New footprints from Laetoli (Tanzania) provide evidence for marked body size variation in early hominins

Abstract

Laetoli is a well-known palaeontological locality in northern Tanzania whose outstanding record includes the earliest hominin footprints in the world (3.66 million years old), discovered in 1978 at Site G and attributed to Australopithecus afarensis. Here, we report hominin tracks unearthed in the new Site S at Laetoli and referred to two bipedal individuals (S1 and S2) moving on the same palaeosurface and in the same direction as the three hominins documented at Site G. The stature estimates for S1 greatly exceed those previously reconstructed for Au. afarensis from both skeletal material and footprint data. In combination with a comparative reappraisal of the Site G footprints, the evidence collected here embodies very important additions to the Pliocene record of hominin behaviour and morphology. Our results are consistent with considerable body size variation and, probably, degree of sexual dimorphism within a single species of bipedal hominins as early as 3.66 million years ago.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.19568.001

Crevasse‐splay and associated depositional environments of the hominin‐bearing lower Okote Member, Koobi Fora Formation (Plio‐Pleistocene), Kenya

“…Refining these interpretations is not only key for addressing this possibility but also for further understanding the depositional environments in which the Okote Member's hominin record was formed and preserved. Further sedimentological and stratigraphic study of the member will help to provide additional palaeoenvironmental constraints on the evolutionary data being gleaned from the H. erectus footprints (Bennett et al ., 2016a; Hatala et al ., ; Roach et al ., ) and comparisons with hominin footprints from elsewhere in eastern Africa (Bennett et al ., 2016b; Liutkus‐Pierce et al ., ; Masao et al ., ). The new data presented here argue that a number of the Okote Member's hominin‐bearing strata are best interpreted as the products of crevasse‐splay and crevasse‐channel sedimentation (Table ).…”

Palaeoecology of giraffe tracks in Late Pleistocene aeolianites on the Cape south coast

“…Pliocene giraffid tracks recorded at Laetoli (3660 ka) 28 had dimensions of 17 cm x 12.5 cm 29 . Holocene giraffe tracks, thought to be hundreds of years old, were recorded from the Kuiseb Delta in Namibia.…”

Obligate Bipedal Locomotion in the Modern Human: A Review of Musculoskeletal Modifications

“…These changes started to appear in Australopithecus afarensis at approximately 3.6 million years ago (Mya); it has been extensively studied via the Laetoli footprints ( Figure 1) discovered by Mary Leaky in 1978 near Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania [21][22][23]. On the other that hominids adaptations, particularly pelvic re-designing, were far different for example that of Oreopithecus bambolii [24].…”