With their two feet on the ground
The oldest evidence of bipedalism dates back to 7 million years ago BP. Today, among the 500 species in the order Primates—which appeared 60 million years ago—Homo sapiens is the only one to be entirely bipedal.
But what is bipedalism? It is the ability to walk and stand upright on two legs. And why is it so important? Because it has provided key advantages in human survival and evolution. When we walk on two legs (rather than four):
→ Your hands are free to do other things (like carrying objects)
→ We have better vision (and we can, for example, see predators better).
Bipedalism appeared with the first members of the human lineage 7 million years ago in Africa with Sahelanthropus tchadensis (nicknamed Toumaï). His skull was discovered in Chad in 2001. The second known bipedal hominid is Orrorin tugenensis, found in Kenya in 2000. Nicknamed the millennium ancestor, he lived 6 million years ago, meaning that we still don't know what happened over the next million years. These early bipedal hominids would have stood 1 m to 1 m 20 and weighed between 30 and 50 kg.
The long march of bipedal hominids:
We are the walking product of a crossbreed between the African Homo sapiens, the European Neanderthals, and the Asian Denisovans. What a beautiful mix!
Informations complémentaires
Did you know?
The study of the origins of life and its evolution developed in the 19th century, a time when this process was seen as a linear path leading to its supposed apex: the white man. This hierarchical, racist, and misogynistic approach has since been challenged and replaced by a more refined and complex vision. The tree of life is now represented as a teeming bush made up of multiple branches, where humans are one species among many.