Ardipithecus
| Ardipithecus Temporal range: Pliocene
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| Ardipithecus ramidus skull | |
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| Genus: | Ardipithecus White et al., 1995
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Ardipithecus is a very early hominid genus, which lived during the late Neogene.
Two species are known: A. kadabba, dated to about 5.6 million years ago (late Miocene),[1] and A. ramidus, which lived about 4.4 million years ago during the early Pliocene.[2]
Because this genus shares several traits with the African great ape genera (Pan and Gorilla), some place it on the that branch rather than human branch.
Most consider it a proto-human because of a likeness in teeth with Australopithecus. Ardipithecus had bipedalism and reduced canines, like the Australopithecines.
References
- ↑ White, Tim D. (2009). "Ardipithecus ramidus and the paleobiology of early hominids". Science. 326 (5949): 75–86. doi:10.1126/science.1175802. PMID 19810190.
{{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter|coauthors=ignored (|author=suggested) (help) - ↑ Perlman, David (July 12, 2001). "Fossils from Ethiopia may be earliest human ancestor". National Geographic News. Retrieved July 2009.
Another co-author is Tim D. White, a paleoanthropologist at UC-Berkeley who in 1994 discovered a pre-human fossil, named Ardipithecus ramidus, that was then the oldest known, at 4.4 million years.
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