Chapter 11: The Genus Homo

Brain size was about 750cc

Homo habilus: “handy man”, Around 2 mya (1.6-2.3), Primary finds at Olduvai Gorge and Lake

Turkana

Limbs more human like: arms shorter and legs longer

Teeth were not large like the other specimens of the same age (boisei)

Cutting: Buttering meat

Bashing: Breaking open long bones for marrow

Oldowan Tools

First tools or first stone tools?Implies greater cognitive ability

Behaviors?

• Hunting?• Scavenging• Homicide/cannibalism• Built simple huts: like bushmen today?• Larger home ranges• Probably nuclear family units: one male, one

(maybe more) females• Food sharing with kin• Seminomadic• Central place foraging?

Homo erectus

African Asian

Brain Bigger:about 1000cc

Teeth very human like

Skeleton Look more human like

(more robust)

"The Turkana Boy“ (early erectus)

Choppers: simpler with cutting edge (Africa and Asia)

Hand axes: symmetric biface(not in Asia, bamboo curtain)

Acheulean tools

Behaviors

• Big Game hunter (elephants and such)• Big packages of meat imply wider sharing networks

(kinship and reciprocity)• First Fire?• Choppers used to working skins (clothes making)• First to leave Africa (Europe and Asia)

– New Habitats

• Language?• Symmetry in tools implies special cognitive ability• Cultural?

Homo floresiensis