Paleoanthropology News

Paranthropus boisei. Image credit: © Roman Yevseyev.

2.6-Million-Year-Old Fossil from Ethiopia Shows Paranthropus Hominins Were Widespread

Jan 21, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

The newly-discovered fossil — a 2.6-million-year-old partial lower jaw found in the Afar region of Ethiopia — represents the first known specimen...

Facial reconstruction of Homo habilis. Image credit: Cicero Moraes.

2-Million-Year-Old Skeleton Offers Clearest Look Yet at Homo habilis

Jan 15, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

A newly-described partial skeleton from the Koobi Fora Formation in northern Kenya is giving paleoanthropologists their most complete picture yet of Homo...

Leang Bulu Bettue in the Maros-Pangkep karst area of South Sulawesi. Image credit: Burhan et al., doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0337993.

Enigmatic Hominins May Have Overlapped with Homo sapiens on Sulawesi

Jan 13, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

At Leang Bulu Bettue, a rock-shelter in the Maros-Pangkep karst region on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, paleoanthropologists have uncovered one of...

The 60,000-year-old backed microlith from Umhlatuzana Rock Shelter in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa: (A) buphanidrine and (B) epibuphanisine detected in a sample from the microlith; (C) the microlith showing the reddish poisonous adhesive residue still adhering to the dorsal backed portion of the tool. Image credit: Isaksson et al., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adz3281.

60,000-Year-Old Poisoned Arrowheads Found in South Africa

Jan 8, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

Archaeologists have identified traces of two toxic plant alkaloids — buphandrine and epibuphanisine — on artifacts from Umhlatuzana Rock Shelter...

773,000-Year-Old Hominin Fossils from Morocco Offer New Clues to Roots of Homo sapiens

Jan 7, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

The hominin fossils discovered in the Grotte à Hominidés at Thomas Quarry I in Casablanca, Morocco, are providing new evidence about the deep origins...

Reconstruction of Sahelanthropus tchadensis. Image credit: University of Silesia.

7-Million-Year-Old Sahelanthropus Fossils Bolster Case for Earliest Upright Walking

Jan 5, 2026 by Sergio Prostak

For more than two decades, Sahelanthropus tchadensis — a very early (6.7 to 7.2 million years old) hominin species discovered in Chad in 2001 —...

An artist’s concept of a Penghu Denisovan walking under the bright Sun during the Pleistocene of Taiwan. Image credit: Cheng-Han Sun.

Researchers Sequence Genome of 200,000-Year-Old Denisovan

Jan 2, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

A research team led by Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology scientists has generated the high-quality genome assembly of a Denisovan using...

Ancient humans. Image credit: sjs.org / CC BY-SA 3.0.

European Homo sapiens May Have Been Hunting with Bow and Arrow Earlier than Previously Believed

Dec 30, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

In a new paper published this month in the journal iScience, researchers from the University of Tübingen and elsewhere present a multidisciplinary analysis...

The facial depiction of the Beachy Head Woman. Image credit: Face Lab, Liverpool John Moores University.

‘Beachy Head Woman’ Originated from Southern England, Ancient DNA Study Shows

Dec 23, 2025 by News Staff

The skeletal remains of an individual colloquially referred to as Beachy Head Woman were re-discovered in the Eastbourne Town Hall collection in 2012,...

This image shows a Neanderthal and a human kid. Image credit: Neanderthal Museum.

New Research Explores Paleolithic Transition from Neanderthals to Anatomically Modern Humans

Dec 22, 2025 by News Staff

The Middle to Upper Paleolithic Transition approximately 50,000 to 38,000 years ago is marked by the decline and extinction of Neanderthals, the emergence...

This is an artist's reconstruction of Homo erectus. Image credit: Yale University.

1.5-Million-Year-Old Fossil Reveals New Details about Homo erectus

Dec 16, 2025 by News Staff

Paleoanthropologists have examined and reconstructed DAN5, a 1.5-million-year-old fossilized skull of early Homo erectus found in Gona in the Afar region...

Forensic facial reconstruction of another Australopithecus species - A. afarensis. Image credit: Cicero Moraes / CC BY-SA 3.0.

Remarkable Fossil from South Africa May Be New Species of Australopithecus: Study

Dec 16, 2025 by News Staff

New research led by scientists from the University of Cambridge and Latrobe University challenges the classification of the Little Foot fossil as Australopithecus...

An artist’s impression of fire at Barnham around 400,000 years ago. Image credit: Craig Williams / The Trustees of the British Museum.

Archaeologists Discover Earliest Evidence of Fire-Making

Dec 10, 2025 by News Staff

Archaeologists have unearthed 400,000-year-old heated sediments and fire-cracked flint handaxes alongside two fragments of pyrite — a mineral used...

Reconstruction of Homo floresiensis. Image credit: Kinez Riza / Atelier Elisabeth Daynes, Sangiran Museum.

Climate Change Played Key Role in Extinction of Homo floresiensis

Dec 9, 2025 by News Staff

Homo floresiensis abandoned Liang Bua — a cave this small-bodied human species had occupied for around 140,000 years — during severe drought...

Australopithecus deyiremeda and Australopithecus afarensis. Image credit: Gemini AI.

Two Australopithecus Species Co-Existed in Ethiopia 3.4 Million Years Ago

Nov 28, 2025 by News Staff

In 2009, paleoanthropologists found eight bones from the foot of an ancient human ancestor in 3.4-million-year-old sediments at the paleontological site...

Kissing Likely Evolved in Common Ancestor of Humans and Large Apes 21 Million Years Ago

Nov 19, 2025 by News Staff

Kissing occurs in most living large apes, and likely also occurred in Neanderthals, first evolving in the ancestor to this group 21.5-16.9 million years...

Denisovans were probably dark-skinned, unlike the pale Neanderthals. The picture shows a Neanderthal man. Image credit: Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London.

Researchers Using Neanderthal DNA to Learn More About How Human Faces Develop and Evolve

Nov 11, 2025 by News Staff

University of Edinburgh scientist Hannah Long and colleagues show how a region of Neanderthal DNA is better at activating a jaw-forming gene than the human...

The 2.58-million-year-old stone tool from the site of Namorotukunan in Kenya. Image credit: Braun et al., doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-64244-x.

Archaeologists Find 2.75-Million-Year-Old Stone Tools in Kenya

Nov 4, 2025 by Natali Anderson

Archaeologists have discovered Oldowan stone tools in three distinct archaeological horizons, spanning approximately 300,000 years (2.75 to 2.44 million...

A group of Neanderthals in a cave. Image credit: Tyler B. Tretsven.

45,000-Year-Old Crimean Neanderthal Reveals Long-Distance Connections across Eurasia

Nov 3, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

The Crimean Peninsula in Ukraine contains key Middle to Upper Paleolithic transitional archaeological sites, including the site of Starosele, where archaeologists...