Reproduction of the skull of the Kibish Man. Museum of Black Civilizations in Dakar (Senegal).Credit: GuillaumeG/Wikimedia Commons
A new study has revealed insights into the age of fossils from Homo sapiens in Africa, another step in understanding how and when humans evolved.
Through analysis of the ash layer from fossils in eastern Africa along Ethiopia’s Omo River, humans were thought to be 200,000 years old. The Omo I remains were discovered in the late 1960s in the Kibish rock formation in the lower valley of the River Omo in southern Ethiopia.
A team led by Céline Vidal, a volcanologist at the University of Cambridge, analysed a layer of ash from a volcanic eruption at the site which covered the sediment in which the fossils were found. Their analysis found the ash to be 33,000 years older than previously thought.
Researchers say more efforts are required to develop a framework for eastern Africa to address volcanological and archaeological questions. This might help resolve the age estimated for the Homo sapiens from eastern Africa.
“The research aims to resolve the chronology of anatomically modern humans in east Africa. This is a timeframe that is critical for our understanding,” says Emmanuel Ndiema a Senior Research Scientist and Head of Archaeology at the National Museums of Kenya.
