FIGURE 2. The hominin world about 1.7 Myr ago.

The circles denote radii of 1,000 miles. Blue circles indicate known populations of Homo at this time: H. ergaster and various australopithecines (including A. (H.) habilis in east Africa, H. georgicus in Georgia, H. erectus in Java, and Paranthropus and Homo in southern Africa). The ancestries of H. ergaster, H. georgicus and H. erectus are unclear, as are their spatial extents and relationships to each other. The yellow circles indicate areas with no fossil hominin evidence but where stone tools were being made: north China, Algeria and Pakistan. As shown, there is ample 'ecological space' in Asia for more hominins than currently recorded.