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Africa is the cradle of human race. Anthropologists have unearthed the
oldest human skeletons in East Africa in places such as Hadar, Olduvai,
Laetoli. One of the best preserved human remnants is a female skeleton
found at Hadar in Ethiopia. Anthropologists assembled about 40% of the
young girl that was given the nick name "Lucy". Lucy was dated
between 3.6 and 3 million years ago and belongs to the Australopethicus
category.
HADAR
Hadar's paleontological and anthropological significance was discovered in
1968 by M. Taieb, a French geologist. Taieb organized a geological and
paleontological survey of the area in 1971, in which he was joined by D.C.
Johanson, Y. Coppens, and J. Kalb. These workers formed the International
Afar Research Expedition (INRE). They chose Hadar from the many other
available sites to begin intensive investigation mainly because of its
excellent preservation of faunal remains.
During the initial field season in 1973 the first early hominid fossils
were recovered from Hadar, a knee joint and a partial temporal. Nearly
6,000 fossils of mammals, a total of 87 species, were recovered in 1973
and in subsequent seasons. In the fall of 1974 a larger team returned to
continue the search and soon made a discovery of hominid teeth.
At the end of November D.C. Johanson discovered at locality 288 the
partial skeleton of a tiny female hominid, which was nicknamed
"Lucy." The 1975 field season brought even more hominid remains,
this time at Locality 333. This locality has been interpreted as evidence
for the catastrophic death of a group of hominids. The 333 site yielded,
by the close of excavations during the 1976-1977 field season, hundreds of
hominid fossil fragments derived from at least 13 individuals representing
all ages. All of the Hadar fossils were returned after study to the
National Museum of Ethiopia in Addis Ababa, where they are permanently
housed.
The Hadar Formation consists of at least 280 m. of sediment. Over 100
stratigraphic sections have been studied thus far, and it has been
possible to subdivide the sedimentary sequence into four stratigraphic
members. Radiometric dating has dated the top of the Hadar units at ca.
2.9 million years (m.y.) ago. Dating for the lower units has been more
controversial, with estimates 3.6 and 3.3 m.y. ago. Thus it can be stated
confidently that the "Lucy" specimen is ca. 3 m.y. old, while
some of the other, stratigraphically lower Hadar hominids are at least 3.3
and possibly as much as 3.6 m.y. old. [Source: Ian Tattersall, et al. eds,
Encyclopedia of Human Evolution and Prehistory (Chicago: St James
Press, 1988), pp. 239-241]
STONE-TOOL MAKING
The first humans used sharp stones as tools. "The emergence of a
flaked-stone technology during the course of hominid evolution marks a
radical behavioral departure from the rest of the animal world and
constitutes the first definitive evidence in the prehistoric record of a
simple cultural tradition, or one based upon learning. Although other
animals Archaeological evidence shows a geometric increase in the
sophistication and complexity of hominid stone technology over time since
its earliest beginnings 3-2 m.y. ago. Stone is the principal material
found in nature that is both very hard and able to produce superb working
edges when fractured A wide range of tasks can be performed such as meat
cutting and bone breaking". [quoted from Tattersall et al.eds, op.cit.,
p. 542].
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