Homo Habilis (“Handy” Man)

Discovered: 1960, officially named in 1964.

When and where did it live? Evolved in Africa sometime before 2 million years ago, went extinct in Africa by about 1.5 million years ago.

Significance: By the middle of the 20th century, researchers were beginning to accept that humans evolved in Africa from an ancient group of “ape people” called the australopiths. In 1960, a research team at Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania found fossil remains of a species that seemed to fall in the gap between the australopiths and humans. They named it Homo habilis — identifying it as the first true human species to evolve.

From the fragmentary fossils found, H. habilis seemed to have had a brain substantially larger than an australopith and more like that of later human species. What’s more, according to its discoverers, H. habilis behaved in a human-like way too.

They suggested it produced stone tools, while the australopiths apparently did not. This feature was so important it even explains the name they chose for the species — H. habilis translates roughly as “handy man”.