1.
Gauteng
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Gauteng, which means place of gold, is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. It was formed part of the old Transvaal Province after South Africas first all-race elections on 27 April 1994. It was initially named Pretoria–Witwatersrand–Vereeniging and was renamed Gauteng in December 1994, situated in the Highveld, Gauteng is the smallest province in South Africa, accounting for only 1. 5% of the land area. Nevertheless, it is highly urbanised, containing the countrys largest city, Johannesburg, its capital, Pretoria. As of 2015, it has a population of nearly 13.2 million, the name Gauteng is derived from the Sotho name, gauta meaning gold with the locative suffix -eng. There was a thriving industry in the province following the 1886 discovery of gold in Johannesburg. In Sesotho, the name Gauteng was used for Johannesburg and surrounding areas long before it was adopted in 1994 as the name of a province. Gauteng, formerly known as Pretoria–Witwatersrand–Vereeniging, was carved out of the old Transvaal province in 1994, although the terminology PWV, after the discovery of gold in 1886, the region proceeded to become the single largest gold producer in the world and the city of Johannesburg was founded. The older city Pretoria was not subject to the same attention, Pretoria grew at a slower rate and was highly regarded due to its role in the Second Boer War. The Cullinan Diamond which is the largest diamond ever mined was mined near Pretoria in a town called Cullinan in the year 1905. Gauteng has only been documented since the 1800s and as a result. At the Sterkfontein caves, some of the oldest fossils of hominids have been discovered, such as Mrs. Ples, today, the Apartheid Museum stands testament to these struggles in Johannesburg. Gauteng is governed by the Gauteng Provincial Legislature, a 73-person unicameral legislature elected by party-list proportional representation. The most recent election of the legislature was held on 7 May 2014, and the African National Congress won 53. 59% of the vote. The official opposition is the Democratic Alliance, which won 30. 78% of the vote and 23 seats, other parties represented are the Economic Freedom Fighters with eight seats and the Freedom Front Plus and the Inkatha Freedom Party with one seat each. Premier David Makhura of the ANC was elected on 21 May 2014, the Gauteng Division of the High Court of South Africa, which has seats in Pretoria and Johannesburg, is a superior court with general jurisdiction over the province. Johannesburg is also home to the Constitutional Court, South Africas highest court, Gautengs southern border is the Vaal River, which separates it from the Free State. It also borders on North West to the west, Limpopo to the north, Gauteng is the only landlocked province of South Africa without a foreign border
2.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
3.
Pleistocene
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The Pleistocene is the geological epoch which lasted from about 2,588,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the worlds most recent period of repeated glaciations. The end of the Pleistocene corresponds with the end of the last glacial period, the Pleistocene is the first epoch of the Quaternary Period or sixth epoch of the Cenozoic Era. In the ICS timescale, the Pleistocene is divided into four stages or ages, all of these stages were defined in southern Europe. In addition to this subdivision, various regional subdivisions are often used. Charles Lyell introduced the term pleistocene in 1839 to describe strata in Sicily that had at least 70% of their molluscan fauna still living today and this distinguished it from the older Pliocene Epoch, which Lyell had originally thought to be the youngest fossil rock layer. The Pleistocene has been dated from 2.588 million to 11,700 years before present and it covers most of the latest period of repeated glaciation, up to and including the Younger Dryas cold spell. The end of the Younger Dryas has been dated to about 9640 BC, the IUGS has yet to approve a type section, Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point, for the upper Pleistocene/Holocene boundary. The proposed section is the North Greenland Ice Core Project ice core 75°06 N 42°18 W, the lower boundary of the Pleistocene Series is formally defined magnetostratigraphically as the base of the Matuyama chronozone, isotopic stage 103. Above this point there are notable extinctions of the calcareous nanofossils, Discoaster pentaradiatus, the Pleistocene covers the recent period of repeated glaciations. The name Plio-Pleistocene has, in the past, been used to mean the last ice age. The revised definition of the Quaternary, by pushing back the date of the Pleistocene to 2.58 Ma. Pleistocene climate was marked by repeated glacial cycles in which continental glaciers pushed to the 40th parallel in some places and it is estimated that, at maximum glacial extent, 30% of the Earths surface was covered by ice. In addition, a zone of permafrost stretched southward from the edge of the sheet, a few hundred kilometres in North America. The mean annual temperature at the edge of the ice was −6 °C, during interglacial times, such as at present, drowned coastlines were common, mitigated by isostatic or other emergent motion of some regions. The effects of glaciation were global, antarctica was ice-bound throughout the Pleistocene as well as the preceding Pliocene. The Andes were covered in the south by the Patagonian ice cap, there were glaciers in New Zealand and Tasmania. The current decaying glaciers of Mount Kenya, Mount Kilimanjaro, glaciers existed in the mountains of Ethiopia and to the west in the Atlas mountains. In the northern hemisphere, many glaciers fused into one, the Cordilleran ice sheet covered the North American northwest, the east was covered by the Laurentide
4.
Hominini
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Members of the human clade, that is, the Hominina, including Homo and those species of the australopithecines that arose after the split from the chimpanzees, are called homininans. Not all homininans are directly related to the emergence of early Homo and this is a modern cladogram, For each clade, the cladogram above shows approximately when newer extant clades emerged. Some texts refer to Homonini as the Hominina branch, the subtribe Hominina is the human branch, that is, it contains only the genus Homo. Researchers proposed the taxon Hominini on the basis that the least similar species of a trichotomy should be separated from the other two. The common chimpanzee and the bonobo of the genus Pan are the closest living relatives to humans. All the extinct genera listed to the right are ancestral to, or offshoots of, however, both Orrorin and Sahelanthropus existed around the time of the split, and so may be ancestral to both Pan and Homo. In the proposal of Mann and Weiss, the tribe Hominini includes Pan as well as Homo, Homo and all bipedal apes are referred to the subtribe Hominina, while Pan is assigned to the subtribe Panina. Wood discusses the different views of this taxonomy, the assumption of late hybridization was in particular based on the similarity of the X chromosome in humans and chimpanzees, suggesting a divergence as late as some 4 million years ago. Sahelanthropus tchadensis is an extinct species that lived seven million years ago. Human Timeline – Smithsonian, National Museum of Natural History
5.
Johannesburg
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Johannesburg is the largest city in South Africa and is one of the 50 largest urban areas in the world. It is the capital of Gauteng, which is the wealthiest province in South Africa. While Johannesburg is not one of South Africas three capital cities, it is the seat of the Constitutional Court, the city is located in the mineral-rich Witwatersrand range of hills and is the centre of large-scale gold and diamond trade. In 2011, the population of the city of Johannesburg was 4,434,827, in the same year, the population of Greater Johannesburg Metropolitan Area was 7,860,781. Some view the surrounding the city of Johannesburg yet more broadly than the metropolitan area, adding Ekurhuleni, West Rand and Lenasia. The land area of the city is large in comparison with those of other major cities, resulting in a moderate population density of 2. The city was established in 1886 following the discovery of gold on what had been a farm, the city is commonly interpreted as the modern day El Dorado due to the extremely large gold deposit found along the Witwatersrand. The name is attributed to one or all of three men involved in the establishment of the city, in ten years, the population was 100,000 inhabitants. A separate city from the late 1970s until the 1990s, Soweto is now part of Johannesburg, Soweto, although eventually incorporated into Johannesburg, had been separated as a residential area for blacks, who were not permitted to live in Johannesburg proper. Lenasia is predominantly populated by English-speaking South Africans of Indian descent, controversy surrounds the origin of the name. There were quite a number of people with the name Johannes who were involved in the history of the city. Among them are the principal clerk attached to the office of the surveyor-general Johannes Rissik, Christiaan Johannes Joubert, another was Stephanus Johannes Paulus Paul Kruger, president of the South African Republic 1883-1900. Johannes Meyer, the first government official in the area is another possibility, precise records for the choice of name were lost. Rissik and Joubert were members of a delegation sent to England to attain mining rights for the area. Joubert had a park in the city named after him and Rissik Street is today a street where the historically important and dilapidated Post Office, since burnt out. The region surrounding Johannesburg was originally inhabited by San people, the Sotho–Tswana practised farming and extensively mined and smelted metals that were available in the area. The most prominent site within Johannesburg is Melville Koppies, which contains an iron smelting furnace, the main Witwatersrand gold reef was discovered in June 1884 on the farm Vogelstruisfontein by Jan Gerritse Bantjes that triggered the Witwatersrand Gold Rush and the start of Johannesburg in 1886. The discovery of gold rapidly attracted people to the area, making necessary a name, Johannes Meyer, the first government official in the area is another possibility
6.
