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Reappraising the palaeobiology of Australopithecus

Nature volume 617, pages 45–54 (2023)Cite this article

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Abstract

The naming of Australopithecus africanus in 1925, based on the Taung Child, heralded a new era in human evolutionary studies and turned the attention of the then Eurasian-centric palaeoanthropologists to Africa, albeit with reluctance. Almost one hundred years later, Africa is recognized as the cradle of humanity, where the entire evolutionary history of our lineage prior to two million years ago took place—after the Homo–Pan split. This Review examines data from diverse sources and offers a revised depiction of the genus and characterizes its role in human evolution. For a long time, our knowledge of Australopithecus came from both A. africanus and Australopithecus afarensis, and the members of this genus were portrayed as bipedal creatures that did not use stone tools, with a largely chimpanzee-like cranium, a prognathic face and a brain slightly larger than that of chimpanzees. Subsequent field and laboratory discoveries, however, have altered this portrayal, showing that Australopithecus species were habitual bipeds but also practised arboreality; that they occasionally used stone tools to supplement their diet with animal resources; and that their infants probably depended on adults to a greater extent than what is seen in apes. The genus gave rise to several taxa, including Homo, but its direct ancestor remains elusive. In sum, Australopithecus had a pivotal bridging role in our evolutionary history owing to its morphological, behavioural and temporal placement between the earliest archaic putative hominins and later hominins—including the genus Homo.

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Fig. 1: Variation in Australopithecus and Pan.
Fig. 2: Selected sites showing the geographical distribution of Australopithecus and other early hominins.
Fig. 3: Schematic temporal distribution of and relationships among Australopithecus species, putative ancestral and descendant taxa solely on the basis of FAD and LAD.
Fig. 4: Evidence for climbing in Australopithecus.

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Acknowledgements

I thank my postdoctoral advisor B. Kimbel and my PhD co-advisor Y. Coppens for their mentorship; B. Wood, R. Bobe, F. Spoor, J. Braga, D. Reed and D. Jablonski for feedback on earlier versions of this paper or for discussions; Y. Haile-Selassie, F. Spoor and F. McGechie for supplying images; and R. Van Sessen for help with the figures and formatting. I am grateful to all of the field and laboratory researchers who made the knowledge included in this Review available. I thank M. and W. Hearst for supporting my research activities that have contributed towards and inspired the writing of this paper.

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    Zeresenay Alemseged

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Alemseged, Z. Reappraising the palaeobiology of Australopithecus. Nature 617, 45–54 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-05957-1

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