Activity: Mapping key events in Life’s History for which there is evidence from Southern
Africa
Strand 4: SA1.2, SA1.4, and SA3
Date:
Name:
Marks:
/20
INTRODUCTION:
Throughout the three eras – Paleozoic, Mesozoic, Cenozoic, the Earth we live on has
changed so much from the Earth we know today. Palaeontologists and evolutionary
scientists are beginning to map a few key events on the history of life on earth. Southern
Africa is a ‘hotspot’ for clues to our history as it is home to many different types of fossils,
including living fossils.
INSTRUCTIONS:
 The text on the following pages describes some of the key events in Life’s History for
which there is evidence in Southern Africa.
 When you read each description in the text that follows, identify the places where
evidence has been found and mark them on the map (appendix A).
 You will mark each place 1 – 12 linking them with 12 paragraphs below and then
provide a key giving a brief description of the event that happened.
 Pictures/drawings can be placed on the map to make it more appealing.
1 – FOSSILISED BACTERIA IN BARBERTON AREA
The earliest signs of life are about 3 500 million years old. One of the most ancient fossil that
is known to exist, is the micro-fossil Archaeospheroides barbertonis which is approximately 3
200 million years old and was found in the rocks near the Baberton area in Mpumalanga.
These tiny fossils are of ancient blue-green algae. These early life forms that are like modern
cyanobacteria formed stromatolites which can be found in what is called the Barberton
Greenstone Belt. Stromatolites are fossilised microorganisms that form in shallow waters
where the microorganisms are trapped and then cemented into sediments.
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Fig 1. Stromatolite formations showing sedimentary layers of cyanobacteria found near Barberton,
Mpumalanga, South Africa.
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2 – SOFT BODIED ANIMALS IN NAMIBIA AND THE NORTHERN CAPE
At the end of the Precambrian period existed what is known today specifically as the
Ediacaran period, named after the Ediacara Hills in Australia where famous fossils of this
stage were found. The life that was found during this period were all soft-bodied as there
were no bones, shells or teeth. As soft bodies don't fossilise very well, fossils discovered
from this period are rare. It is thought that the world’s first burrowing animals evolved
during the Ediacaran period, as there is evidence from trace fossils, however we don’t know
what these creatures looked like. Ediacaran animals died out about 450 million years ago.
Fossils of these ancient forms of life have been found in Namibia and the Northern Cape.
a)
b)
Fig 2. a) An artist’s interpretation of what the Ediacaran Period might have looked like with all life being softbodied. b) Trace fossil in rock dated to this period.
3 – EARLY LAND PLANTS IN AND AROUND GRAHAMSTOWN AREA
The Devonian period of the Palaeozoic era was marked by the first amphibians as well as
vascular plants, which had specialised cells for carrying water and nutrients. These plants
were the club mosses, ferns and horsetails and many of their relatives are alive still today.
There are well preserved fossils of these club mosses and the simple relatives of conifers in
the late Devonian rocks near Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape.
Fig 3. Fossils of plants typically from Devonian period (400-345 mya) which had specialised cells to transport
water and nutrients and are related to many conifers alive today. These as well as many fish fossils are found
in the Devonian shale found around Grahamstown.
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4 – FORESTS OF PRIMITIVE PLANTS SUCH AS GLOSSOPTERIS NEAR MOOI
RIVER AND ESCOURT
Near the end of the Palaeozoic era, in the Permian period (280 – 225mya), Southern Africa
had moved away from the South Pole. When the climate became warmer, the land became
covered in new types of cone-bearing plants. The best known plant in the Southern
hemisphere from that time is a “seed-fern” tree called the Glossopteris. They probably were
among the earliest true seed-bearing plants which appeared at the end of the Permian
period. Fossils of Glossopteris tree trunks are common near Estcourt and Mooi River in
KwaZulu-Natal. Plants like these formed the huge coal deposits that are mined in South
Africa today. Glossopteris fossils were also an important discovery along with other fossils in
supporting evidence for continental drift.
a)
b)
c)
Fig 4. Fossils of plants typically from Devonian period (400-345 mya) which had specialised cells to transport
water and nutrients and are related to many conifers alive today. a) The supercontinent Pangaea with the
distribution of Glossopteris fossils found across the southern continents. b) An illustration of what the giant
tree would have looked like. c) Fossilised leaves of the Glossopteris, which means ‘tongue-like’.
