Earliest modern human-like hand bone from a new >1.84-million-year-old site at Olduvai in Tanzania.
Modern humans are characterized by specialized hand morphology that is associated with advanced manipulative skills. Thus, there is important debate in paleoanthropology about the possible cause-effect relationship of this modern human-like (MHL) hand anatomy, its associated grips and the invention and use of stone tools by early hominins. Here we describe and analyse Olduvai Hominin (OH) 86, a manual proximal phalanx from the recently discovered >1.84-million-year-old (Ma) Philip Tobias Korongo (PTK) site at Olduvai Gorge (Tanzania). OH 86 represents the earliest MHL hand bone in the fossil record, of a size and shape that differs not only from all australopiths, but also from the phalangeal bones of the penecontemporaneous and geographically proximate OH 7 partial hand skeleton (part of the Homo habilis holotype). The discovery of OH 86 suggests that a hominin with a more MHL postcranium co-existed with Paranthropus boisei and Homo habilis at Olduvai during Bed I times.
1] IDEA (Instituto de Evolución en África), Museo de los Orígenes, Plaza de San Andrés 2, 28005 Madrid, Spain [2] Department of Prehistory, Complutense University, Prof. Aranguren s/n, 28040 Madrid, Spain.
Manuel
M
Domínguez-Rodrigo
1] Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1180 Observatory Drive, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA [2] Evolutionary Studies Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, WITS, 2050 Johannesburg, South Africa [3] Plio-Pleistocene Palaeontology Section, Department of Vertebrates, Ditsong National Museum of Natural History (Transvaal Museum), Pretoria 0002, South Africa.
Travis Rayne
TR
Pickering
1] Center for the Advanced Study of Human Paleobiology, Department of Anthropology, The George Washington University, Washington, District of Columbia 20052, USA [2] Department of Anatomical Sciences, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, New York 11794-8081, USA [3] Institut Català de Paleontologia Miquel Crusafont (ICP), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Edifici Z (ICTA-ICP), campus de la UAB, c/ de les Columnes, s/n, 08193 Cerdanyola del Vallès (Barcelona), Spain.
Sergio
S
Almécija
1] Evolutionary Studies Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, WITS, 2050 Johannesburg, South Africa [2] Plio-Pleistocene Palaeontology Section, Department of Vertebrates, Ditsong National Museum of Natural History (Transvaal Museum), Pretoria 0002, South Africa [3] Department of Biology, Birmingham-Southern College, Birmingham, Alabama 35254, USA.
Jason L
JL
Heaton
1] IDEA (Instituto de Evolución en África), Museo de los Orígenes, Plaza de San Andrés 2, 28005 Madrid, Spain [2] Museo Arqueológico Regional, Plaza de las Bernardas s/n, 28801 Alcalá de Henares, Madrid, Spain.
Enrique
E
Baquedano
Archaeology Unit, University of Dar es Salaam, Dar es Salaam, PO Box 35050 Tanzania.
Audax
A
Mabulla
Department of Geodynamics, Complutense University, c/ José Antonio Novás 12, 28040 Madrid, Spain.
David
D
Uribelarrea
D000818:Animals; D005580:Fossils; D050276:Hand Bones / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D015186:Hominidae / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D013636:Tanzania