Hominids Essay

Time of Existence

Homo erectus is an extinct species of hominin that lived throughout most of the Pleistocene, with the earliest first fossil evidence dating to around 1.8 million years ago and the most recent to around 143,000 years ago.

Remains of Homo erectus are found throughout Africa and in western and eastern Asia (as far east as the island of Java in Indonesia). Other fossils, assigned by some scholars to this species, have been found in Europe, as far north as England. Homo erectus had a long tenure; the earliest Homo erectus fossils are dated to roughly 1.8 million years ago, while the earliest fossils assigned to this species date to roughly 300 thousand years ago (ka). Homo erectus is important to the study of human evolution because it is the first species to be found outside of Africa and displayed many anatomical features (especially brain size and aspects of the postcranial skeleton—i.e., the parts of the skeleton below the head) that reflect evolution toward the pattern seen in Homo sapiens.

Homo erectus were very successful in creating cultural technologies that allowed them to adapt to new environmental opportunities. They were true pioneers in developing human culture and in expanding their geographic range beyond Africa to populate tropical and subtropical zones elsewhere in the Old World. This territorial expansion most likely began around 1.8-1.7 million years ago, coinciding with progressively cooler global temperatures. Surprisingly, however, Homo erectus remained little changed anatomically until about 800,000 years ago. After that time, there apparently were evolutionary developments in features of the head that would become characteristic of modern humans. By half a million years ago, some Homo erectus were able to move into the seasonally cold temperate zones of Asia and Europe. This migration was made possible by greater intelligence and new cultural technologies, probably including better hunting skills and the ability to...