5 – THE COELACANTH: A LIVING FOSSIL PART OF THE GROUP THAT IS
ANCESTRAL TO AMPHIBIANS
The Coelacanth is a lobe-finned fish from the Permian period that was once thought to be
extinct and was only known as a fossil. The Coelacanth was known as a fossil and in 1938 it
was discovered to be a living animal too. Sometimes scientists find some animals and plants
that have not changed for millions of years and call them ‘living fossils’. When a living fossil
is found, it shows us that palaeontologists were probably correct when they described what
the fossils must have looked like.
On 22nd December 1938, a South African fishing boat netted a large fish with deep blue
scales and fins on short legs. Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer, who worked at the East London
Museum, saw the fish and sent a drawing to Professor J.L.B. Smith, a world authority on fish,
at Rhodes University, Grahamstown. He recognised it as a fossil fish from rocks up to 350
million years old. It was thought to have been extinct for at least 65 million years. A second
coelacanth was found in 1952 in the Comores Islands and many have been found since then.
They have even been filmed walking on their stumpy fins. Recently, a different species of
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Coelecanth has been found near Indonesia, and another population has also been found
near Sodwana Bay on the KwaZulu-Natal north coast.
Fig 5. The Coelecanth can be described as a ‘living fossil’. It is similar to fossils found that were 350 million
years old, but is still alive today.
6 – MAMMAL-LIKE REPTILES IN THE KAROO
Reptiles diversified and spread as the most successful and largest land vertebrates in the
Permian period. One important group was reptiles with some mammal features called
Therapsids. Thrinaxodon and Lystrosaurus were small therapsids that grew to about 50cm
long. Fossils of these mammal-like reptiles have been found in the Karoo.
b)
a)
Fig 6. The therapsids were called mammal-like reptiles as they shared many similarites between mammals
and reptiles. Two of these animals were a) Lystrosaurus and b) Thrinaxodon who’s fossils have been found
extensively in the Karoo.
7 – DINOSAUR FOSSILS IN SOUTHERN AFRICA
The special type of reptile called a dinosaur appeared and spread during the Triassic Period
of the Mesozoic Era. A South African example of a dinosaur is Euskelosaurus browni. It was
one of the first dinosaurs discovered in Africa. It lived in the Eastern Cape and fossils have
been found near Lady Grey. Later, during the Jurassic Period many different kinds of
dinosaurs evolved. They were the dominant form of animal life on Earth. One of the best
places in the whole world to look for dinosaur fossils is the sedimentary rocks of the
Drakensberg Mountains and Maluti Mountains. Fossils of ferns and cone-bearing conifers
have also been found in the same areas as the dinosaurs.
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a)
b)
Fig 7. Dinosaurs dominated the Jurassic period (190-145 mya) during the Mesozoic era. The a) Euskylosaurus
which means ‘good-legged lizard’ was a semi-bipedal herbivorous dinosaur that grew roughly 10m long, 3m
high and wieghed about 1.8 tons. The b) Lesothosaurus, as the name suggests, lived in Lesotho and was one
of the smallest dinosaurs of the during the Triassic period and was only 1m long.
8 – THE ARRIVAL OF MAMMALS
The first true mammals appeared during the Jurassic period of the Mesozoic era. They were
small, about the size of a mouse and lived side by side with the dinosaurs. South Africa is the
only place in the world where there are fossils that show changes from the earliest
Therapsid, mammal-like reptiles, from the Karoo rocks of the Permian period to the first true
mammals such as the Megazostrodon, found in the Eastern Cape Drakensberg and Lesotho.
Fig 8. After the Cretaceous mass extinction 65 mya, which was thought to be caused by a metorite, 75% of
all species on Earth were destroyed including the dinosaurs. It was small mammals like the Megazostrodon
that survived and evolved into the multitude of mammals that are alive today.
9 – PREHUMANS AUSTRALOPITHECUS IN THE CRADLE OF HUMANKIND
The Homonids are the “human-like” anthropoids that diversified from the apes between 810 mya. The apes lived in tropical forests, while the homonids lived in woodlands and
savannah. About 4mya, several different species of Homonids with large brains appeared in
Africa and then more than 2mya some Homonids with very large brains and the ability to use
tools evolved in the south. These homonids were not humans, but are sometimes called
prehumans. These prehumans are in the genus Australopithecus.
