The Miocene Epoch

When?

punchline?

23 million- 5 million years ago

The age of the apes

Eras of the Cenozoic

When?

Punch line?

Paleocene 65 million- Explosion of Mammals

Eocene 55 million-stimulated the adaptation of Mammals (more recognizable)

Oligocene 34 million- Age of monkeys (anthropoids/prosimians)

Miocene 24 million- Age of the Apes

Pliocene 5 million- First human ancestors

Pleistocene 1.8 million- Homo

Plesiadapiforms

(Plesiadapis)

Primate like mammal from the paleocene epoch

• small brain
• long narrow snout
• spiky teeth
• no postorbital bar
• diastema
• claws not nails

Eocene

What kind of life forms?

Mammals are sorted out

• Rodents
• Carnivores
• Dolphins/Whales
• True prosimian primates

Adapis

What? 

When?

45-55 million years ago

similar to a lemur

big brain

looks like tarsier with very big eyes

not short faced

34 million ya

mostly still tropical forest covers planet

Anthropoids adapt

mountains growing 

cooling 

rain shadows

34 million years ago

Anthropoid (small!!)

has a bony eye socket 

has a sagital crest (first appearance in fossil record!!!!!)

Could be common ancestor of homonoids

Proconsul africanus

Where?

Who?

Family?

Found in Africa

Small

Lewis Leki helping in discovery of this small ape

Pongidea

Indentifiable by its teeth 

doesnt have ape body (quad)

Miocene apes of Europe

Found in France-Similar to Chimp

Found in Spain-Similar to Orang

Found in Italy and East Africa

Similar to Gibbon

Found in India

Direct ancestor of Gibbon

15 million years ago Africa and Eurasia begin sliding into each other causing the North east corner to bubble up resulting in Red Sea, Gulf of Aiden, Great Rift Valley

• mixed forest covers the area of GRV
• Artepithecus found on west side
• Fossil record of the horse very dense here

Limestone is a weak material that is easily eaten away by water forms like swiss cheese 

stalagtites

Stalamites

Things fall in get covered up by minerals and form great fossils

area is anaerobic (little bacteria)

limits dating ability

1924- Raymond Dart 

Discovered face in limestone  

knew it walked upright

very old smallish

about 2.5 million yo

400 cc brain

similar teeth to ours

baby

Australopithecus 

When?

What?

3- 2.5 million ya

Means southern ape

distinct genus of its own

Broom verified the fossil

Austolopithecus

Body

• brain no larder than an adult
• nuchal line where neck muscles attach
• foramen magnum on bottom of skull
• large molars! with thick enamel 
• under five feet tall 80lbs
• PROOF! Pelvis is same shape,build, relative size as humans
• notch where the femur fits into pelvis

Swartkrans

2 million years old 

Paranthropus robustus

head of hominid found with bite marks likely killed by jaguar and dropped into sinkhole

1.8 million years old

biped

cheek bones are big protrude out farther than nose

maseter muscle completely covers the teeth to the canine

back teeth are very large-Dominant in grinding foods

Hadar

 LUCY

Species?

Discovery?

Skeleton?

When?

Details

Ausralopithcus afarensis

Dicovered in 1974

70% complete skeleton

lived 3.3 million years ago

pelvis-broad but narrow from front to back

4ft tall

Sacro-Illiac joint more ape like than human like=absorb shock through knee

Slightly dimorphic

short 

walk upright- slight bend in the knee

substantially long arms

hair covered body

300 cc brain

large canine w/slight diastama

slight buck in teeth

long and narrow palette not as long as ape

shoulder joint points up slightly

long curved fingers

flexible ankle

NO patellar fossa (tendon of knee starting in muscle and connects over joint)

Human v Lucy

Leg Muscles

1/3 of her muscles attach in front of pelvis

1/2 in humans

Evolution of the human

What came next?

First- bipedalism- helps as a means of getting food and bringing it back to a group

next- Large Brain

Next- Reducted size of face

In the forest without a male:

In the woodland savannah w/o male:

In the savannah w/o male:

-Safety, food, reproduction are all equal 

-takes more time to access and process food, challenges of safety are high, increased challenge for herself and children

-spend more time on reproduction because a partner helps get food and protects

Sex, Estrus, Male Partners

Males become domesticated

changes?

moves toward less showy estrus 

select less impulsive aggressive and dominant male

less estrus changes strategy of males->harder

reduction of canine

loss of sexual dimorphism in canine and skeleton size

Olduvai Gorge

Wet

lots of species because of dense popultion

fossil record found in layer of volcanic ash(1.8 mill)

Louis and Mary Leaky

found stone tools washed out of volcanic layer in Olduvai- the earliest tools ever found

First tools 2.5 million years old

both sides broken

hit w/stone break off flakes=jagged edges

only specific rocks break

CORE TOOL

hammer hits core

[image]

carrying tools?

seeing over tall grasses?

less area of the body exposed to direct sun?

