11 July 2002

Toumaï, the face of the deep

At between 6 and 7 million years old, this skull is the earliest known record of the human family. Discovered in Chad in Central Africa, the new find, nicknamed 'Toumaï', comes from the crucial yet little-known interval when the human lineage was becoming distinct from that of chimpanzees. Because of this, the new find will galvanize the field of human origins like no other in living memory — perhaps not since 1925, when Raymond Dart described the first 'ape-man', Australopithecus africanus, transforming our ideas about human origins forever. A lifetime later, Toumaï raises the stakes once again and the consequences cannot yet be guessed. Dart's classic paper was published in Nature, as have most of the milestones in human origins and evolution. To celebrate the new find, we are proud to offer a selection of ten of the very best from Nature's archives, including Dart's classic paper.

A new hominid from the Upper Miocene of Chad, Central Africa
MICHEL BRUNET, FRANCK GUY, DAVID PILBEAM, HASSANE TAISSO MACKAYE, ANDOSSA LIKIUS, DJIMDOUMALBAYE AHOUNTA, ALAIN BEAUVILAIN, CÉCILE BLONDEL, HERVÉ BOCHERENS, JEAN-RENAUD BOISSERIE, LOUIS DE BONIS, YVES COPPENS, JEAN DEJAX, CHRISTIANE DENYS, PHILIPPE DURINGER, VÉRA EISENMANN, GONGDIBÉ FANONE, PIERRE FRONTY, DENIS GERAADS, THOMAS LEHMANN, FABRICE LIHOREAU, ANTOINE LOUCHART, ADOUM MAHAMAT, GILDAS MERCERON, GUY MOUCHELIN, OLGA OTERO, PABLO PELAEZ CAMPOMANES, MARCIA PONCE DE LEON, JEAN-CLAUDE RAGE, MICHEL SAPANET, MATHIEU SCHUSTER, JEAN SUDRE, PASCAL TASSY, XAVIER VALENTIN, PATRICK VIGNAUD, LAURENT VIRIOT, ANTOINE ZAZZO & CHRISTOPH ZOLLIKOFER
Nature 418, 145–151 (2002); doi:10.1038/nature00879
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Geology and palaeontology of the Upper Miocene Toros-Menalla hominid locality, Chad
PATRICK VIGNAUD, PHILIPPE DURINGER, HASSANE TAÏSSO MACKAYE, ANDOSSA LIKIUS, CÉCILE BLONDEL, JEAN-RENAUD BOISSERIE, LOUIS DE BONIS, VÉRA EISENMANN, MARIE-ESTHER ETIENNE, DENIS GERAADS, FRANCK GUY, THOMAS LEHMANN, FABRICE LIHOREAU, NIEVES LOPEZ-MARTINEZ, CÉCILE MOURER-CHAUVIRÉ, OLGA OTERO, JEAN-CLAUDE RAGE, MATHIEU SCHUSTER, LAURENT VIRIOT, ANTOINE ZAZZO & MICHEL BRUNET
Nature 418, 152–155 (2002); doi:10.1038/nature00880
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Palaeoanthropology: Hominid revelations from Chad
BERNARD WOOD
The story of human origins in Africa takes a twist with the description of a 6–7-million-year-old cranium from Chad. The discovery hints at the likely diversity of early hominids.
Nature 418, 133–135 (2002); doi:10.1038/418133a
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Oldest human forebear found
New-found skull could sink our current ideas about human
evolution.
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Toumaï, face of the deep
Earliest known record of human family turns up in Chad.
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Classic papers

Dart, R. A. Australopithecus africanus: The Man-Ape of South Africa
Nature 115, 195–199 (1925)
When Dart, an anatomist from South Africa, reported the first 'ape-man', he was derided by the same people who fell for the fraudulent Piltdown Man. But Piltdown was a fake and Dart was vindicated. The modern study of human origins starts here.
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Leakey, L. S. B. A new fossil skull from Olduvai
Nature 184, 491–493 (1959)
Fossil-hunter Louis Leakey had been scouring East Africa for clues about human origins in vain for 30 years before he (or rather, his wife) hit the jackpot at Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania. The new player on the fossil scene was lantern-jawed 'Nutcracker man'.
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Leakey, L. S. B., Tobias, P. V. and Napier, J. R. A new species of the genus Homo from Olduvai Gorge.
Nature 202, 7–9 (1964)
Leakey scores again with fossils associated with primitive tools. He announces Homo habilis — 'handy man' — the first fossil member of our own genus; and with him, the first stirrings of technology.
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Leakey, R. E. F. Evidence for an advanced Plio-Pleistocene hominid from East Rudolf, Kenya
Nature 242, 447–450 (1973)
Richard Leakey — son of Louis — describes a skull as iconic as they come, but always known enigmatically as '1470'. Thought to belong to an early form of Homo (now Homo rudolfensis), this specimen is a key fossil in the understanding of human origins.
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Johanson, D. C. and Taieb, M. Plio-Pleistocene hominid discoveries in Hadar, Ethiopia
Nature 260, 293–297 (1976)
Donald Johanson pushes the human story back beyond the 3-million-year-mark with a skeleton, later assigned to Australopithecus afarensis. The skeleton is now known as 'Lucy', after Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, the Beatles' tune popular in the field camp.
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Leakey, M. D. and Hay, R. L. Pliocene footprints in the Laetolil Beds at Laetoli, northern Tanzania
Nature 278, 317–323 (1979)
When a volcanic eruption sent a rain of ash over what is now Tanzania, an adult and child, probably both Australopithecus afarensis, set out to watch the show — leaving, as a poignant souvenir, perfect and very modern-looking footprints, preserved in the ashfall.
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Brown, F., Harris, J., Leakey, R. and Walker, A. Early Homo erectus skeleton from west Lake Turkana, Kenya
Nature 316, 788–792 (1985)
This report of a young but surprisingly tall young Homo erectus male raises many questions about our own African genesis, and the origins of that very human feature called 'childhood'.
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Cann, R. L., Stoneking, M. & Wilson, A. Mitochondrial DNA and human evolution
Nature 325, 31–36 (1987)
A molecular bombshell that traces the human story by comparing mitochondrial DNA frrom modern humans. The message is clear — all modern humans have their roots in Africa, and surprisingly recently, between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago.
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Arsuaga, J.-L., Martínez, I., Gracia, A., Carretero, J.-M. & Carbonell, A. Three new human skulls from the Sima de los Huesos Middle Pleistocene site in Sierra de Atapuerca, Spain
Nature 362, 534–537 (1993)
The 'Pit of Bones' near Burgos in Spain is a treasure-trove of information on the first Europeans. At around 300,000 years old, these skulls may have been close to the ancestry of the classic cave-man, Neanderthal Man.
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White, T. D., Suwa, G. and Asfaw, B. Australopithecus ramidus, a new species of early hominid from Aramis, Ethiopia
Nature 371, 306–312 (1994)
Now known as Ardipithecus ramidus, this extremely primitive creature was the first member of the human family known from beyond 4 million years ago. Still controversial, its affinities with the new finds from Chad have yet to be investigated.
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