South Africa
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South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa, is the southernmost country in Africa. South Africa is the 25th-largest country in the world by land area and it is the southernmost country on the mainland of the Old World or the Eastern Hemisphere. About 80 percent of South Africans are of Sub-Saharan African ancestry, divided among a variety of ethnic groups speaking different Bantu languages, the remaining population consists of Africas largest communities of European, Asian, and multiracial ancestry. South Africa is a multiethnic society encompassing a variety of cultures, languages. Its pluralistic makeup is reflected in the recognition of 11 official languages. The country is one of the few in Africa never to have had a coup détat, however, the vast majority of black South Africans were not enfranchised until 1994. During the 20th century, the black majority sought to recover its rights from the dominant white minority, with this struggle playing a role in the countrys recent history. The National Party imposed apartheid in 1948, institutionalising previous racial segregation, since 1994, all ethnic and linguistic groups have held political representation in the countrys democracy, which comprises a parliamentary republic and nine provinces. South Africa is often referred to as the Rainbow Nation to describe the multicultural diversity. The World Bank classifies South Africa as an economy. Its economy is the second-largest in Africa, and the 34th-largest in the world, in terms of purchasing power parity, South Africa has the seventh-highest per capita income in Africa. However, poverty and inequality remain widespread, with about a quarter of the population unemployed, nevertheless, South Africa has been identified as a middle power in international affairs, and maintains significant regional influence. The name South Africa is derived from the geographic location at the southern tip of Africa. Upon formation the country was named the Union of South Africa in English, since 1961 the long form name in English has been the Republic of South Africa. In Dutch the country was named Republiek van Zuid-Afrika, replaced in 1983 by the Afrikaans Republiek van Suid-Afrika, since 1994 the Republic has had an official name in each of its 11 official languages. Mzansi, derived from the Xhosa noun umzantsi meaning south, is a name for South Africa. South Africa contains some of the oldest archaeological and human fossil sites in the world, extensive fossil remains have been recovered from a series of caves in Gauteng Province. The area is a UNESCO World Heritage site and has termed the Cradle of Humankind
7.
Sterkfontein
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The archaeological sites of Swartkrans and Kromdraai are in the same area. Sterkfontein is a South African National Heritage Site and was declared a World Heritage Site in 2000. The Sterkfontein Caves are also home to numerous wild African species including Belonogaster petiolata, numerous early hominin remains have been found at the site over the last few decades. These have been attributed to Australopithecus, early Homo and Paranthropus, modern excavation of the caves began in the late 1890s by limestone miners who noticed the fossils and brought them to the attention of scientists. It was not until 1936 that students of Professor Raymond Dart, in 1936, the Sterkfontein caves yielded the first adult Australopithecine, substantially strengthening Raymond Darts claim that the skull known as the Taung child was a human ancestor. There was a pause in excavation during World War II, in 1947 he found the almost complete skull of an adult female A. africanus. Robert Broom initially named the skull Plesianthropus transvaalensis, but it became known by its nickname. Mrs Ples is now defined as a member of A. africanus, in 1997, a near complete skeleton of a second species of Australopithecus was found in the caves by Ronald J. Clarke, extraction of the remains from the surrounding breccia is ongoing. The skeleton was named Little Foot, since the first parts found were the bones of a foot, excavations continue to this day and finds now total some 500 hominids, making Sterkfontein one of the richest site in the world for early hominids. The Member 4 deposits containing the Australopithecus africanus fossils have been dated to between 2.6 and 2.0 Ma, with the Sts5 Mrs Ples fossil estimated to date to between 2. 05-2. It is estimated to be around 2. 6-2.2 Ma based on a combination of uranium-lead dating and palaeomagnetic analysis and belongs to a species of australopith. In contrast, surface exposure dating of sediments indicate that skeleton StW573 has an age of approximately 4 million years. While the flowstone dated in the dating has been shown to have formed later than the fossil. The palaeomagnetic analysis remains the most credible age estimate based on the current data as it included work on both sediments and speleothem, a slightly younger deposit dated to between 1.8 to 1.5 Mya has revealed the remains of a specimen of early Homo. StW53 has been described as similar to Homo habilis or as a new species Homo gautengensis. No stone tools were associated with the fossil but StW53 itself has evidence for stone tool cut-marks, Member 5 contains Oldowan and Acheulian stone tools as well as specimens of early Homo and Paranthropus and is dated to between 1.6 and 1.1 Mya. Cradle of Humankind List of caves in South Africa Muldersdrift About Sterkfontein Caves
8.
Cradle of Humankind
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The Cradle of Humankind is a paleoanthropological site about 50 kilometres northwest of Johannesburg, South Africa in the Gauteng province. Declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1999, the site currently occupies 47,000 hectares, the registered name of the site in the list of World Heritage Sites is Fossil Hominid Sites of South Africa. The Sterkfontein Caves contain the discovery of a 2. 3-million-year-old fossil Australopithecus africanus, found in 1947 by Robert Broom, Sterkfontein alone has produced more than a third of early hominid fossils ever found prior to 2010. The Dinaledi Chamber contains over 1500 H. naledi fossils, the most extensive discovery of a hominid species ever found in Africa. The name Cradle of Humankind reflects the fact that the site has produced a number of hominin fossils ever found. In 1935, Robert Broom found the first ape-man fossils at Sterkfontein, in 1938, a young schoolboy, Gert Terrblanche, brought Raymond Dart fragments of a skull from nearby Kromdraai which later were identified as Paranthropus robustus. Also in 1938, a single tooth was found at the Coopers site between Kromdraai and Sterkfontein. In 1948, the Camp-Peabody Expedition from the United States worked at Bolts Farm and Gladysvale looking for fossil hominids, later in 1948, Robert Broom identified the first hominid remains from Swartkrans cave. Brain began working at sites in the Cradle, including Coopers Cave and he soon would initiate his three-decade work at Swartkrans cave, it would result in the recovery of the second-largest sample of hominid remains from the Cradle. The oldest controlled use of fire by Homo erectus was discovered at Swartkrans. In 1966, Phillip Tobias began his excavations of Sterkfontein which are continuing and are the longest continuously running fossil excavations in the world. In 1994, Andre Keyser discovered fossil hominids at the site of Drimolen, in 1997, Kevin Kuykendall and Colin Menter of the University of the Witwatersrand found two fossil hominid teeth at the site of Gondolin. Also in 1997, the near-complete Australopithecus skeleton of Little Foot, in 2001, Steve Churchill of Duke University and Lee Berger found early modern human remains at Plovers Lake. Also in 2001, the first hominid fossils and stone tools were discovered in-situ at Coopers, in 2008, Lee Berger discovered the partial remains of two hominids in the Malapa Fossil Site that lived between 1.78 and 1.95 million years ago. Cavers Rick Hunter and Steven Tucker discovered hominid fossils in an unexplored area of the Rising Star/Westminster Cave System assigned site designation UW-101. In November 2013, Lee Berger led a joint expedition of the University of the Witwatersrand, the site is still in the process of being dated. In the last days of the Rising Star Expedition, cavers Rick Hunter, preliminary excavations at this site, designated UW-102, have begun and yielded complete hominid fossil material of its own. It is unknown what the relationship of sites 101 and 102 is, hominids may have lived all over Africa, but their remains are found only at sites where conditions allowed for the formation and preservation of fossils
9.
Cooper's Cave
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Coopers Cave is a series of fossil-bearing breccia filled cavities. Coopers Cave has provided a tool assemblage that has been provisionally assigned to the Developed Olduwan. Coopers is arguably the second richest early stone tool site in the Cradle of Humankind area, coopers is a series of breccia-filled dolomitic caves that formed in fissures along geological faults. Coopers D has been dated by uranium-lead methods to between 1.5 and 1.4 million years ago, coopers A, based on the animals recovered, is thought to be about the same age
10.
Gladysvale Cave
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It is situated within the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site and is itself a South African National Heritage Site. Gladysvale is the first cave that Robert Broom visited in the Transvaal in his mid-1930s search for a hominid-bearing cave nearer to Johannesburg than Taung and he visited Gladysvale after a butterfly collector from the Transvaal Museum reported a human mandible in the wall of the cave. When Broom arrived at the cave the mandible was gone, sterkfontein soon lured Broom away from the site. In 1946 Phillip Tobias led a student expedition to the site where a fine baboon fossil was recovered, in 1948 Frank Peabody of the Camp-Peabody expedition from the United States spent several weeks at Gladysvale but failed to find any hominid remains. The site was lost from scientific memory until it was re-opened by Lee Berger, within a few weeks of excavation the first hominid remains were discovered – two teeth of Australopithecus africanus. This discovery made Gladysvale the first new hominid site to be discovered in South Africa since 1948. Many thousands of fossils have been recovered from the Gladysvale deposits including rare remains of hominids, from the Gladysvale external deposits, almost a quarter of a million bones have been recovered since excavations began in 1992. There are many millions of bones still in place in the cave, fossils recovered include antelope, giant zebra, carnivores including extinct wolves, monkeys and hominids attributed to Australopithecus africanus and early Homo. Tools have also found with the most spectacular being an Acheulean handaxe. The site is divided into three underground cave systems with the upper cave holding the Gladysvale Internal Deposits and an External Deposit. Gladysvale was one of the first sites in Africa to be 3-D digitally mapped by Peter Schmid, the Gladysvale sequence has been dated using a combination of biostratigraphy, palaeomagnetism, electron spin resonance and uranium series dating. The youngest deposits are thought to be around 54,000 years old while the oldest deposits that are the source of the Au. africanus fossils are around 2. 4–2.0 million years old. The Gladysvale External deposits contain extensive faunal remains and date to between 780,000 and 530,000 years ago, an Acheulian handaxe was recovered from internal deposits older than the Bruhnes-Matuyama boundary at 780,000 years. Media related to Gladysvale Cave at Wikimedia Commons The Gladysvale Homepage
11.
