Artistic representation of Graecopithecus freybergi
Around 7 million years ago, a small creature braved wild cats and hyenas to cross the floodplains of Bulgaria – and, surprisingly, it may have done so on just two legs.
A fossil femur described in a study earlier this month in Paleobiodiversity & Paleoenvironments offers evidence that an extinct monkey, estimated to weigh about 24 kilograms and provisionally identified as Graecopithecus freybergipresented multiple anatomical features consistent with bipedalism.
Researchers who analyzed the ancient thigh bone argue that this compact creature could therefore have been ours primordial predecessor.
“Com 7.2 million yearsthis ancestor, which we classify as belonging to the genus Graecopithecuscould be the oldest known human,” he says. David Begunpaleoanthropologist at the University of Toronto and co-author of the study, at .
A lineage of Graecopithecus has been a controversial hypothesis years ago, it still reminds me of the same magazine.
There are scientists who refute the conclusion of the new study, including the implication that humanity emerged in the Balkans and not in Africa.
In the most recent study, researchers characterize the owner of the old thigh bone as a adult female the size of a small chimpanzee.
However, the morphology of the femur is more revealing than its size. For example, it features a relatively long femoral neck, which connects the shaft of the thigh bone to the head of the femur, which then fits into the hip. A longer femoral neck suggests bipedalism because it allows the leg to move more freely.
It also represents the evolutionary compromise between strength and mobility.
The researchers also cite the insertion points of the gluteal muscleswhich appear to be conducive to bipedalism. Furthermore, the thickness of the outer layer of the bone is indicative of the stresses caused by upright locomotion.
The Azmaka region during the late Miocene would have been a sparsely forested savannah, supporting the idea that bipedalism may have emerged as wooded landscapes gave way to grasslands.
However, despite possibly abandoning the trees, this monkey would not have walked exactly like us.
The characteristics of its femur suggest facultative bipedal locomotor abilities, meaning it could have been able to walk upright when advantageous, but also move across the ground using all four limbs.
Perhaps it assumed an upright posture to detect predators, search for food more effectively in increasingly scarce environments, or transport its young between arboreal nesting sites – the study theorizes.
Taking into account the environmental and climatic changes of the time, it is possible that the Graecopithecus also traveled from the Balkans to Africa.
