stone tools in the same region by 1.2 million years later; about Homo erectus, which emerged from Africa soon thereafter and spread across the world...
...paleontologists can't be sure that they are from the same species. But like the skull, these fossils show a mix of primitive and advanced traits. Australopithecus afarensis, which lived between 3.6 million and 2.9 million years ago, had forearms that were long compared with its legs, while Homo erectus, which appeared about 1.7 million years ago, had shortened forearms and longer legs, more like modern humans. The new fossils fall right in the middle, both chronologically and anatomically, suggesting that the leg bones lengthened at least a million years before the forearm bones shrank...