4 Extra Credit Questions and also a 3 paragraph reflection.

ANTHRO 201- Lecture/Discussion Outline

Spring 2019

Ch.7: Origins of the

Genus Homo

Guiding Questions

· When, Where, and How Did the Genus Homo Develop?

· What were the cultural capacities of our ancestors?

· What Is the Relationship Between Biological Change and Cultural Change in the Genus Homo?

When, Where, and How Did the Genus Homo Develop?

· Homo habilis

· “Handy man”

· First of the genus Homo

· 2.5 mya to 1.6mya

· 500 to 800cc

· Larger brains & smaller faces than australopithecines

· East & South Africa

· neck down, differs little from Australopithecus

The Lower Paleolithic 2.6 mya to 200,000-250,000ya

· First part of the Old Stone Age.

· Beginning is marked by Oldowan tools, the earliest identifiable stone tool tradition.

Oldowan Tools

· Earliest stone tools found in: Lake Turkana area of Kenya, southern Ethiopia, Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania, and the Hadar region of Ethiopia.

· Found in same geological strata as Homo habilis.

· Flakes used for cutting meat, reeds, sedges, and grasses and for cutting and scraping wood.

· Small indentations on surfaces suggest leftover cores transformed into choppers:

· for breaking open bones

· may have been used for defense

Sex, Gender and the Behavior of Early Homo

· Man The Hunter hypothesis

· Division of labor by food-foraging societies

· not defined through biologically based sex differences

· influenced by cultural and environmental factors

· NOTE: Evidence from chimpanzees & bonobos cast doubt on the notion of a sex-based division of labor in human evolutionary history.

Hunters or Scavengers?

· Earliest members of genus Homo were tertiary scavengers.

· Used tools to break open the long bones to get at the rich marrow inside.

· Evidence of planning ahead: storing of stone tools & raw materials for making tools.

Brain Size and Diet

· Brain will triple in size from 2.5mya-300,000ya

· BIOCULTURAL

· Cultural abilities correspond simultaneous biological expansion of the brain.

· Meat eating

· fulfills energy requirements of brain expansion

· leisure time to explore

Homo erectus

“Upright Human”

· 1.89 mya- 143,000 years ago

· 1st hominin expand into new regions of Old World.

· Fossils: Africa, China, Java

· Larger cranial capacity than Homo habilis

· Forehead is less sloping & teeth are smaller

· flat skullenormous brow ridges (ape-like) BUT cranial capacity much larger than ape’s

· Tall (5 feet, 10 inches)

· sexual dimorphism between males and females almost same as modern Homo sapiens.

Physical Traits of Homo erectus

· Cranial Capacity: 600-1225 cc (avrge of 1,000 cc)

· Occipital or Nuchal torus (projection at the back of the skull)

· Supraorbital torus (browridge)

· Postorbital constriction

· Lower facial prognathism

· Thick cranial bones

Why did Homo erectus migrate out of Africa?

· The first hominin to expand into new regions of the Old World.

· Some possible reasons include:

· 1. Curiosity

· 2. Lack of natural resources

· 3. Following migrating herds

· 4. Technologically-capable of surviving the trek to the colder climates outside of Africa

SPLITTERS: Homo erectus

2 mya to 300,000ya

· Splitters see anatomical differences between the African and Asian discoveries.

· Asian fossils: Homo erectus

· African fossils: Homo ergaster

· European fossils: Homo antecessor (Spain)&

Homo heidelbergensis ( Mauer Jaw: 500,000ya-Neandertals)

· Analyses show that they all represent closely related species and possibly geographical varieties of a single species.

Homo erectus in Africa

Nariokotome Boy: Turkana Boy

· Olduvai Gorge

· Most complete skeleton ever found of Homo erectus/ergaster

· 1.6 mya, died at age 12.

· 5 foot 3 inches

· Probable that he would have been 6 foot in adulthood.

Culture of Homo erectus

· Acheulean tools

· Africa, Europe, and Asia

· Hand-axes (bi-faces) developed from earlier Oldowan chopper.

· Tools began to diversify.

· Hand axes, cleaver, points, scrapers, borers, and other types of small tools.

Use of Fire (eventual control of fire)

· culture and technology

· 700,000 yo Kao Poh Nam rock shelter (Thailand)

· compelling evidence for deliberate controlled use of fire

· Using fire even earlier

· Swartkrans in South Africa.

· deposits 1-1.3 mya: bones found & were heated to temps far in excess of what one would expect as the result of natural fires

Hunting

· Organization hunt large animals

· suggested by remains in 400,000yo sites of Ambrona and Torralba, in Spain.

