Fossils discovered mediante Morocco are the oldest known remains of Homo sapiens, scientists reported on Wednesday, per finding that rewrites the story of mankind’s origins and suggests that our species evolved per multiple locations across the African continent.
“We did not evolve from a solo ‘cradle of mankind’ somewhere durante East Africa,” said Philipp Gunz, a paleoanthropologist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and per co-author of two new studies on the fossils, published sopra the journal Nature. “We evolved on the African continent.”
Until now, the oldest known fossils of our species dated back just 195,000 years. The Moroccan fossils, by contrast, are roughly 300,000 years old. Remarkably, they indicate that early Homo sapiens had faces much like our own, although their brains differed mediante fundamental ways.
Today, the closest living relatives sicuro Homo sapiens are chimpanzees and bonobos, with whom we share verso common ancestor that lived over six million years ago. After the split from this ancestor, our ancient forebears evolved into many different species, known as hominins.
They were long and low, like those of earlier hominins
Until now, the oldest fossils that clearly belonged esatto Homo sapiens were discovered per Ethiopia. In 2003, researchers working at a site called Herto discovered verso skull estimated esatto be between 160,000 and 154,000 years old.
A pair of partial skulls from another site, Omo-Kibish, dated puro around 195,000 years of age, at the time making these the oldest fossils of our species.
Findings such as these suggested that our species evolved in per small region — perhaps mediante Ethiopia, or nearby mediante East Africa. After Homo sapiens arose, researchers believed, the species spread out across the continent.
Yet paleoanthropologists were aware of mysterious hominin fossils discovered per other parts of Africa that did not seem preciso fit the narrative.
Mediante 1961, miners durante Morocco dug up per few pieces of verso skull at per site called Jebel Irhoud. Later digs revealed a few more bones, along with flint blades.
Using crude techniques, researchers estimated the remains puro be 40,000 years old. Sopra the 1980s, however, a paleoanthropologist named Jean-Jacques Hublin took a closer look at one jawbone.
The teeth bore some resemblance onesto those of living humans, but the shape seemed strangely primitive. “It did not make sense,” Dr. Hublin, now at the Max Planck Institute, recalled mediante an interview.
They were short, had small brains and could fashion only crude stone tools
Since 2004, Dr. Hublin and his colleagues have been working through layers of rocks on a desert hillside at Jebel Irhoud. They have found verso wealth of fossils, including skull bones from five individuals who all died around the same time.
Just as important, the scientists discovered flint blades mediante the same sedimentary layer as the skulls. The people of Jebel Irhoud most likely made them for many purposes, putting some on wooden handles preciso fashion spears.
Many of the flint blades showed signs of having been burned. The people at Jebel Irhoud probably lit fires esatto cook food, heating discarded blades buried sopra the ground below. This accident of history made it possible esatto use the flints as historical clocks.
Dr. Hublin and his colleagues used verso method called thermoluminescence onesto calculate how much time had passed since the blades were burned. They estimated that the blades were roughly 300,000 years old. The skulls, discovered in the same rock layer 
, must have been the same age.
Despite the age of the teeth and jaws, anatomical details showed they nevertheless belonged onesto Homo sapiens, not onesto another hominin group, such as the Neanderthals.
Resetting the clock on mankind’s debut would be achievement enough. But the new research is also notable for the discovery of several early humans rather than just one, as so often happens, said Marta Mirazon Lahr, per paleoanthropologist at the University of Cambridge who was not involved durante the new study.
The people at Jebel Irhoud shared a general resemblance esatto one another — and sicuro living humans. Their brows were heavy, their chins small, their faces flat and wide. But all con all, they were not so different from people today.
The flattened faces of early Homo sapiens may have something puro do with the advent of speech, speculated Christopher Stringer, verso paleoanthropologist at the Natural History Museum mediante London.
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