By DEBORAH SMITH
27 February 2009
The Age
[http://www.theage.com.au]
WHAT may be the oldest human footprints in the world have been discovered in Africa.
The 1.5-million-year-old prints reveal that our ancient ancestors walked like us and had modern-looking feet.
One set of seven footprints shows an individual about 175centimetres tall standing with legs astride, before moving slowly across what would have been a muddy, slippery surface.
The rare find was made near Ileret in northern Kenya by an international team co-led by John Harris of Rutgers University in New Jersey.
Professor Harris said the size of the fossil footprints indicated they were made by extinct humans, early Homo erectus, who inhabited the region then.
"Homo erectus was the precursor of our own species, Homo sapiens. That's the exciting part," he said.
The prints show that, like us, they had arched feet and big toes pointing forward in line with the rest, and they transferred their weight from heel to ball to big toe as they walked.
Four sets of well-preserved adult footprints, and a small, single impression probably made by a child, were found alongside those of other creatures, including antelopes.
"This trail of footprints provides us with a unique snapshot in time of the animals that were living on this landscape 1.5million years ago," said Professor Harris, whose study has been published in the journal Science.
The only older known footprints were discovered 30 years ago by Mary Leakey at Laetoli in Tanzania. But these 3.7-million-year-old impressions were made by a less advanced hominid, Australopithecus afarensis. Although it walked upright, it had a more ape-like big toe thatstuck out at an angle, andashallower arch, Professor Harris said.
British researchers Robin Crompton and Todd Pataky, of the University of Liverpool, said the human foot was one of our most distinctive adaptations.
The Kenyan footprints were an important find because they were the "oldest attributable to our own genus, Homo", they wrote in the journal.
"The finding heralds an exciting time for studies of the evolution of human gait."
http://www.theage.com.au
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