Gondolin Cave
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Gondolin Cave is a fossiliferous dolomitic paleocave system in the Northwest Province, South Africa. The paleocave formed in the Eccles Formation dolomites, Gondolin is currently the only described hominin-bearing fossil site in the Northwest Province-portion of the designated Cradle of Humankind UNESCO World Heritage Site. The cave is located on privately owned land and is not accessible to the public, as is the case with other South African Paleo-cave systems with Pliocene and/or Pleistocene fossil deposits, the system was mined for lime during the early 20th century. No records of the date of lime mining activities at Gondolin, long-term residents near Gondolin report that the system was mined prior to the 1950s. The cave was named after J. R. R, tolkiens Gondolin by the early 1970s. The first phase of excavation addressed the extremely fossiliferous in situ remnant deposits adhering to the wall of the cave system. The three week 1979 excavation removed approximately 2 m3 of calcified sediments from the cave wall. The removed sediment blocks were organised into 43 blocks/trays and processed using acetic acid at the Transvaal Museum, a significant gap in research at Gondolin occurred in the 1980s, during which time all of the excavated blocks were processed. The first description of the fossil assemblage in 1993 only partially described 4,344 individual specimens that could be assigned to a specific taxonomic levels. In 1997 a survey of the sediments at Gondolin included the first sampling of the ex situ dumpsite deposits at the locality via a test trench. Materials removed from Trench A included fossiliferous breccia blocks from most, if not all, from this sampled material, two isolated hominin teeth were recovered. The first, GA1, is a worn and fractured left molar that has not been attributed to either genus or species (but resembles Homo in some features. In contrast, GA2 is a complete left m2 that has been analysed and attributed to Paranthropus robustus. The most recent excavations at Gondolin were undertaken in 2003 and 2004 to explore the largely decalcified GD1 deposits along the rim of the Gondolin locality. A four-week excavation season produced a sample of 4,863 fossil specimens from approximately 50 m3 of soil overburden, the original description of fossil specimens from the GD2 deposits only addressed a small portion of the assemblage. A single hominin tooth that was thought to have been derived from the GD2 sampling was later determined to be an intrusive modern Homo tooth. The first described occurrence of the extinct porcupine from an other than the Makapansgat Member 3 deposits. The first comprehensive analysis of a South African early Pleistocene assemblage solely derived from in situ deposits
12.
Haasgat
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Haasgat is a fossiliferous South African paleocave located in the Cradle of Humankind UNESCO World Heritage Area, approx. 20 kilometres northeast of the sites of Sterkfontein and Swartkrans. 60 kilometres north-northwest of the City of Johannesburg and it is located on private land and is not accessible by the public. The cave system formed on the slope of a narrow. As is the case many of the dolomitic paleocaves in the region. Although this mining obliterated the original entrance and parts of the system. While Haasgat was long known to residents of the Kalkheuvel West region, the site was abandoned after this single phase of sampling and data from the site has rarely been incorporated into studies of South African Plio-Pleistocene fossil record. Since 2010, an international team has initiated a new phase of ex situ and in situ excavation, geological sampling. Subsequent biostratigraphic interpretations of the fauna processed from the ex situ dumpsites produced two different proposed age ranges and this suggests an age between 2.3 and 1.95 Ma for the majority of fossils from the site
13.
Kromdraai fossil site
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It is situated within the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site and is itself a South African National Heritage Site. In 1938, the site was brought to the attention of Robert Broom by a schoolboy named Gert Terrblanche who had discovered several hominin teeth. The teeth formed part of a skull that would become the holotype of Paranthropus robustus, Broom began excavations at the site that would continue until approximately 1947 and would result in the discovery of numerous hominin remains. Two deposits were noted and named at the site — Kromdraai A, brain recommenced work at Kromdraai B and discovered numerous additional hominin remains as well as abundant non-hominin fauna. In the 1980s Elizabeth Vrba briefly conducted excavations at Kromdraai B in order to recover additional samples for her work on South African bovids, in 1993 excavations were re-opened by Francis Thackeray of the Transvaal Museum and Lee Berger of the University of the Witwatersrand. They were later joined by teams from Harvard University and other collaborators, important results of this work have been the recovery of additional hominin fossils as well as the obtaining of more accurate dates for the site. Besides the holotype specimen of P. robustus, at the time of the writing of this article 29 hominin specimens had been recovered from Kromdraai B, many thousands of animal fossils have also been recovered from both Kromdraai A and B. Kromdraai B is dated to between approximately 2.0 -1.6 Ma with the majority if not all the Paranthropus robustus fossils dating to between 1.8 and 1.6 Ma, hominids Paranthropus robustus Cradle of Humankind List of fossil sites
14.
Malapa Fossil Site, Cradle of Humankind
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It is situated within the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site. At the beginning of project, there were approximately 130 known cave sites in the region. Included in this were more than 25 fossil sites that had been unknown to science, Berger brought in geologist Paul Dirks, at that time Head of the School of GeoSciences at the University of the Witwatersrand, to lead the geological aspects of this exploratory project. On 1 August he dropped off Prof. Dirks to map the recognized cave system and proceeded into the area with his dog Tau. Almost immediately he discovered a fossil site that was unknown to science. On 15 August, Prof. Berger returned to the site with his student, Dr. Job Kibii. Within minutes, Matthew had discovered the first remains of human ancestors - a clavicle. On the opposite side of the block Prof. Berger quickly discovered a jawbone with a tooth of a hominid. The find would soon be prepared and identified as part of a skeleton of a juvenile hominid. On 4 September 2008, Berger returned to the site more than a dozen colleagues where Berger discovered a second partial skeleton of an adult female. Over 200 elements have been recovered to date, the partial skeletons are initially described in two papers in the journal Science by Berger and colleagues as a new species of early human ancestor called Australopithecus sediba. The species has long arms, like an ape, short powerful hands, the skeletons are found among the articulated skeletons of a sabre-toothed cat, antelopes and even mice and hares. It is not known how these skeletons came to be in this pool, no carnivores or scavengers reached their bodies. The fossil was dated using a combination of palaeomagnetism and uranium-lead dating by Andy Herries, Robyn Pickering, u-Pb dating of the underlying flowstone indicates that the fossils are not older than 2.0 Ma. The occurrence of species of animal became extinct at ~1.5 Ma indicate the deposit is not younger than 1.5 Ma. In 2011 a more accurate date of the fossils was established when a capping flowstone was too old to enable the normal polarity deposits to date to the Olduvai event. The deposits were instead correlated to a year long period centred at around 1.977 Ma. List of fossil sites Free Images and resources about Australopithecus sediba and Malapa for Educators and Students
15.
Motsetsi
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Motsetsi has been declared a South African National Heritage Site. Motsetsi has been investigated since its discovery by Lee Berger in 1999, since then a series of part-time excavations have recovered tens of thousands of fossils. Excavations have been conducted at Motsetse by the University of the Witwatersrand, only a very small part of this site has been excavated. Of the many thousands of fossils recovered from Motsetsi, no fossils have yet been found. Many very fine fossils of animals, however, have been discovered including the remains of very well preserved Dinofelis fossils – a type of false saber-toothed cat. Motsetse is a series of breccia-filled dolomitic caves that formed in a fissure along a geological fault, Motsetsi has been dated to 1. o to 1.6 million years old based on the animals recovered
16.
Plovers Lake
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Plovers Lake Cave is a fossil-bearing breccia filled cavity in South Africa. The cave is located about 4 km Southeast of the well known South African hominid-bearing sites of Sterkfontein and Kromdraai and about 36 km Northwest of the City of Johannesburg, Plovers Lake has been declared a South African National Heritage Site. Plovers Lake had two periods of excavation, one in the late 1980s and early 1990s by C. K. Many thousands of fossils were found by both teams, in the Outer Deposits, Brain and Thakeray discovered a very fine fossil baboon that had survived a leopard or saber-toothed cat attack as was evidenced by a healed wound over the eye. They also discovered many other animals and some stone tools. Berger and Churchill worked in the Inner Deposits, and quickly discovered that this site was younger than the Outer Deposits and contained the remains of Middle Stone Aged occupation by humans. They recovered over 25,000 fossil remains, many hundreds of tools including knives and spear points, Plovers Lake is a large series of deposits formed along huge fissures in a checkerboard pattern. The Outer Deposit is a breccia-filled dolomitic cave that has been de-roofed, the Inner Deposits have most of the roof intact and extend for several hundred meters. Most of the site has not been excavated, the Outer Deposits have been dated to around 1.0 million years old based on the size of porcupines recovered. The Inner Deposits have been dated to greater than 70,000 years using radiometric techniques, hominids List of fossil sites Lee Berger Cradle of Humankind Plovers Lake web site
17.
Wonder Cave (Kromdraai, Gauteng)
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The Wonder Cave, in Kromdraai, Gauteng, South Africa, is the third-largest cave chamber in the country, and is believed to be about 2.2 billion years old. The single chamber has an area of 46000 square metres, and is 125 metres long and 154 metres wide and it was discovered in the late nineteenth century by miners who dynamited and excavated limestone for the making of cement. Mining stopped during the Second Boer War, and never resumed, the cave has about 14 stalactite and stalagmite formations up to 15 metres high, 85% of which are still growing. The 60 metre deep cave is accessible to visitors by elevator, and is located within the Rhino and Lion Nature Reserve, in the Cradle of Humankind, a World Heritage Site. Cradle of Humankind List of caves in South Africa Muldersdrift Media related to Wonder Caves at Wikimedia Commons Southern Africa Places Prime Origins
18.
Australopithecus africanus
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Australopithecus africanus is an extinct species of the australopithecines, the first of an early -form species to be classified as hominin. Recently it was dated as living between 3.3 and 2.1 million years ago, or in the late Pliocene and early Pleistocene times, it is debated as being a direct ancestor of modern humans. A. africanus was of slender, or gracile, build and has found only in southern Africa at four sites, Taung, Sterkfontein, Makapansgat. Dart assigned the specimen the name Australopithecus africanus, it was dubbed the Taung child. This was the first time the word ape was formally assigned to any hominin, Dart theorized the Taung child skull must represent an intermediate species between apes and humans. And the rejection was buttressed by the widespread belief then, especially in British academia and he dismissed Darts claim, suggesting instead that the Taung child skull belonged to a young ape, most likely an infant gorilla or chimpanzee. Keith immersed himself in defending the Piltdown man and his reputation suffered greatly after the hoax was exposed in 1953, phillip Tobias, in a lengthy essay published in Current Anthropology in 1992, detailed the history of the investigation of the hoax. As part of the essay Tobias debated the inconsistencies in Keiths statements, Darts theory—that the skull known as the Taung child was a human ancestor—was supported by Robert Broom, a paleontologist with the Transvaal Museum of natural history in Pretoria. In 1936, the Sterkfontein caves yielded the first adult australopithecine, later, Broom classified an adult endocranial cast having a brain capacity of 485 cc as Plesianthropus transvaalensis. In April 1947, while blasting at Sterkfontein, he and John T. Robinson discovered a skull belonging to a female which he also classified as Plesianthropus transvaalensis. Both fossils were classified as Australopithecus africanus. Mrs. Ples, whose capacity is only about 485 cubic centimetres, was one of the first fossils to reveal that upright walking had evolved well before any significant growth in brain size. And, in comparison to modern apes, Dart noted as with the Taung child the lack of facial projection and it has slightly human-like, advanced cranial features, but also presents primitive features including ape-like curved fingers adapted to tree climbing. Both P. robustus and A. africanus crania seem very alike despite the heavily built features of P. robustus. A. africanus had a pelvis that would enable more efficient bipedalism than that of A. afarensis, such a morphology would support an earlier time for making and using tools than previously had been thought likely. Evidence of human-like sexual dimorphism in the spine has recently been described in the primate A. africanus. Recent analysis of the Little Foot specimen dated it to about 3, the Makapansgat fossils have been dated to between 3.0 and 2.6 mya. Those at Sterkfontein currently are dated to between 2.6 and 2.0 mya with the Mrs Ples fossil dating to around 2.0 million years, and Gladysvale fossils were dated between about 2.4 and 2.0 mya
19.
Taung Child
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The Taung Child is the fossilised skull of a young Australopithecus africanus. It was discovered in 1924 by quarrymen working for the Northern Lime Company in Taung, Raymond Dart described it as a new species in the journal Nature in 1925. The Taung skull is in repository at the University of Witwatersrand, dean Falk, a specialist in brain evolution, has called it the most important anthropological fossil of the twentieth century. In the early 20th century, the workers at quarries in southern Africa routinely uncovered fossils from the tufa formations they mined. Many were of extinct fauna, which included baboons and other primates, the director gave it to his son, Pat Izod, who displayed it on the mantle over the fireplace. Josephine Salmons was the first female student of Dart, an anatomist at the University of Witwatersrand, Salmons was permitted to take the fossilised skull and presented it to Dart, who also recognised it as a significant find. Dart asked the company to any more interesting fossilised skulls that should be unearthed. Young sent some of the back to Dart. The paper appeared in the 7 February 1925 issue of the journal Nature, the fossil was soon nicknamed the Taung Child. Scientists were initially reluctant to accept that the Taung Child and the new genus Australopithecus were ancestral to modern humans, in the issue of Nature immediately following the one in which Darts paper was published, several authorities in British paleoanthropology criticized Darts conclusion. Grafton Elliot Smith stated that he needed more evidence – and a picture of the skull – before he could judge the significance of the new fossil. Arthur Smith Woodward dismissed the Taung Child as having little bearing on the issue of whether the ancestors of man are to be sought in Asia or Africa. These critiques became more fervent a few months later, will satisfy geologists that this claim is preposterous. There were several reasons why it took decades for the field to accept Darts claim that Australopithecus africanus was in the line of descent. For one, the British scientific establishment was at the time enamored with the hoax Piltdown Man, expecting human ancestors to have evolved a large brain very early, they found that the Taung Childs small brain and human-like teeth made it an unlikely ancestor to modern humans. Until the 1940s, most anthropologists also believed that humans had evolved in Asia, and despite accepting that modern humans had emerged through evolution, a large number of anthropologists believed that the genus Homo had split from the great apes as much as 30 million years ago. They therefore felt uneasy about accepting that humans had had a small-brained, solly Zuckerman, who had studied anatomy under Raymond Dart in South Africa, concluded as early as 1928 that Australopithecus was little more than an ape. He and a team carried out further studies of the Australopithecine family in the 1940s and 1950s
20.
Mrs. Ples
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Mrs. Ples is the popular nickname for the most complete skull of an Australopithecus africanus ever found in South Africa. Mrs. Ples was discovered by Robert Broom and John T. Robinson on April 18,1947, because of Brooms use of dynamite and pickaxe while excavating, Mrs. Ples’ skull was blown into two pieces and some fragments are missing. Ples is one of the most perfect pre-human skulls ever found, the nickname ″Mrs. Ples″ was coined by Brooms young co-workers. It derives from the scientific designation Plesianthropus transvaalensis, that Broom initially gave the skull, in scientific publications the specimen is referred to by its catalogue number, STS5. The genus Australopithecus, of which there are species, is considered the likely precursor of the genus Homo. Though its cranium is comparable to a chimpanzees, Australopithecus walked upright and this was a surprise to anthropologists at the time, because it had been assumed that the big brain of Homo had preceded, or at least evolved in tandem with our upright gait. Mrs. Ples, whose capacity is only about 485 cubic centimetres, was one of the first fossils to reveal that upright walking had evolved well before any significant growth in brain size. The sex of the specimen is not completely certain and so Mrs. Ples may in fact be Mr. Ples, moreover, X-ray analysis of the specimens teeth has suggested it was an adolescent. Hence a designation of Miss Ples or Master Ples is also possible, the paleoanthropologist, Prof. Federick E. Grine, has studied the dental morphology of Mrs. /Mr. Ples with a view to finally establishing Mrs. /Ms, using the Computed Tomography scans of STS5 from the experiments of Weber et. al. they compared them to CT scans of more recently discovered A. africanus skulls from Sterkfontein. These scans allowed Grine to reconstruct images of the roots of the teeth, in order to see how the molar, Ples was indeed a middle-aged female. However, the question is not entirely settled, since other studies have come to the opposite conclusion, if correct, this would make Mrs. Ples the South African counterpart to the famous Lucy fossil. This skull, along with others discovered at Taung, Sterkfontien, the fossil has been dated by a combination of palaeomagnetism and uranium-lead techniques to around 2.05 million years. In 2004, Mrs. Ples was voted 95th in the SABC3s, list of human evolution fossils Taung Child See also, *Tattersall, Ian, Schwartz, Jeffery. Westview Press, Boulder CO. pp. 65–66
21.
Australopithecus prometheus
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Australopithecus africanus is an extinct species of the australopithecines, the first of an early -form species to be classified as hominin. Recently it was dated as living between 3.3 and 2.1 million years ago, or in the late Pliocene and early Pleistocene times, it is debated as being a direct ancestor of modern humans. A. africanus was of slender, or gracile, build and has found only in southern Africa at four sites, Taung, Sterkfontein, Makapansgat. Dart assigned the specimen the name Australopithecus africanus, it was dubbed the Taung child. This was the first time the word ape was formally assigned to any hominin, Dart theorized the Taung child skull must represent an intermediate species between apes and humans. And the rejection was buttressed by the widespread belief then, especially in British academia and he dismissed Darts claim, suggesting instead that the Taung child skull belonged to a young ape, most likely an infant gorilla or chimpanzee. Keith immersed himself in defending the Piltdown man and his reputation suffered greatly after the hoax was exposed in 1953, phillip Tobias, in a lengthy essay published in Current Anthropology in 1992, detailed the history of the investigation of the hoax. As part of the essay Tobias debated the inconsistencies in Keiths statements, Darts theory—that the skull known as the Taung child was a human ancestor—was supported by Robert Broom, a paleontologist with the Transvaal Museum of natural history in Pretoria. In 1936, the Sterkfontein caves yielded the first adult australopithecine, later, Broom classified an adult endocranial cast having a brain capacity of 485 cc as Plesianthropus transvaalensis. In April 1947, while blasting at Sterkfontein, he and John T. Robinson discovered a skull belonging to a female which he also classified as Plesianthropus transvaalensis. Both fossils were classified as Australopithecus africanus. Mrs. Ples, whose capacity is only about 485 cubic centimetres, was one of the first fossils to reveal that upright walking had evolved well before any significant growth in brain size. And, in comparison to modern apes, Dart noted as with the Taung child the lack of facial projection and it has slightly human-like, advanced cranial features, but also presents primitive features including ape-like curved fingers adapted to tree climbing. Both P. robustus and A. africanus crania seem very alike despite the heavily built features of P. robustus. A. africanus had a pelvis that would enable more efficient bipedalism than that of A. afarensis, such a morphology would support an earlier time for making and using tools than previously had been thought likely. Evidence of human-like sexual dimorphism in the spine has recently been described in the primate A. africanus. Recent analysis of the Little Foot specimen dated it to about 3, the Makapansgat fossils have been dated to between 3.0 and 2.6 mya. Those at Sterkfontein currently are dated to between 2.6 and 2.0 mya with the Mrs Ples fossil dating to around 2.0 million years, and Gladysvale fossils were dated between about 2.4 and 2.0 mya
22.
Little Foot
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Little Foot is the nickname given to a nearly complete Australopithecus fossil skeleton found in 1994–1998 in the cave system of Sterkfontein, South Africa. The fossils were found in a formation in Sterkfontein. The nickname little foot was given to the fossil in 1995, from the structure of the four ankle bones they were able to ascertain that the owner was able to walk upright. The recovery of the bones proved extremely difficult and tedious, because they are embedded in concrete-like rock. It is due to this that the recovery and excavation of the site took around 15 years to complete, the four bones of the ankle had been collected already in 1980 but were undetected between numerous other mammal bones. Only after 1992, on initiative by Phillip Tobias, a rock was blown up in the cave that contained an unusual accumulation of fossils. The fossils recovered were taken from the cave and scrutinized thoroughly by paleoanthropologist Ronald J. Clarke, in 1994 while searching through museum boxes labelled Cercopithecoids containing fossil fragments, Ronald J. Clarke identified several that were unmistakably hominin. He spotted four left foot bones that were most likely from the same individual and these fragments came from the Silberberg Grotto, a large cavern within the Sterkfontein cave system. They were described as belonging to the genus Australopithecus, and catalogued as Stw 573, due to the diminutive nature of the bones, they were dubbed Little Foot. Dr. Clarke found further foot bones from the individual in separate bags in 1997. Amazingly, within two days they found the part of the bone protruding from the rock in the lower part of the grotto. Because the bones of both legs were in anatomically correct arrangement, the team speculated that it could be a complete skeleton, in the following months, Clarke and his two assistants with the help of a hammer and small chisel uncovered further foot bones. Stephen Motsumi discovered the first remains of the body, an upper arm bone on 11 September 1998. It was a connected with the lower jaw, which was facing up. These were announced to the press in 1998. A year later, in July and August 1999, a left forearm as well as the left hand was discovered. These were again in anatomically correct arrangement, subsequent work has uncovered a relatively complete skeleton, including parts of the pelvis, ribs and vertebrae, a complete humerus and most of the lower limb bones. This discovery is likely to be far more complete than the famous Australopithecus afarensis skeleton, Lucy, from the site of Hadar, first, the discovery was not assigned to any particular species in the genus of Australopithecus. In the first description in July 1995 it was said, The bones are probably a member of Australopithecus africanus or another early species of hominids
23.
Australopithecus sediba
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Australopithecus sediba is a species of Australopithecus of the early Pleistocene, identified based on fossil remains dated to about 2 million years ago. The fossils were found together at the bottom of the Malapa Cave, where they fell to their death. Over 220 fragments from the species have recovered to date. MH1 is disarticulated and 34% complete if skeletal elements known to be in a block are included while MH2 is 45. 6% complete. Australopithecus sediba may have lived in savannas but ate fruit and other foods from the similar to modern-day savanna chimpanzees. The conditions in which the individuals were buried and fossilized were extraordinary, the first specimen of A. sediba was found by paleoanthropologist Lee Bergers nine-year-old son, Matthew, on August 15,2008. While exploring near his fathers dig site in the hills north of Johannesburg, on the Malapa Nature Reserve. The boy alerted his father to the find, who could not believe what he saw — a hominid clavicle, upon turning the block over, sticking out of the back of the rock was a mandible with a tooth, a canine, sticking out. And I almost died, he later recalled, the fossil turned out to belong to a 4 ft 2 in juvenile male, whose skull was discovered in March 2009 by Bergers team. The find was announced to the public on April 8,2010, also found at the Malapa archeological site were a variety of animal fossils, including saber-toothed cats, mongooses, and antelopes. Berger and geologist Paul Dirks speculated that the animals might have fallen into a deep 100–150-foot death-trap, the bodies may have then been swept into a pool of water with a sandy bottom and rich with lime, allowing the remains to become fossilized. The fossil was dated using a combination of palaeomagnetism and uranium-lead dating which showed that the fossils are no older than ~2.0 Ma, the presence of animal species which became extinct at ~1.5 Ma indicates the deposit is no younger than 1.5 Ma. The sediments have a normal polarity and the only major period between 2.0 and 1.5 Ma when this occurred is the Olduvai sub-Chron between 1.95 and 1.78 Ma. Accordingly, the fossils were dated to ~1.95 Ma. Recent dating of a capping flowstone demonstrated this was not possible, however, the cusp spacing is more like Australopithecus. The femur and tibia are fragmentary, but the foot combines an advanced anklebone combined with a primitive heel and its cranial capacity is estimated at around 420–450 cm3, about one-third that of modern humans. A. sediba had a modern hand, whose precision grip suggests it might have been another tool-making Australopithecus. Evidence of the precision gripping and stone tool production can be seen from Homo-like features such as having a long thumb, the nearly complete wrist and hand of an adult female from Malapa, South Africa presents Australopithecus-like features, such as a strong flexor apparatus associated with arboreal locomotion
24.
Paranthropus robustus
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Paranthropus robustus is an early hominin, originally discovered in Southern Africa in 1938. Particularly regarding cranial features, the development of P. robustus seemed to be in the direction of a heavy-chewing complex, on account of the definitive traits associated with this robust line of australopithecine, anthropologist Robert Broom established the genus Paranthropus and placed this species in it. Paranthropus robustus is generally dated to have lived between 2.0 and 1.2 million years ago and it had large jaws and jaw muscles with the accompanying sagittal crest, and post-canine teeth that were adapted to serve in the dry environment they lived in. After Raymond Dart’s discovery of Australopithecus africanus, Broom was in favour of Darts claim that Australopithecus africanus was an ancestor of Homo sapiens, however, there was a great deal of skepticism and criticism from the academic community. Many claimed that Dart had been premature in naming the species, as the type specimen and it was thought that such important claims should be based on a full skeleton of an adult. Robert Broom was a Scottish doctor then working in South Africa who began making his own excavations in Southern Africa to find specimens of A. africanus. It was his intent to find complete adult skeletons that would justify the species designation of A. africanus, the fossils included parts of a skull and teeth, all dated to 2 million years old. Sites with fossils of Paranthropus robustus are found only in South Africa, in the cave at Swartkrans, the remains of 130 individuals were discovered. The study made on the dentition of the revealed that the average P. robustus rarely lived past 17 years of age. Paranthropus robustus was the first discovery of a robust species of hominin, it was well before P. boisei. These three species have alternately been in their own or placed within the genus Australopithecus and this is partly because in many small details, the species robustus resembles A. africanus more than it does either of the other robust species, aethiopicus or boisei. Brooms discovery was the second australopithecine after Australopithecus africanus, typical of robust australopithecines, P. robustus had a head shaped a bit like a gorillas with a more massive built jaw and teeth in comparison to hominins within the Homo lineage. The sagittal crest that runs from the top of the acts as an anchor for large chewing muscles. The teeth of these primates were larger and thicker than any gracile australopithecine found, on the skull, a bony ridge is located above from the front to back indicating where the jaw muscles joined. P. robustus males may have stood only 1. 2m tall and weighed 54 kg while females stood just under 1 meter tall and weighed only 40 kg, the teeth found on P. robustus are almost as large as those of P. boisei. Broom analyzed his findings carefully and noted the differences in the molar teeth size which resembled a gorillas a bit more than a humans, other P. robustus remains have been found in Southern Africa. The average brain size of P. robustus measured to only 410 and 530 cc, some have argued that P robustus had a diet of hard gritty foods such as nuts and tubers since they lived in open woodland and savanna
25.
Homo naledi
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Homo naledi is an extinct species of hominin, which anthropologists first described in 2015 and have assigned to the genus Homo. In 2013, fossil skeletons were found in South Africas Gauteng province, in the Rising Star Cave system, as of 10 September 2015, fossils of at least fifteen individuals, amounting to over 1550 specimens, have been excavated from the cave. The skeletal anatomy presents ancestral features known from australopithecines with more recent features associated with later hominins, the fossils have not been chronometrically dated, but estimates derived from statistical analysis of cranial traits have yielded a range of 2 million years to 912,000 years before present. The fossils were discovered by recreational cavers Rick Hunter and Steven Tucker in 2013, other experts contend more analyses are needed to support this classification. There are some indications that the individuals may have been placed in the cave near the time of their death. The word naledi means star in the Sotho language and it, and the corresponding name Dinaledi Chamber, were chosen to reference the Rising Star cave system where the fossils were found. This chute led to a room 30 m underground, the surface of which was littered with fossil bones, before exploring the cave that day, the cavers had been asked by fellow caver and geologist Pedro Boshoff to let him know if they came across any fossils. On October 1,2013, photos were shown to Boshoff who recognized their significance, in total, over 1,550 pieces of bone belonging to at least fifteen individuals have been recovered from the clay-rich sediments. The layered distribution of the bones suggests that they had deposited over a long time. Only one square meter of the chamber has been excavated. Around 300 bone fragments were collected from the surface of the Dinaledi Chamber, the fossils include skulls, jaws, ribs, teeth, bones of an almost complete foot, of a hand, and of an inner ear. The bones of old, young and infants were found, the description of the new species was announced at a press conference on September 10,2015 held at Maropeng, Cradle of Humankind, Johannesburg, South Africa. A display case of the fossils was unveiled during the ceremony and was subsequently on display to the public at Maropeng throughout September and October 2015, the University of the Witwatersrand is the curator of the fossils. The skeletal anatomy displays plesiomorphic features found in the australopithecines and more apomorphic features known from later hominins, adult males are estimated to have stood around 150 cm tall and weighed around 45 kg, while females would likely have been a little shorter and weighed a little less. An analysis of H. naledis skeleton suggests it stood upright and was bipedal and its hip mechanics, the flared shape of the pelvis are similar to australopithecines, but its legs, feet and ankles are more similar to the genus Homo. The hands of H. naledi appear to have better suited for object manipulation than those of australopithecines. Some of the bones resemble modern human bones, and other bones are more primitive than Australopithecus, the thumb, wrist and palm bones are modern-like while the fingers are curved, more australopithecine, and useful for climbing. The shoulders are configured largely like those of australopithecines, the vertebrae are most similar to Pleistocene members of the genus Homo, whereas the ribcage is wide distally like A. afarensis
26.
Cave painting
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Cave paintings are painted drawings on cave walls or ceilings, mainly of prehistoric origin, to some 40,000 years ago in Eurasia. The exact purpose of the Paleolithic cave paintings is not known, evidence suggests that they were not merely decorations of living areas since the caves in which they have been found do not have signs of ongoing habitation. They are also located in areas of caves that are not easily accessible. Some theories hold that cave paintings may have been a way of communicating with others, the paintings are remarkably similar around the world, with animals being common subjects that give the most impressive images. Humans mainly appear as images of hands, mostly hand stencils made by blowing pigment on a hand held to the wall. The earliest known cave paintings/drawings of animals are at least 35,000 years old and are found in Pettakere cave on the island of Sulawesi in Indonesia, previously it was believed that the earliest paintings were in Europe. The earliest non-figurative rock art dates back to approximately 40,000 years ago, nearly 340 caves have now been discovered in France and Spain that contain art from prehistoric times. But subsequent technology has made it possible to date the paintings by sampling the pigment itself, the choice of subject matter can also indicate chronology. For instance, the reindeer depicted in the Spanish cave of Cueva de las Monedas places the drawings in the last Ice Age. The oldest date given to a cave painting is now a pig that has a minimum age of 35,400 years old at Pettakere cave in Sulawesi. Indonesian and Australian scientists have dated other non-figurative paintings on the walls to be approximately 40,000 years old, the method they used to confirm this was dating the age of the stalactites that formed over the top of the paintings. The art is similar in style and method to that of the Indonesian caves as there were also hand stencils and this date coincides with the earliest known evidence for Homo sapiens in Europe. Because of the cave arts age, some scientists have conjectured that the paintings may have made by Neanderthals. The earliest known European figurative cave paintings are those of Chauvet Cave in France and these paintings date to earlier than 30,000 BCE according to radiocarbon dating. Some researchers believe the drawings are too advanced for this era, the radiocarbon dates from these samples show that there were two periods of creation in Chauvet,35,000 years ago and 30,000 years ago. In 2009, cavers discovered drawings in Coliboaia Cave in Romania, an initial dating puts the age of an image in the same range as Chauvet, about 32,000 years old. Some caves probably continued to be painted over a period of thousands of years. This was created roughly between 10,000 and 5,500 years ago, and painted in rock shelters under cliffs or shallow caves, though individual figures are less naturalistic, they are grouped in coherent grouped compositions to a much greater degree
27.
Armenia
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Armenia, officially the Republic of Armenia, is a sovereign state in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia. The Republic of Armenia constitutes only one-tenth of historical Armenia, Armenia is a unitary, multi-party, democratic nation-state with an ancient cultural heritage. Urartu was established in 860 BC and by the 6th century BC it was replaced by the Satrapy of Armenia, in the 1st century BC the Kingdom of Armenia reached its height under Tigranes the Great. Armenia became the first state in the world to adopt Christianity as its official religion, in between the late 3rd century to early years of the 4th century, the state became the first Christian nation. The official date of adoption of Christianity is 301 AD. The ancient Armenian kingdom was split between the Byzantine and Sasanian Empires around the early 5th century, under the Bagratuni dynasty, the Bagratid Kingdom of Armenia was restored in the 9th century. Declining due to the wars against the Byzantines, the fell in 1045. An Armenian principality and later a kingdom Cilician Armenia was located on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea between the 11th and 14th centuries. By the 19th century, Eastern Armenia had been conquered by the Russian Empire, during World War I, Armenians living in their ancestral lands in the Ottoman Empire were systematically exterminated in the Armenian Genocide. By 1920, the state was incorporated into the Transcaucasian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, in 1936, the Transcaucasian state was dissolved, transforming its constituent states, including the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, into full Union republics. The modern Republic of Armenia became independent in 1991 during the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Republic of Armenia recognises the Armenian Apostolic Church, the worlds oldest national church, as the countrys primary religious establishment. The unique Armenian alphabet was invented by Mesrop Mashtots in 405 AD, Armenia is a member of the Eurasian Economic Union, the Council of Europe and the Collective Security Treaty Organization. Armenia supports the de facto independent Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, which was proclaimed in 1991, the native Armenian name for the country is Հայք. The name in the Middle Ages was extended to Հայաստան, by addition of the Persian suffix -stan, the further origin of the name is uncertain. It is also postulated that the name Hay comes from one of the two confederated, Hittite vassal states—the Ḫayaša-Azzi. The exonym Armenia is attested in the Old Persian Behistun Inscription as Armina, the ancient Greek terms Ἀρμενία and Ἀρμένιοι are first mentioned by Hecataeus of Miletus. Xenophon, a Greek general serving in some of the Persian expeditions, describes many aspects of Armenian village life and he relates that the people spoke a language that to his ear sounded like the language of the Persians. According to the histories of both Moses of Chorene and Michael Chamchian, Armenia derives from the name of Aram, a descendant of Hayk
28.
Areni-1 cave
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The Areni-1 cave complex is located near the Areni village in southern Armenia along the Arpa River. In 2010, it was announced that the earliest known shoe was found at the site, in January 2011, the earliest known winery in the world was announced to have been found. Also in 2011, the discovery of a straw skirt dating to 3900 BC was reported, in 2009, the oldest brain was discovered
29.
Austria
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Austria, officially the Republic of Austria, is a federal republic and a landlocked country of over 8.7 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Hungary and Slovakia to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, the territory of Austria covers 83,879 km2. The terrain is mountainous, lying within the Alps, only 32% of the country is below 500 m. The majority of the population speaks local Bavarian dialects of German as their native language, other local official languages are Hungarian, Burgenland Croatian, and Slovene. The origins of modern-day Austria date back to the time of the Habsburg dynasty, from the time of the Reformation, many northern German princes, resenting the authority of the Emperor, used Protestantism as a flag of rebellion. Following Napoleons defeat, Prussia emerged as Austrias chief competitor for rule of a greater Germany, Austrias defeat by Prussia at the Battle of Königgrätz, during the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, cleared the way for Prussia to assert control over the rest of Germany. In 1867, the empire was reformed into Austria-Hungary, Austria was thus the first to go to war in the July Crisis, which would ultimately escalate into World War I. The First Austrian Republic was established in 1919, in 1938 Nazi Germany annexed Austria in the Anschluss. This lasted until the end of World War II in 1945, after which Germany was occupied by the Allies, in 1955, the Austrian State Treaty re-established Austria as a sovereign state, ending the occupation. In the same year, the Austrian Parliament created the Declaration of Neutrality which declared that the Second Austrian Republic would become permanently neutral, today, Austria is a parliamentary representative democracy comprising nine federal states. The capital and largest city, with a population exceeding 1.7 million, is Vienna, other major urban areas of Austria include Graz, Linz, Salzburg and Innsbruck. Austria is one of the richest countries in the world, with a nominal per capita GDP of $43,724, the country has developed a high standard of living and in 2014 was ranked 21st in the world for its Human Development Index. Austria has been a member of the United Nations since 1955, joined the European Union in 1995, Austria also signed the Schengen Agreement in 1995, and adopted the euro currency in 1999. The German name for Austria, Österreich, meant eastern realm in Old High German, and is cognate with the word Ostarrîchi and this word is probably a translation of Medieval Latin Marchia orientalis into a local dialect. Austria was a prefecture of Bavaria created in 976, the word Austria is a Latinisation of the German name and was first recorded in the 12th century. Accordingly, Norig would essentially mean the same as Ostarrîchi and Österreich, the Celtic name was eventually Latinised to Noricum after the Romans conquered the area that encloses most of modern-day Austria, around 15 BC. Noricum later became a Roman province in the mid-first century AD, heers hypothesis is not accepted by linguists. Settled in ancient times, the Central European land that is now Austria was occupied in pre-Roman times by various Celtic tribes, the Celtic kingdom of Noricum was later claimed by the Roman Empire and made a province
30.
Tischofer Cave
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The Tischofer Cave is a cave in the Kaisertal valley in the Kaisergebirge mountains in Austria. It was important locally as a place and weapons cache for local rebels during the Napoleonic Wars. The roughly 40 m long cave, which is about 8.5 m high at the entrance, was used during the Stone Age by bears and other predators as shelter and that makes the Tischofer Cave the oldest proven site of human occupation in Tyrol. Discoveries of human skeletons and tools also indicate that the cave acted as a copper smithy, the Tischofer Cave may be reached on foot via the Kaiser Path in the Kaisertal valley, a pathway secured with cable railings. It is recorded in the Tyrolean Cave Register as number 1312/001, article from Hofmann, Wege im Inntal with comprehensive description Die Tischofer Höhle im Kaisertal bei Kufstein at www. tirol-infos. at. Tischofer Höhle im Kaisertal at www. kaisergebirge-online. de
31.
Belgium
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Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a sovereign state in Western Europe bordered by France, the Netherlands, Germany, Luxembourg, and the North Sea. It is a small, densely populated country which covers an area of 30,528 square kilometres and has a population of about 11 million people. Additionally, there is a group of German-speakers who live in the East Cantons located around the High Fens area. Historically, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg were known as the Low Countries, the region was called Belgica in Latin, after the Roman province of Gallia Belgica. From the end of the Middle Ages until the 17th century, today, Belgium is a federal constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. It is divided into three regions and three communities, that exist next to each other and its two largest regions are the Dutch-speaking region of Flanders in the north and the French-speaking southern region of Wallonia. The Brussels-Capital Region is a bilingual enclave within the Flemish Region. A German-speaking Community exists in eastern Wallonia, Belgiums linguistic diversity and related political conflicts are reflected in its political history and complex system of governance, made up of six different governments. Upon its independence, declared in 1830, Belgium participated in the Industrial Revolution and, during the course of the 20th century, possessed a number of colonies in Africa. This continuing antagonism has led to several far-reaching reforms, resulting in a transition from a unitary to a federal arrangement during the period from 1970 to 1993. Belgium is also a member of the Eurozone, NATO, OECD and WTO. Its capital, Brussels, hosts several of the EUs official seats as well as the headquarters of major international organizations such as NATO. Belgium is also a part of the Schengen Area, Belgium is a developed country, with an advanced high-income economy and is categorized as very high in the Human Development Index. A gradual immigration by Germanic Frankish tribes during the 5th century brought the area under the rule of the Merovingian kings, a gradual shift of power during the 8th century led the kingdom of the Franks to evolve into the Carolingian Empire. Many of these fiefdoms were united in the Burgundian Netherlands of the 14th and 15th centuries, the Eighty Years War divided the Low Countries into the northern United Provinces and the Southern Netherlands. The latter were ruled successively by the Spanish and the Austrian Habsburgs and this was the theatre of most Franco-Spanish and Franco-Austrian wars during the 17th and 18th centuries. The reunification of the Low Countries as the United Kingdom of the Netherlands occurred at the dissolution of the First French Empire in 1815, although the franchise was initially restricted, universal suffrage for men was introduced after the general strike of 1893 and for women in 1949. The main political parties of the 19th century were the Catholic Party, French was originally the single official language adopted by the nobility and the bourgeoisie
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Neolithic flint mines of Spiennes
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The mines were active during the mid and late Neolithic between 4,300 and 2,200 BC. Declared to be remarkable for the diversity of technological solutions used for extraction the site, discovered in 1843, the first excavations were undertaken during railway construction in 1867 and intermittent excavations have been carried out up to the present day. The Mines of Spiennes cover some 100 ha of downland four miles south-east of the city of Mons, the site is dotted with millions of scraps of worked flint and numerous mining pits, that Neolithic settlers have gradually turned into vertical mine shafts to depths of over 10 m. Research has illustrated Neolithic techniques for the cutting of the flint and the extraction of large slabs of flint, the nodules were extracted using flint picks. The stones were then knapped into rough-out shapes of axes, the SILEXS Interpretive Centre has opened in spring 2015. The rough-outs were exchanged over an area, about 150 km. Polishing strengthens the product, making the axe- or adze-head last longer. The smooth surface also aids the cutting action by lowering friction with the wood, the axes were used initially for forest clearance during the Neolithic period, and for shaping wood for structural applications, such as timber for huts and canoes. The site has been compared with Grimes Graves and Cissbury in the United Kingdom, and Krzemionki in Poland, however, different hard rocks were used for the polished stone axes. Examples include the Langdale axe industry, Penmaenmawr and Tievebulliagh, guillaume, Ph. Lipinski & A. Masson, Les mines de silex néolithiques de la Meuse dans le contexte européen. Musées de la Meuse, Sampigny 1987, F. Gosselin, Un site dexploitation du silex à Spiennes, au lieu-dit Petit-Spiennes. F. Hubert, Une minière néolithique à silex au Camp-à-Cayaux de Spiennes, F. Hubert, Lexploitation préhistorique du silex à Spiennes. Ministère de la Région wallonne, Direction générale de lAménagement du Territoire, du Logement et du Patrimoine, R. Shepherd, Prehistoric Mining and Allied Industries. Société de recherches préhistoriques en Hainaut, Minières néolithiques à Spiennes,1997 ICOMOS evaluation Collet, H. Les mines néolithiques de Spiennes, état des connaissances et perspectives de recherche. Section 10, The Neolithic in the Near East and Europe, actes du XIVème congrès UISPP, Université de Liège, Belgique,2 –8 septembre 2001 H. Collet, A. Hauzeur & J. Lech,2008. The prehistoric flint mining complex at Spiennes on the occasion of its discovery 140 years ago In P. Allard, F. Bostyn, flint mining in Prehistoric Europe, Interpreting the archaeological records. European Association of Archaeologists, 12th Annual Meeting, Cracow, Poland, 19–24 September 2006, H. Collet,2014. Les minières néolithiques de silex de Spiennes
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Scladina
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The caves in the area have been undergone systematic exploration since 1949. Scladina Cave was discovered in 1971 by cavers of the CAS, in 1978 the Scientific Council of the Prehistory Department of the University of Liège began to direct the excavations. Since the site has yielded numerous artifacts of Mousterian Neanderthal origin, amidst assemblages of stone tools, bones, after the initially clearing of the entrance the excavations uncovered two strata of Neanderthal occupation, the oldest dating back 130,000 years. The sediments yielded artifacts and Mousterian stone tools, the earliest were attributed to the Middle Palaeolithic, two Neanderthal occupation sites were identified, one dated to be 130,000 years old and the other 40,000 years. Modern humans infrequently occupied the site between 32,000 and 9,000 years ago and used the site as a place during the late Neolithic. Continued excavations since 1978 have produced a stream of findings that culminated in the discovery of the remarkable Sclayn child fossils in 1993. Sclayn cave site has been classified as a heritage site of Wallonia on 27 May 2009 and is since open to the public. Dated to be around 127,000 years old, the first fragment of the now nearly complete mandible, was found on 16 July 1993, a maxillary fragment and several teeth of the child were excavated in subsequent campaigns. A genetic sample was successfully extracted from one of the molars at a laboratory for ancient DNA and analyzed at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. Initially it was suggested that the Scladina child was 2 to 4 years older than current estimates, some scholars, though debate universal periods of anterior tooth growth, as it is known that anterior tooth growth takes longer in great apes than in humans and varies among human populations. The study of the turned out to support the idea that extremely prolonged duration of human development is unique to Homo sapiens. This trend suggests to scientists the necessary prevalence of differing patterns of behavioral and social development as well. Neanderthal diet consisted to over 70% of meat, unlike that of contemporary Homo sapiens hunter-gatherer societies, although some cooked vegetables are evident. Provisioning techniques, made superior by extensive use, aided early Homo in pursuits of worldwide expansion. One large game evident in the diets of Scladina Neanderthals is bear, several bear bones were found amongst other stone tools and modifiers within the Scladina cave site. Wear marks on the bones,4 of the 6 bear bone tools which originated from a single femur, the idea is to correctly inform about prehistory, deemed to be still perceived as nebulous and mythical by the general public. The site and its center are open to the public all year round. Private groups, school classes are permanently granted access to the cave, the laboratory, list of human evolution fossils Scladina Cave Archaeological Center The Scladina cave Archéologie Andennaise SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION of tooth development
34.
