Two old human relatives crossed 1.5 million years ago
Two old human relatives crossed 1.5 million years ago
About 1.5 million years ago, the paths of two ancient species crossed at a rank of rank in Kenya. Her footprints in the mud were frozen in time and remained undetected by 2021.
The analysis of the prints has shown that you are to Homo erectus , an ancestor of modern man, and the more distant relative paranthropus boisei. The two individuals crossed the sea area within a few hours or days and left the first direct proof of the living together of different archaic hominin species in the same place.
"This is the first moment that we have from these two types that live in the same environment and possibly interact with each other," says Kevin Hatala, co -author of the study and paleoanthropologist at Chatham University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The study was published in Science on November 28th.
The prints preserved about the individuals, including the height of their foot vaults, the shape of their toes and their walking habits.
"It's really a moment in time," says Tracy Kivell, Paleoanthropologist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.
"These fossilized footprints are as close as we can get a time machine that brings us back to an African lake 1.5 million years ago," says Bernard Wood, Paleoanthropologist at George Washington University in Washingen Dc.
migration path
Earlier studies that mainly be based on finds have suggested that different hominine species lived side by side. But fossils are often distributed over large areas and their esteemed dates include thousands of years. "You don't know if they really get in touch with each other or not," explains Kivell.
In July 2021, researchers discovered several sets of ancient footprints at the Koobi Fora site in the East Turkana area of Kenya, including a continuous path of pressing, which were left by a hominine individual, as well as isolated presses that come from at least three more. The surface dates back to 1.52 million years and the impressions of wavy sand, reeds and fish nests indicate that the area was a shore with flat water.
The path comprises 13 footprints. Hatala and his team estimated that the Hominin, who left him, went at a speed of 1.81 meters per second, similar to a modern person who runs quickly.
By using 3D X-ray images, the researchers examined how the movement of a foot affects the traces left. They compared the depth of the vault and the toe angles in the Hominin prints with those of humans. The analysis suggests that the isolated impressions come from individuals from H. erectus, who is the first human species that went upright and continuously how modern people went.
The researchers attributed the continuous path to an individual of the Art Paranthropus Boisei, which also seems to have worked. This species had a flatter foot and the position of her big toe changed from step to step. The big toe had a greater scope for movement - it was able to bend up to 19 degrees to the outside in the right foot and almost 16 degrees in the left foot - compared to the great toes of the humans, which only tend to be up to about 10 degrees. "There is a certain mobility in the big toe that goes beyond what we see in modern people," says Hatala.
animal prints
The footprints of H. Erectus and P. Boisei are only a few meters apart. "We can only assume that they have perceived each other. How exactly they interacted, whether they learned from each other or whatever, that remains a mystery," says Wood.
In addition to the Hominin impressions, there were also traces of 30 relatives of the cattle, three horse-like animals and 61 birds, including a huge extinct stork, leptoplos falconeri.
Hatala hopes to combine data from footprints and bone fossils in order to “give a really high -resolution picture of what happened in this area during this area during this area.”
Wood says that future studies could concentrate on the animals and birds. "This brings the whole thing alive in a way that is difficult to reach with regular fossil finds."
-
Hatala, K. G. et al. Science 386, 1004–1010 (2024).