Prehistoric skull reveals important new insights about early human evolution

An ancient pre-human skull, unearthed from under a medieval Georgian village, is the most complete ever found, and shows that our evolutionary history was perhaps more unified than we previously thought.

Throughout the years, scientists have unearthed many fossils that belonged to the species of hominid that came before Homo sapiens emerged onto the scene. Most of these finds were incomplete though, with only pieces of skulls and bones. Also, many of them showed a wide variety of differences — in jaw structure, and in the shape and size of the skull and the features of the skull as well. Without some kind of complete, 'unifying' piece, this evidence has led some researchers (but not all) to propose that each of the differences represented a feature of a different species, such as Homo habilis, Homo rudolfensis, Homo ergaster and Homo erectus, just to name a few.

This find under the village of Dmanisi, dated back to 1.8 million years ago, is apparently providing that 'unification' now, though. A team from the University of Zurich unearthed five different skulls, all belonging to individuals from the same species of pre-human (probably Homo erectus), and the final skull is the most complete pre-human skull ever found. According to the team, the variety seen in these specimens, along with this complete skull, ties everything together. Instead of there being many diverse species of pre-human, there were really only a few, and the differences that have been seen are due to diversity within those species — like we see with modern humans today.

According to the University of Zurich press release: "This makes Homo erectus the first 'global player' in human evolution."

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The theory of evolution has stood up throughout the years since it was first proposed, but it's finds like these that fill in the fine details. With our various ancestors now potentially united, perhaps the diversity that researchers have seen from various finds can now provide us with more insight into the diversity we show today.

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