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Homo erectus, extinct species of the human genus (Homo), maybe an ancestor of modern humans (H. sapiens). H. erectus, apparently the first human species to control fire, likely originated in Africa and dispersed quickly through Africa, Europe, and South and Southeast Asia starting about 1.9 million years ago.
Homo erectus featured a flat face compared to earlier hominins; pronounced brow ridge; and a low, flat skull. [ 81 ] [ 82 ] The presence of sagittal , frontal , and coronal keels, which are small crests that run along these suture lines, has been proposed to be evidence of significant thickening of the skull, specifically the cranial vault .
After consulting doctors and accounts of wilderness explorers, researchers concluded that an overdose of vitamin A—perhaps from eating a carnivore’s liver, which concentrates vitamin A—caused the bleeding and her death. When this skull cap was discovered in 1891, it was the first early human recognized outside Europe.
Important Homo erectus specimens. Sangiran 17 – a 1.2 million-year-old skull discovered in 1969 in Sangiran, Indonesia. This adult male skull is the best preserved Homo erectus skull from Java. Zhoukoudian 3 – a skullcap discovered in 1929 in Zhoukoudian, China. This adolescent’s skullcap was originally found in fragments.
Cast of skull 5 (D4500) - the most complete Homo erectus skull found at Dmanisi, Georgia - on display in the Museum's Human Evolution gallery. The original fossil skull is about 1.8 million years old.
About two million years ago, a new set of fossils began to appear in the human fossil record. Designated as Homo erectus, they show evidence of increases in both body size and brain size.
In the 1930s, 12 Homo erectus skull caps and two lower leg bones were found in a bone bed 20m above the Solo River at Ngandong in central Java.
Homo erectus, or 'upright man', is an extinct species of human that occupies an intriguing spot within the human evolutionary lineage. These prehistoric hunter-gatherers were highly successful in adapting...
Besides their brain capacity, the skulls of H. erectus show a number of other distinctive features. The face, which is preserved in only a few specimens, is massively constructed, and its lower parts project forward.
Found in a hilltop cave, the oldest known Homo erectus and Paranthropus robustus fossils shed light on a critical period of hominin evolution.