Site Findings

This map indicates some of the main findings done in the past hundred years in the field of paleoanthropology. Some of the more recent findings have been done in Africa where the vast majority of early skulls and bones have been found. The area where most were found is composed of Laetoli, the Olduvai Gorge, Lake Turkana, Koobi Fora, Aramis, Hadar and Omo and this is also known as the East African Rift Valley. Many years ago when the tectonic plates were shifting, they caused a mountain chain to form there when the plates hit each other and during the Plio-Pleistocene era, the mountains "sunk in" as it were and caused a rift.

On the west side of the Rift valley, the jungle still grew abundantly, whereas the east side of the valley had now fallen into a "rain shadow" causing a change in environment and grassland and savannah instead of thick woodland. It is thought that this may have been a cause for the divergence from apes to hominids and that this may have influenced the upcoming of bipedal walking. One of the first hominids, Ardipithecus ramidus , was found in Aramis supporting this possible theory.

How exactly hominids spread into the rest of the world from Africa, is still unknown. The two possible theories for this occurrence are discussed in more detail in The Multiregional Hypothesis and the "Out of Africa" Hypothesis.

Click on the different sites on the map to see which hominid was found there.