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Some of the earliest fossils of these australopithecines have been found in South Africa. In
1924 Raymond Dart discovered an Australopithecus africanus skull of a young child in the
lime mines of Taung near Kimberley, interestingly there was a hole in the cranium and marks
in the eye sockets of this fossill and it was Prof. Lee Berger who hypothesized in a paper
published in 2006 that ‘Taung Child’ was very likely killed or eaten afterwards by a large
eagle. In 1947 Robert Bloom discovered ‘Mrs Ples’, another Australopithecus africanus fossil
in the Sterkfontein caves which is now called the Cradle of Humankind and has been
designated a World Heritage Site. Also discovered in this area by Dr. Ron Clark in 1994 was
‘Little Foot’, which is believed to be another australopithecine fossil.
a)
b)
c)
Fig 9. a) Taung Child discovered near Kimberley, b) Mrs Ples and c) Dr. Ron Clark with Little foot both found
in the Sterkfontein Caves in the Cradle of Humankind. All of these early homonids are australopithecines.
10 – DISCOVERY OF KARABO AUSTRALOPITHECUS SEDIBA IN MALAPA
In 2008 a partial skeleton was found at Malapa near Sterkfontein in the Cradle of Humankind
by 9 year old Matthew Berger who is the son of Prof. Lee Berger. Since then, two of the
most complete early homonid skeletons have been discovered at Malapa. These fossils
show a more advanced species than Australopithecus africanus and so have be renamed
Australopithecus sediba and nicknamed ‘Karabo’ which means ‘the answer’ in Tswana.
b)
a)
Fig 10. The two skeletons of a) Australopithecus sediba found in Malapa. b) Prof. Lee Berger with the skull
of ‘Karabo’.
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11 – FLORISBAD SKULL ARCHAIC HOMO SAPIEN
A hominid skull was discovered in a lithium spring in Florisbad just north of Bloemfontein.
There is a little confusion on this discovery as it seems to be a species in between the
modern human Homo sapien and a more earlier species Homo heidelbergensis that lived 260
000 years ago.
b)
Fig 11. The Florisbad skull in the National Museum in Bloemfontein. An archaic Homo sapien that is 260 000
years old.
12 – EARLY MODERN HUMAN HOMO SAPIENS
The modern human Homo sapiens appeared in Africa about 200 000 years ago. Many
people believe that the eastern side of Africa and South Africa are the original home of
humans. The remains of people that are almost the same as modern humans, but 200 000
years old, have been found at Elandsfontein and Klasies River Mouth in the Cape. Fossils of
early Homo sapiens 100 000 years old have been also found at Border Cave in KwaZulu-Natal
and at Die Kelders in the Western Cape.
Fig 12. Early modern human fossils found in Elandsfontein, Klasies River Mouth, Die Kelders all in the Cape
and Borders Cave in KwaZulu-Natal/Swaziland.
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Activity: Mapping key events in Life’s History for which there is evidence from Southern
Africa
Strand 4: SA1.2, SA1.4, and SA3
Date:
Name:
Mark scheme:
4 = excellent work, no mistakes made
3 = very good work, 1 – 2 mistakes made
2 = tried very hard, 3 – 4 mistakes made
1 = more than 4 mistakes made
0 = this aspect not done
Item being assessed
All 12 locations are accurately identified and numbers shown on map.
Accurate key is included with a brief description of event.
Pictures/drawing are included, making map look good and easy to use.
TOTAL
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Mark
/12
/4
/4
/20
20 MARKS
Mapping Key Events in Life’s History in Southern Africa
Appendix A
BOTSWANA
NAMIBIA
POLOKWANE
GABARONE
NELSPRIUT
Cradle of
Humankind
MAFIKENG
PRETORIA
Johannesburg
MAPUTO
Baberton
MBABANE
SWAZILAND
The Borders
Taung
Sodwana Bay
Florisbad
KIMBERLEY
BLOEMFONTEIN
LESOTHO
MASERU
Eskort
Mooi River
PIETERMARITZBURG
Lady Grey
ATLANTIC
OCEAN
Beaufort West
BISHO
Elandsfontein
CAPE TOWN
Die Kelders
Grahamstown
Klasies River Mouth
East London
INDIAN
OCEAN