Discovery of ancient Australopithecus anamensis skull
At the Woranso-Mille paleontological site in northern Ethiopia, researchers have discovered a 3.8 million-year-old cranium (skull) belonging to a primitive hominin known as Australopithecus anamensis. Initially unearthed in 2016, but not reported until dating and other analyses were completed in 2019, the well-preserved fossil is the first skull of this particular species to be found. Paleoanthropologists expect that this discovery will reshape the ancient timeline of human evolutionary history because it reveals the previously unknown facial features of A. anamensis, which now can be compared to the facial morphologies of other ancient hominins. The fossil evidence also opens up the possibility of the coexistence of two early hominins—A. anamensis and A. afarensis—in the same area of Ethiopia. Prior to this cranium discovery, these two species were assumed to have emerged consecutively along a more linear chronology. See also: Anthropology; Australopith; Dating methods; Earliest hominins; Fossil; Fossil humans; Paleontology; Physical anthropology
