Paleolithic
Main articles: Lower Paleolithic, Middle Stone Age, and Later Stone Age
The first known hominids evolved in Africa. According to paleontology, the early
hominids' skull anatomy was similar to that of the gorilla and the chimpanzee, great
apes that also evolved in Africa, but the hominids had adopted a bipedal locomotion
which freed their hands. This gave them a crucial advantage, enabling them to live in
both forested areas and on the open savanna at a time when Africa was drying up
and the savanna was encroaching on forested areas. This would have occurred 10 to 5
million years ago, but these claims are controversial because biologists and genetics
have humans appearing around the last 70 thousand to 200 thousand years.[7]
By 4 million years ago, several australopithecine hominid species had developed
throughout Southern, Eastern and Central Africa. They were tool users, and makers of
tools. They scavenged for meat and were omnivores.[8]
By approximately 3.3 million years ago, primitive stone tools were first used to scavenge
kills made by other predators and to harvest carrion and marrow from their bones. In
hunting, Homo habilis was probably not capable of competing with large predators
and was still more prey than hunter. H. habilis probably did steal eggs from nests and
may have been able to catch small game and weakened larger prey (cubs and older
animals). The tools were classed as Oldowan.[9]
Around 1.8 million years ago, Homo ergaster first appeared in the fossil record in Africa.
From Homo ergaster, Homo erectus evolved 1.5 million years ago. Some of the earlier
representatives of this species were still fairly small-brained and used primitive stone
tools, much like H. habilis. The brain later grew in size, and H. erectus eventually
developed a more complex stone tool technology called the Acheulean. Possibly the
first hunters, H. erectus mastered the art of making fire and was the first hominid to leave
Africa, colonizing most of Afro-Eurasia and perhaps later giving rise to Homo floresiensis.
Although some recent writers have suggested that Homo georgicus was the first and
primary hominid ever to live outside Africa, many scientists consider H. georgicus to be
an early and primitive member of the H. erectus species.[10][11]