Prehistoric life
Homo erectus
Debate continues over whether Homo erectus is a human ancestor. If Homo erectus and Homo ergaster are identified as separate species, Homo erectus would be a sibling rather than a true ancestor. Homo erectus was a successful, long-lived species that migrated out of Africa. Possibly the first humans to live in hunter-gather societies, they also used rafts to travel the oceans. One of the first specimens identified as Homo erectus was the Java Man fossil discovered in 1891. Orginally named Pithecanthropus erectus, it was not recognised as a close human relative at first, as old theories held that our ancestors would have had human brains and ape-like bodies, rather than the converse.
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Upright man
Life on Earth
Stone remains reveal how early man first walked, hunted and even communicated.
Stone remains reveal how early man first walked, hunted and even communicated.
Behaviours
Discover what these behaviours are and how different plants and animals use them.
Additional data source: Animal Diversity Web
When they lived
Discover the other animals and plants that lived during the following geological time periods.
What their world was like
The last ice age hasn't ended, the climate has just warmed up a bit causing the ice sheets to retreat. When the ice was more extensive, our climate was very different.
Fossil types
Learn more about the other animals and plants that also form these fossils.
It's not only the actual bodily remains of dead animals and plants that can become fossils. Things created or left behind by animals can also fossilise, such as their footprints, burrows and dung.
About
Homo erectus (from the Latin ērĭgĕre, "to put up, set upright") is an extinct species of hominid that lived from the end of the Pliocene epoch to the later Pleistocene, about 1.3 to 1.8 million years ago. The species originated in Africa and spread as far as India, China and Java. There is still disagreement on the subject of the classification, ancestry, and progeny of H. erectus, with two major alternative hypotheses: erectus may be another name for Homo ergaster, and therefore the direct ancestor of later hominids such as Homo heidelbergensis, Homo neanderthalensis, and Homo sapiens; or it may be an Asian species distinct from African ergaster.
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Classification
- Life
- Animals
- Vertebrates
- Mammals
- Primates
- Great apes
- Modern and early humans
- Homo erectus
BBC News about Homo erectus
- Skull fuels Homo erectus debate The fossilised skull of an ancient hominid has been found in Kenya, fuelling a debate about the species Homo erectus.
- Earliest 'human footprints' found
Elsewhere on the web
- Homo erectus fact file (humanorigins.si.edu)
- Diagnostic features of homo erectus (archaeologyinfo.com)
- Homo erectus discovery (mnsu.edu)
- Homo erectus and modern humans (stanford.edu)
- Homo erectus (wikipedia.org)
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BBC links
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