Human ancestors knew how to walk with their feet even while living on trees

After analyzing the most complete skeletal remains of a StW573, called Little Foot, identified 3.67 million years old, scientists confirmed our earliest ancestors walked straight. on the feet even while still living on trees.

According to Nature Science, a study of the most complete skeleton of the earliest human ancestor was carried out with the participation of scientists at the University of Liverpool (UK), providing evidence. convinced that our ancestors knew to walk straight on their feet even when they were still living on trees.

This is the most perfectly preserved skeleton of humanity's oldest ancestor - (Photo: Naked science).

The first bones of the skeleton a StW573 individual, called Little Foot , was identified as 3.67 million years old, including 12 foot bones and leg bone fragments, described in the 1990s. The back of the skeleton was discovered in two decades of excavation, cleaning, restoration and analysis. Those are the bones found in a very deep cave.

Professor Robin Crompton, expert in musculoskeletal biology at the University of Liverpool and colleagues analyzed how Little Foot can walk. More than 90% of this skeleton belongs to a representative of Australopithecus . The skeleton of Little Foot - one of the first bones found, has perfectly preserved limbs.

This study confirms the assumptions of Professor Ronald Clark of the University of Witwatersrand (South Africa), who discovered the skeleton. The professor believes that two species of Australopithecus live in South Africa at the same time - Australopithecus africanus, a smaller species that lives on trees, and Australopithecus Prometheus, with the same height as modern humans.

Professor Robin Crompton said that this was the first hominid discovered, with the lower limbs longer than the upper limbs, just like in us humans. This is an important finding, because hominid families before Australopithecus have arms longer than their legs, like large apes, such as Gorilla monkeys. This means they move a lot on two limbs. Moreover, Little Foot has hip joints, like us, that can move action from body to foot and vice versa. Although the foot of Little Foot has grown longer than the arm, but the legs have not yet reached the same length as in humans. Although Little Foot cannot carry such clever things as us, climbing trees is much easier than modern humans.