Discovery in 1959, Olduvai, East Africa

1.75 million years old

Slight sagital crest

bigger 

massive molar dentition front teeth barely exist

-1961 discovery in Oldovai

1.8 million 

evolving toward us

600+ CC

similar size of front teeth as us still slightly larger molars

no divergent big toe

inflexible ankles

longitudinal arch

butchering cites found in caves

bipedal

cranial capacity of >600 CC

temporalis never reaches midline (no sagital crest)

face is not dished in

molars are small and oval shaped

in past 2 + species

Subordinate Animal Shift

Habitat -> grassland

change diet

change in schedule (nocturnal)

Cranial Capacity growth

Why?

lucy (austrolopithecus aferensis 3.3)  450-550cc

v

Homo habilis (1.8) 850 cc

originally helped to maintain body temp better 

loss of body hair

sweat glands need to be exposed

increase in pigment

blood is cooler when it returns to core

[image]African Origins 

First found in France

1.6 million years old

spread w/the population

First produced by homo habilis

Austrolopithecus Aferensis 3.3 Million

↓

A. Africanus 3 Million

⁄ → Parathropus

H. Habilis 2.5 Million

↓

H. Erectus 1.8 million

↓

H. Sapiens

Lake Turkana

HOMO ERECTUS

Turkana Boy

homo erectus 1.75 million- 300k years ago

850 cc

large incissors 

broad powerful neck

first hominid to leave Africa (1.5 mill)

maybe the face used as a third hand causes wear on teeth

big faces and substantial brain

8-13 years old

most complete skeleton ever found!!!

tall-long legs

would've been 6ft tall

900cc brain

1.5 million years ago first evidence of fire

fire hardened spears

Faces were removed may have meant that the brains were being extracted and base of skull bashed

Achulean Tools 

more scavenging then hunting 

Ambrona, Spain

500,000 Years ago

thin layer of charcol covered area from grass burning

hunting?

migration route-> flush them into marsh

terra Amata, France

300,000 years ago

no homo fossils found

found campsites where posts placed in ground

found tools in a corner, poop in another corner

Food Processing

Gorillas

Humans

Homo Erectus

Gorillas-follivores requires a large gut in order to process food

Humans- High quality food- we have a short gut because the food takes less time to break down

homo erectus- similar to humans

Evolution of the Family 

Human life Spans

it is easier to birth as a quadraped

size of brain human baby smaller after birth

(develops throughout adolesence)

human infants are born undeveloped neurologically

Chimpanzees die shortly after their last child birth-shortly after infertility

grandparents support well being of grandchildren

(evolved in homo sapien)

Flores, Indonesia 

homo floresiensis

Island Effect

94,000-13,000 years ago

3'6 55lbs

found in cave

380 cc (smaller than chim)

made stone tools

Island Effect:

Like the pygmy elephent-shrunk

when animals become isolated on islands trapped in a world of limited resources

adjust their bodies to world

homo erectus pop that experienced the island effect?

Archaic Homo Sapiens

450,000-90,000 years ago

lasted two glacial periods

same sized brain as ours

covered area in coastal Africa and Southern Eurasia coast

Teeth 40% bigger than ours

150,000 years ago (middle paleolithic)

flake tools

2 step process

carves cores so as to get specific tool(flake) shape

[image]

Hallmark of the upper paleolithic

blades

Africa 100,000

starts looking like a can 

bones being carved into fish hook harpoons with use of blade

Oldowan- 5cm/lb

Acheulean-25cm/lb

Levalloisian-100cm/lb

Upper Paleolithic Blades-1200cm/lb (i lb rock gives you 1200cm of cutting tools)

The lifespan of its teeth

When the teeth wear down the animal can no longer feed

teeth are designed to last as the animal survives

this was true in archaic animals as well

Chin

aka mental eminence

basal bone sticks out=chin

reduce the size of face, mandible transformed anatomically into chin

Neanderthals

Neander Valley

Archaic Homo sapiens

130,000-35,000 years ago

isolated by last ice age

west/East europe, saudi arabia

practiced mousterian tool making (flake tools)

Cold adapted

lived on polar ice

very bulky and blunt bodies

hunted pleistocene mega fauna (composite tools-atlatl and harpoons)

successful in environment for 100,000

traded tools

1854-skull cap found (1859-Darwin)

Theory was that it was a Russian who climbed into cave and died but because of scowling he got a large brow line

Charles Dawson

1910

Dies national hero

Discovered skull at Piltdown

Eoanthropus dawsoni

-no brow ridge

Found: Occipital, Frontal, Mandible, Canine

=more modern in appearance than that of neanderthal the jaw was similar to an ape

modern size human brain

condile missing on jaw (mandibular-joint)

Piltdown-Big brain → Everything else

Everyone Else- Everything → Big brain

Kenneth Oakley

1949

did fluorine dating tests on piltdown

.03% both pieces

Piltdown skull put in vault in British museum because there were too many unanswered questions and inconsistencies 

JS Weiner

redid the fluorine testing found that skull was old jaw new

may have been placed by Conan Doyle (author of Sherlock Holmes)

made graves=buried the dead

-as though sleeping on side(fetal)

-flower burial 

-evidence of help from each other