Discovered in Turkey a 8.7 million monkey fossil
The new fossil (Anadoluvius turkae) suggests our ancestors evolved in Europe and not in Africa as commonly believed
The origin of hominins, to which man, the common chimpanzee and numerous extinct genera, considered as our ancestors, belong, is one of the most debated topics in paleoanthropology. The traditional view, since the time of Charles Darwin, holds that hominins originated in Africa. More recently, a European origin has been proposed, based on analysis of late Miocene apes from Europe and central Anatolia.
A newly discovered ape fossil, Anadoluvius, from an 8.7-million-year-old site in Turkey challenges established ideas about human origins and strengthens the theory that our ancestors evolved in Europe before migrating to Africa between nine and seven million years ago.
This is what emerges from a recently published international study, led by Prof. David Begun from the University of Toronto and Prof. Ayla Sevim Erol from the University of Ankara, published in Communications Biology (www.nature.com/articles/s42003-023-05210-5).
The analysis of a recently found monkey's fossil, called Anadoluvius turkae, recovered in Corakyerler, near Cankr demonstrates that Mediterranean fossil monkeys are diverse and part of the first known radiation of early hominins, the group that includes African apes, such as chimpanzees, bonobos, and gorillas, humans, and their fossil ancestors.
“Our findings suggest that hominids not only evolved in western and central Europe, but spent more than five million years evolving there and spreading across the eastern Mediterranean, before finally dispersing into Africa, probably as a consequence of the changing environment and the decline of forests”
Begun said.
"Members of this radiation to which Anadoluvius belongs are currently identified only in Europe and Anatolia"
The conclusion is based on examination of a significantly well-preserved partial skull discovered at the site in 2015, which includes most of the facial structure and anterior part of the braincase.
"The completeness of the fossil allowed us to do a more extensive and detailed analysis using many characters and attributes that are encoded in a program designed to calculate evolutionary relationships"
Begun added.
“The face is mostly complete, after applying a mirror images; the new part is the forehead, with bones preserved up to approximately the crown of the skull,”
continued Begun.
"All the fossils previously described do not have this part of the braincase"
According to the researchers, Anadoluvius was the size of a large male chimpanzee, around 50-60 kg, very large for a chimpanzee, and close to the average size of a female gorilla, around 75-80 kg. It lived in a forest environment, dry and probably spent a lot of time ashore.
“We have no limb bones, but judging by its jaws and teeth, the animals found next to it and the geological indicators of the environment, Anadoluvius probably lived in relatively open conditions, unlike the forest environments of living great apes”
said Sevim Erol.
“It's more similar to what we think was the environment of the first humans in Africa. The powerful jaws and large, densely enameled teeth suggest a diet that included hard or tough foods from terrestrial sources, such as roots and rhizomes”
continued Sevim Erol.
The animals that lived with Anadoluvius are those that are now commonly associated with African dry grasslands and forests, such as giraffes, porcupines, rhinoceroses, various antelopes, zebras, elephants, porcupines, hyenas, and lion-like carnivores. Research shows that the ecological community appears to have dispersed into Africa from the eastern Mediterranean around eight million years ago.
“The foundation of modern African fauna in the open countryside of the eastern Mediterranean has long been known and now we can add the ancestors of African apes and humans to the list of participants”
said Sevim Erol.
The findings establish that Anadoluvius turkae is a branch of the part of the evolutionary tree that gave rise to chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and humans. Although African apes are only known in Africa today, as were the first known humans, according to the study's authors, who also include scientists from Ege University and Pamukkale University in Turkey and the Naturalis Biodiversity Center in the Netherlands, the ancestors of both probably came from Europe and the eastern Mediterranean.
The findings establish that Anadoluvius turkae is a branch of the part of the evolutionary tree that gave rise to chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and humans. Although African apes are known only from Africa today, as were the first known humans, the authors conclude that the ancestors of both came from Europe and the eastern Mediterranean. Anadoluvius turkae and other fossil apes from nearby Greece (Ouranopithecus) and Bulgaria (Graecopithecus) form a group that approaches in many details of anatomy and ecology the earliest known hominids, or humans. The new fossils are the best-preserved specimens of this group of early hominins and provide the strongest evidence to date that the group originated in Europe and later dispersed across Africa. The team's analysis also suggests that Balkan and Anatolian apes evolved from Western and Central European ancestors. With its most comprehensive data, the research provides evidence that these other apes were also hominins and means it is more likely that the entire group evolved and diversified in Europe, rather than the alternative scenario in which separate branches of apes arose. they have previously moved independently to Europe.
