First human ancestors came from Europe not Africa 7.2 million-year-old fossils indicate

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The first hominin species, a line that eventually leads to humans, may have emerged in Europe 7.2 million years ago and not Africa—the most widely accepted starting point for our ancestors.

An international team of scientists has presented two studies that suggest the divergence point between chimpanzees and humans took place in the Eastern Mediterranean rather than East Africa. Their findings, published in PLOS ONE, are based on two fossils of the species Graecopithecus freybergi, which were discovered in Greece and Bulgaria and have now been dated to between 7.2 and 7.1 million years ago.

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Both fossils—a lower jaw and an upper premolar—were examined using state-of-the-art computer tomography, allowing the scientists to look at their internal structures.

Their findings showed the teeth are fused in a way that is characteristic of early humans, including Ardipithecus and Australopithecus, the latter of which the famous Lucy fossil belongs to. The jawbone also had dental root features that appear to belong to a pre-human rather than to an ancient chimp.

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Cole says that the studies show that there was a connected landmass between Africa and Europe and that the desert between them created a barrier, dividing populations and causing a new species to emerge.

But the fossilised hominim is not necessarily our earliest ancestor and may have separated from some other early species that would eventually go on to become Ardipithecus.

“ If we just try to look at it with hominin dispersals in context, there have certainly been primates and hominin species moving in and out of Africa and we tend to see the drawings of the arrows moving in one direction, but there’s no reason why they can’t be bidirectional,” he says.

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