Spy Cave
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Spy Cave is located near Spy in the municipality of Jemeppe-sur-Sambre, province of Namur, Belgium above the left bank of the Orneau River. Classified as a premier Wallonian Heritage site of the Walloon Region, the cave consists of numerous small chambers and corridors. Since the first amateur investigations during the late 19th century numerous amateur and professional archaeologists have carried out excavations, the excavation was conducted by Liège, archaeologist Marcel de Puydt and geologist Max Lohest. Paleontologist and zoologist Julien Fraipont published the description in the American Anthropologist journal. The assemblages of the oldest excavations have been mixed, that makes the interpretation of the palaeoenvironment difficult, in addition publications of de Puydt, Lohest and Fraipoint disagree on the number of layers of knapped flints. The hominid skeletons discovered during the first excavations have been named Spy I, a female, and Spy 2 and these were dated to around 36,000 years BP, although a Bayesian analysis in 2014 concluded that they were probably more than 40,000 years old. The identification of the remains of a Neanderthal child, Spy VI, was published in 2010, almost 12,000 faunal remains of the Pleistocene were discovered, including mammoth, horse, cave hyena, woolly rhinoceros, reindeer, and cave bear bones. All levels contained mammoth remains, including a number of molars. It has been suggested that the Neanderthal occupants brought mammoth heads to the site and ate the brains, because many of the molars were unworn, these would have been very young or newborn calves, killed in early spring, when plant food would not yet have been available. Evidence of occupation by Upper Paleolithic anatomically modern humans has also found at Spy. Pendants and perforated beads made from ivory, presumably by modern humans, were found in the cave. Goyet Caves Media related to Spy Cave at Wikimedia Commons
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Bosnia and Herzegovina
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Bosnia and Herzegovina, sometimes called Bosnia-Herzegovina, and, in short, often known informally as Bosnia, is a country in Southeastern Europe located on the Balkan Peninsula. Sarajevo is the capital and largest city, in the central and eastern interior of the country the geography is mountainous, in the northwest it is moderately hilly, and the northeast is predominantly flatland. The inland is a larger region and has a moderate continental climate, with hot summers and cold. The southern tip of the country has a Mediterranean climate and plain topography, Bosnia and Herzegovina is a region that traces permanent human settlement back to the Neolithic age, during and after which it was populated by several Illyrian and Celtic civilizations. Culturally, politically, and socially, the country has a rich history, the Ottomans brought Islam to the region, and altered much of the cultural and social outlook of the country. This was followed by annexation into the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, which lasted up until World War I. In the interwar period, Bosnia was part of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and after World War II, following the dissolution of Yugoslavia, the country proclaimed independence in 1992, which was followed by the Bosnian War, lasting until late 1995. The country is home to three ethnic groups or, officially, constituent peoples, as specified in the constitution. Bosniaks are the largest group of the three, with Serbs second and Croats third, a native of Bosnia and Herzegovina, regardless of ethnicity, is identified in English as a Bosnian. The terms Herzegovinian and Bosnian are maintained as a rather than ethnic distinction. Moreover, the country was simply called Bosnia until the Austro-Hungarian occupation at the end of the 19th century, Bosnia and Herzegovina has a bicameral legislature and a three-member Presidency composed of a member of each major ethnic group. The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina is itself complex and consists of 10 cantons, additionally, the country has been a member of the Council of Europe since April 2002 and a founding member of the Mediterranean Union upon its establishment in July 2008. The name is believed to have derived from the hydronym of the river Bosna coursing through the Bosnian heartland. According to philologist Anton Mayer the name Bosna could be derived from Illyrian Bass-an-as which would be a diversion of the Proto-Indo-European root bos or bogh, meaning the running water. According to English medievalist William Miller the Slavic settlers in Bosnia adapted the Latin designation Basante, to their own idiom by calling the stream Bosna, the name Herzegovina originates from Bosnian magnate Stephen Vukčić Kosačas title, Herceg of Hum and the Coast. Hum, formerly Zahumlje, was a medieval principality that was conquered by the Bosnian Banate in the first half of the 14th century. Bosnia is located in the western Balkans, bordering Croatia to the north and west, Serbia to the east and it has a coastline about 20 kilometres long surrounding the city of Neum. It lies between latitudes 42° and 46° N, and longitudes 15° and 20° E, the countrys name comes from the two regions Bosnia and Herzegovina, which have a very vaguely defined border between them
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Badanj Cave
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Badanj Cave is located in Borojevići village near the town of Stolac, Bosnia and Herzegovina. This rather small cave has come to attention after the 1976 discovery of its cave engravings. The site is rock shelter or overhang recessed beneath a cliff that descends to the bank of the river Bregava. Two chronologically distinct strata of Palaeolithic occupation were identified beneath the surface layer, of particular significance was the discovery of a particular carving of the Badanj site, as it ranks among the oldest works of art in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The carving is cut into the surface of a large polished block of stone. Only the rear half of the body survives, with flanks typical for a horse and part of the body, the Badanj carvings include depictions of animals and symbols, as is typical of Mediterranean prehistoric art. The site was dated to the late Upper Palaeolithic and it is also designated as a National Monument of Bosnia and Herzegovina since 2003
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Bulgaria
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Bulgaria, officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in southeastern Europe. It is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, with a territory of 110,994 square kilometres, Bulgaria is Europes 16th-largest country. Organised prehistoric cultures began developing on current Bulgarian lands during the Neolithic period and its ancient history saw the presence of the Thracians, Greeks, Persians, Celts, Romans, Goths, Alans and Huns. With the downfall of the Second Bulgarian Empire in 1396, its territories came under Ottoman rule for five centuries. The Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78 led to the formation of the Third Bulgarian State, the following years saw several conflicts with its neighbours, which prompted Bulgaria to align with Germany in both world wars. In 1946 it became a one-party socialist state as part of the Soviet-led Eastern Bloc, in December 1989 the ruling Communist Party allowed multi-party elections, which subsequently led to Bulgarias transition into a democracy and a market-based economy. Bulgarias population of 7.2 million people is predominantly urbanised, most commercial and cultural activities are centred on the capital and largest city, Sofia. The strongest sectors of the economy are industry, power engineering. The countrys current political structure dates to the adoption of a constitution in 1991. Bulgaria is a parliamentary republic with a high degree of political, administrative. Human activity in the lands of modern Bulgaria can be traced back to the Paleolithic, animal bones incised with man-made markings from Kozarnika cave are assumed to be the earliest examples of symbolic behaviour in humans. Organised prehistoric societies in Bulgarian lands include the Neolithic Hamangia culture, Vinča culture, the latter is credited with inventing gold working and exploitation. Some of these first gold smelters produced the coins, weapons and jewellery of the Varna Necropolis treasure and this site also offers insights for understanding the social hierarchy of the earliest European societies. Thracians, one of the three primary groups of modern Bulgarians, began appearing in the region during the Iron Age. In the late 6th century BC, the Persians conquered most of present-day Bulgaria, and kept it until 479 BC. After the division of the Roman Empire in the 5th century the area fell under Byzantine control, by this time, Christianity had already spread in the region. A small Gothic community in Nicopolis ad Istrum produced the first Germanic language book in the 4th century, the first Christian monastery in Europe was established around the same time by Saint Athanasius in central Bulgaria. From the 6th century the easternmost South Slavs gradually settled in the region, in 680 Bulgar tribes under the leadership of Asparukh moved south across the Danube and settled in the area between the lower Danube and the Balkan, establishing their capital at Pliska
