ANTH 2 Lecture Notes - Lecture 17: Meave Leakey, Mary Leakey, Paleontology
6 Aug 2020
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Moved in trees like an ape, walked on ground like a hominid transitional form. They looked very ape-like (big hands, hairy, etc. ) Some people think that it"s an ape ancestor, not human. Teeth are extremely chimp-like with big canines. The pelvis was crushed in the fossil so they constructed it how they wanted. It is an interpretation that was based on the size of the foramen magnum because it"s really small. You can"t date the fossil very accurately because it was found in the sand in the sahara. It is listed as possible/potential early hominid. New evidence of earliest bipedalism because they have bones that are very chimp-like but are clearly human. Just last year some other independent study from ny confirmed that they were complete bipeds. We have many candidates for our earliest ancestor, but none is confirmed. They"re naming a new fossil species about once a year. Kanapoi and alia bay, kenya (east africa)