· Dismembered remains of elephants, horses, red deer, wild oxen, and rhinoceroses.

· Remains closely associated with nearby tools.

· Not just butchering, but also killing.

Homo floresiensis

Language Origins

· Regions of the human brain that control language lie adjacent to regions involved in precise hand control.

· Oldowan toolmakers, like modern humans, were overwhelmingly right-handed.

· In making tools, they gripped the core in the left hand, striking flakes off with the right.

The Hypoglossal Canal

· The nerve that passes through the hypoglossal canal controls tongue movement, and complex tongue movements are involved in spoken language.

· Members of the genus Homo after about 500,000 years ago have an enlarged hypoglossal canal.

The Middle Paleolithic: Archaic Homo sapiens and Neanderthals

Archaic Homo sapiens

· Found in Northern Africa and Western Europe

· Also known as Homo antecessor and Homo hiedelbergensis (but possibly simply a transitional form of Homo erectus)

· Possible ancestors of both modern Homo sapiens and Neandertals

· Associated with sites such as Terra Amata and Atapuerca

“Pit of the Bones” (Sima de los Huesos)

· Sierra de Atapuerca - northern Spain 205,000-325,000 ya

· remains of 28 individuals (both sexes) dumped into a deep cave shaft

· animal bones in pit with humans

· possibility that early humans used site as a dump

· may have involved ritual activity that predicted burial which became common 100,000 years ago.

· Population displays significant degree of variation.

· Cranial capacity ranges from 1,125 to 1,390 cubic centimeters, overlapping the upper end of the range for H. erectus and the average size of H. sapiens’ range (1,300 cc).

· The bones display a mix of features, some typical of H. erectus, others of H. sapiens, including some Neandertal characteristics.

Denisovans

· Archaic H. sapiens

· southern Siberia 30-50,000 ya

· Denisova cave in which they were found.

· Fossil evidence: finger bone, toe bone, and two molar teeth.

· DNA analysis: Denisovans are local descendants of Homo erectus

· may have interbred with Neandertals & later H. sapiens

· Both Neandertal and Denisovan genomes exist within contemporary peoples today!

Neandertals

· Europe and southwestern Asia

· 400,000 to 40,000years ago.

· Brains-modern size (1200-1750cc)

· Faces distinctively different from modern humans

· Extremely muscular people

· Their large noses and teeth projected forward.

· They had bony brow ridges over their eyes.

· On the back of their skull, there was a bunlike bony mass for attachment of powerful neck muscles.

Mousterian Tradition

· Tool-making tradition of the Neandertals and their contemporaries of Europe, western Asia, and northern Africa.

· Tools were lighter and smaller than the Levalloisian and included hand axes, flakes, scrapers, borers, wood shavers, and spears.

Symbolic Life of Neandertals

· At least seventeen sites in Europe, South Africa, and Southwest Asia include Middle Paleolithic burials.

· Shanidar Cave, Iraq

· Kebara Cave, Israel

Culture of Neandertals

· Made a variety of tools for special purposes.

· Made objects for symbolic purposes.

· Engaged in ceremonial activities.

· Cared for the old and disabled.

Neandertal Burials

· The position of the body and the careful removal of the skull indicate that the fossil from Kebara Cave in Israel was deliberately buried there about 60,000 years ago.

Features of Neandertal Burials

(1) the body placed in a fetal position (with the optional removal of the skull – Kebara Cave)

(2) an east-west alignment for the body

(3) the use of grave goods (including small mammal bones)

(4) possibly the use of flowers (indicated by pollen)

What Is the Relationship Between Biological Change and Cultural Change in the Genus Homo?

Speech and Language in the Middle Paleolithic

· Paleoneurologists, working from endocranial casts, are agreed that Neandertals had the neural development necessary for spoken language.

· The size of the hypoglossal canal in Neandertals is like that of modern humans and unlike that of apes.

· An expanded thoracic vertebral canal suggests the increased breath control required for speech.

Culture, Skulls, and Modern Human Origins

· For Middle Paleolithic Homo, cultural adaptive abilities relate to the fact that brain size was comparable to that of people living today.

· Archaeological evidence indicates sophisticated technology, as well as conceptual thought of considerable complexity, matching increased cranial capacity.

Archaic Homo sapiens And Modern Human Origins

· Multiregional Hypothesis - all populations of archaic H. sapiens are easily derivable from earlier populations of H. erectus from the same regions.

· “Eve” Hypothesis - transition from archaic to anatomically modern H. sapiens took place in one population, probably in Africa.

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