SOUTH AFRICA

Around the World July 1, 2011

Last year witnessed the announcement of a new member of the human family, Australopithecus sediba, who lived in South Africa nearly two million years ago.
SHARE:

SOUTH AFRICA: Last year witnessed the announcement of a new member of the human family, Australopithecus sediba, who lived in South Africa nearly two million years ago. Paleoanthropologists have now found two more A. sediba individuals—an adult and infant—who fell in a cave "death trap." Combined with the older female and youth found previously, scientists are now able to study the development of these early hominins, who show a combination of primitive and modern skeletal traits, from cradle to grave.

  • Features July/August 2025

    Setting Sail for Valhalla

    Vikings staged elaborate spectacles to usher their rulers into the afterlife

    Read Article
    Museum of the Viking Age, University of Oslo
  • Features May/June 2025

    Lost City of the Samurai

    Archaeologists rediscover Ichijodani, a formidable stronghold that flourished amid medieval Japan’s brutal power struggles

    Read Article
    Tohan Aerial Photographic Service/AFLO
  • Features May/June 2025

    A Passion for Fruit

    Exploring the surprisingly rich archaeological record of berries, melons…and more

    Read Article
    © BnF, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY
  • Features March/April 2025

    An Egyptian Temple Reborn

    By removing centuries of soot, researchers have uncovered the stunning decoration of a sanctuary dedicated to the heavens

    Read Article
    Painted lotus-leaf capitals after cleaning in the entrance hall of the temple of Khnum, Esna, Egypt
    Ahmed Emam/© Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities