The origin of man has long occupied the best minds of anthropologists, but even now it has not been possible to come to a consensus, because each of the researchers defends exclusively his own point of view. The most plausible theory is that the very first man on Earth is the product of gradual development from an ape.
If you read the works of anthropologists, you can understand that, in their opinion, the very first people appeared on Earth about 1.5 million years ago, at least that is the age of the remains found. The finds were discovered in Africa, in the Kalahari Desert; judging by bone studies, they belonged to australopithecines - the direct ancestors of modern humans. However, in 1982, Russian archaeologists discovered even more ancient burials on the territory of modern Yakutia, whose age was determined to be 2.5 million years.
In the excavations they found primitive tools and bones of animals that were killed and served as food for a certain community of australopithecines. However, these findings do not serve as proof of the intelligence of ancient people; they only took the first steps towards developing the brain and subjugating nature. It is believed that only 500 thousand years ago people learned to communicate with each other through a conscious set of sounds - the beginnings of meaningful speech. The appearance of images of animals and the surrounding area on the walls of caves dates back to this period.
Having mastered rational speech, ancient man began to develop much faster than before, and tribes began to be created in which there was a division of labor. Scientists believe that from this period we can already talk about the development of Homo sapiens into Homo sapiens and its further improvement.
Theologians tell a completely different story about how the very first man appeared on Earth; they claim that God created the Universe, our planet, the animal and plant world. After that, he created a man and a woman, who became the ancestors of all modern humanity. At first, Adam and Eve, as the Creator called the first people, lived in the Garden of Eden, then, due to sins and quarrels with the Lord, they were expelled from it and began to live on the sinful Earth, to be fruitful and multiply.
Theologians who advocate this theory about the emergence of man say that our body, although somewhat similar to a monkey, is still much more complex, therefore, it could not appear on its own; God created it with his own hands. Another argument in favor of the divine origin of people is that animals, including anthropoid apes, do not have a mind and soul, which only the Creator could give to people. At the same time, the divine theory does not give any idea about the specific date of birth of Adam and Eve. Some researchers believe that they were created about 43 thousand years ago, others give completely different figures - approximately 6 thousand years.
Recently, a theory has emerged about the emergence of Homo sapiens from aliens who visited our planet several hundred thousand years ago. One version reports that creatures from another planet created people adapted to local conditions so that they would mine the gold necessary for the development of their world. Subsequently, these workers acquired intelligence, and when the aliens left for their homeland, people remained on Earth and continued their existence.
No less fantastic is the idea that certain celestial beings descended to the surface of the Earth and entered into relations with ancient women. From them came more intelligent and developed descendants who, over time, began to lead tribes and communities and teach more backward members of communities new methods of obtaining food and building homes. According to this theory, the children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the Gods became the first intelligent people on Earth and passed on their abilities to all humanity.
As is already known, there are several theories of the emergence of Homo sapiens, each of which is defended by certain groups of researchers. It is not known for certain when and how the first people appeared on Earth with sufficient intelligence to become the pinnacle of God’s (or nature’s) creation.
The event of greatest importance in the history of the Earth was appearance of the first people.
It is usually believed that this happened at the beginning of the Quaternary period, about 500 thousand years ago. To emphasize the importance of this event in the history of the Earth, many scientists, as mentioned above, call this period the Anthropocene period, that is, the period of the birth and appearance of man.
Man comes from the animal world. Its ancestors are great apes. However, man, unlike all other animals, learned in the process of collective labor not only to use the benefits of nature, but also to remake nature, to subjugate its forces. The remains of the oldest ape-men - Pithecanthropus - were found in the layers of the late Tertiary period, dating back more than a million years. The most ancient ape-people continued to live in the first millennia of the Quaternary period. Therefore, it would be more correct to consider the beginning of the Anthropocene period from the time of the appearance of human ancestors, that is, add to the Anthropocene period part of the Tertiary period - the so-called Pliocene era, which is about 5 million years old. The whole story fits into this period of time modern species animals, starting with their closest ancestors.
The remains of Quaternary ape-men, called Sinanthropus, which means “Chinese people,” were found by the Chinese scientist V. C. Pei in Northern China in caves near Beijing.
Along with the bones of Sinanthropus, thick layers of ash from fires, fragments of animal bones, and rough fragments of broken stones that served as knives and scrapers for Sinanthropus were found in these caves. Probably these ancient people They used wooden clubs for hunting, but the wood has not survived to this day.
Sinanthropus was significantly different from modern people, but they were still people. They already used fire, and this was the greatest conquest in the history of mankind.
The time of existence of ape-people ended approximately 500 thousand years ago and was replaced by the “Paleolithic”, or in Russian, the Old Stone era (or the Old Stone period). The Paleolithic, as this era (or this period) is sometimes called, in turn was replaced first by the Neolithic, or New Stone Age, and then by the Age of Metal.
The Old Stone Period, or Paleolithic, is divided into two unequal parts: the Lower and Middle Paleolithic, which lasted about 300 thousand years, and the Upper Paleolithic, which lasted no more than 100 thousand years. The duration of all other eras is no more than 12-15 thousand years.
During the Lower Paleolithic, the direct descendants of ape-men lived - primitive people, or, as they are usually called, Neanderthals.
They were still significantly different from modern people and retained some features of their ancestors. The remains of their camps, as we said above, were found in the lower layers of Crimean caves, in Central Asia and in many other places.
Neanderthals were short (155-156 centimeters), but they were distinguished by significant strength. A large, elongated head with a low forehead extending back and an overhanging eyebrow, under which small eyes were hidden, sat on a thick short neck, which on the back side seemed to form one whole, with a flat nape. A wide nose and a chin slanted back, like those of monkeys, and not a protruding chin like ours - this was the portrait of our ancestor.
The Neanderthal's gait was extremely awkward. A heavy short body sat on strong legs with short lower legs and wide massive feet. The powerful hands had wide hands with thick short fingers, which, however, could make rough stone wedges (axes) and scrapers. The club in the hands of this primitive strongman was a reliable weapon of defense, attack and hunting.
The favorite habitats of Neanderthals were river valleys and caves.
The enormous advantage of the Neanderthal, as well as his closest ancestors, over other animals was upright posture, as a result of which the hands were free to make various tools, and this primarily expanded the possibilities of hunting. Hunting at that time was, together with collecting fruits and edible plant roots, the main source of subsistence.
For about 300 thousand years, Neanderthals perfected their primitive art of stone processing. Gradually, as a result of labor, their appearance changed. They became more and more like modern people. By the time the Great Ice Age reached its peak largest sizes, man managed to adapt to new living conditions, and he himself has already become completely similar to modern man. At this time, a very important improvement was made in the manufacture of labor and hunting tools. Man learned to make tools not from a whole piece of stone, cutting them with rough chips, like a wooden wedge, but from specially chipped stone plates; at the same time, he learned to produce flint plates that were thin and long, like a knife blade. People began to widely use bone for all kinds of crafts. Dart tips, piercings, awls, carefully crafted scrapers, knives, chisels for carving bones, bone needles with eyes for sewing clothes, and the like appeared.
This stage of development of human society is called Upper Paleolithic.
At sites of that time, sometimes, in addition to various household items and hunting tools, female figurines carved from mammoth tusks or carved images of various animals used in magical (witchcraft) rituals are sometimes found.
Hard-to-reach caves sometimes served as sanctuaries for our ancestors, and various religious rituals were performed in them. On the walls of some caves, drawings made in red and black paint have survived to this day, depicting bison, mammoths, deer pierced by darts, drawings of hands with chopped off fingers, as well as witchcraft signs that are incomprehensible to us.
Upper Paleolithic people - “new people”, or, as they are usually called, “reasonable people”, were physically no longer significantly different from modern people.
Upper Paleolithic people did not know how to make pottery; they did not know bows and arrows and used darts. They did not have domestic animals and, of course, did not even know the rudiments of agriculture. Hunting was still the main means of subsistence, and in it they achieved significant success.
The “new people” were nomadic hunters. They already knew how to hunt such large animals as bison, rhinoceros and even mammoth, but they also willingly ate the corpses of these animals if they found them in perpetually frozen soil - on the site of a melting glacier. They exterminated smaller and more easily accessible animals, especially reindeer, and birds - ptarmigan, in huge quantities. We find many thousands of bones of various animals during excavations of their sites. But especially a lot of bones of mammoths and reindeer are sometimes found there, which is why Upper Paleolithic people are also called “mammoth and reindeer hunters.”
Many tens of thousands of years have passed, and now, on the verge of modernity, about 15 thousand years ago, humanity was enriched with a new wonderful invention: man invented the bow and arrows. This immediately expanded the possibilities of his hunting, which was still the main source of human existence. Rhinoceroses and mammoths have long been extinct. The huge ice sheet was melting quickly. Its southern border was already near present-day Leningrad. The climate was becoming warmer.
A new era was beginning in the history of mankind - the New Stone, or Neolithic.
The most important discoveries and inventions follow one after another. Man is increasingly seizing power over nature. Almost simultaneously with the invention of the bow, man tamed the wolf in some places and the jackal in others, and thus got the domestic dog. Then the remarkable property of clay was discovered: when fired, it produces a waterproof and sufficiently fire-resistant material. Vessels for cooking food began to be made from clay. People have also learned to process hard stones more skillfully - to drill and polish them. Wooden boats appeared, made from a whole tree trunk.
But hunting, as before, still remains the main source of human existence.
Along with hunting, fishing and hoe farming began to develop.
The Stone Age ended about 6-7 thousand years ago. People learned to mine metal and make hunting and household items from it.
The era of metal has arrived. Knives, spears and arrows were the first metal products. They were first made from pure copper, then from bronze (an alloy of copper and tin) and finally from iron.
In addition to hunting and fishing, cattle breeding and agriculture were added, the beginnings of which, apparently, arose at the end of the Neolithic. From the appropriation of finished products of nature, man moved to their conscious increase.
Our Soviet scientists P. P. Efimenko, S. N. Zamyatnin, M. V. Voevodsky, S. N. Bibikov, P. I. Boriskovsky, G. P. Sosnovsky, O. N. Bader, M. Z. Panichkina and many others have great merit in the discovery and study of the most ancient settlements of the Stone Age on the territory of the USSR.
M. M. Gerasimov managed to develop a restoration technique appearance people by their skulls, and we now have the opportunity to see portraits of our ancestors who lived tens of thousands of years ago. Foreign scientists worked unsuccessfully on solving this problem for many years and declared it unsolvable.
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This question has always worried both scientists and ordinary people. Many scientists still devote their entire lives to studying this question, without finding an exact answer. And although no one knows for sure yet, in the scientific world they accepted as a basis the theory of Darwin, who believed that man evolved from a monkey naturally. However, so far no one has found such evidence of the origin of man from animals that is completely irrefutable.
Darwin's theory
IN modern world Darwin's theory no longer has the same power as before, but it is still the basis for understanding where man came from.
The question of the origin of animal species is considered by such a science as biology. The origin of man is also a question of concern to this science.
British biologist and geologist Charles Darwin published his book on the Origin of Species in 1859, which is one of the most famous works in the history of the science of biology.
In his book, Darwin outlined a theory on the basis of which he made an assumption about the evolution of living beings. He believed that living beings had evolved over billions of years through natural selection, that is, the strongest survived and adapted to new conditions.
Then, in the book “The Origin of Man and Sexual Selection,” he tried to substantiate the theory of Georges-Louis de Buffon, who suggested that the first people on Earth appeared due to evolutionary processes. After Darwin published this work, it was recognized by everyone scientific world.
Darwin's descendants, followers of his school - Darwinists, then declared that man descended from the monkey. This opinion today is considered to be the only correct scientific explanation of what the origin of man was. There is still no scientific refutation of this theory.
Scientists believe that the first people on Earth appeared about 7 million years ago from ancient monkeys. Of course, there are also antagonists to this statement. The further evolution of man took place in a very complex way, leaving the right to life only to more advanced species.
Australopithecus
Australopithecus is considered the first link in the human evolutionary chain. In the Republic of Chad, remains of this species were found that are more than 6 million years old. The "youngest" Australopithecus was found in South Africa. No more than 900 thousand years have passed since his death. Of all the links found in human evolution, this species existed for the longest period of time.
Australopithecines have distinct features of both human and ape-like creatures. Their height was up to one and a half meters, and their weight ranged from 30 to 50 kg. The absence of large fangs suggests that they could not use them as weapons, therefore, they ate more plant foods than meat. They would not be able to kill large animals, so they hunted small animals or picked up already dead creatures.
These primates were able to use primitive tools that did not need to be made: stones, branches, etc. Based on this, Australopithecus is called “a skilled man.”
Pithecanthropus
The life of the first people on Earth was clearly not easy, given their poor adaptability to simply survival.
The first remains of this species of ape were found on the island of Java, which is located in South Asia. This species existed on planet Earth approximately 1 million years ago. During the same period, Australopithecines completely disappeared. About 400 thousand years ago, Pithecanthropus also became extinct.
Thanks to the found remains, from which it was possible to determine the structure of the skeleton, scientists suggest that this species almost always walked on two legs, for which it was nicknamed “Homo erectus.” This was found out due to the fact that the femur of such a primate is very similar to a human one.
Their tools were also found during excavations. They cannot be described as masters of this craft, but the Pithecanthropes already at that time understood that sharp sticks and stones were more suitable for hunting and cutting food than untreated wood and cobblestones.
In addition, scientists believe that they managed to learn to coexist peacefully with fire. That is, they were not as afraid of it as other animals, but they still did not know how to get it on their own.
Pithecanthropus did not yet know how to speak and communicated with similar primates at the level of ordinary ancient monkeys.
They are often associated with another branch of evolution - synanthropes, which existed at the same time. Scientists believe that they were similar to each other and led a similar lifestyle.
Neanderthal
Neanderthals existed in Europe and Western Asia for hundreds of thousands of years, isolated from other lineages of great apes.
For the most part, Neanderthals were carnivores and ate meat. To do this, they had huge jaws, which did not protrude forward, like those of more ancient primates. They even hunted very large animals: mammoths, ancient rhinoceroses, etc.
The brain volume was the same as that of modern humans, although scientists suggest that in some groups of individuals it was even larger.
Due to the fact that they lived during the Ice Age, these apes were well adapted to survive in a cold environment. In addition, they had very broad shoulders, pelvis, and well-developed muscles.
About 40 thousand years ago, Neanderthals as a species of apes began to sharply die out. And 28 thousand years ago there was not a single living representative of this species left. Their extinction is associated with another link in human evolution - the Cro-Magnons, who could hunt and kill them.
Cro-Magnon
Representatives of this species are called “modern man.” Modern man, especially representatives of the Caucasian races, is considered completely identical to the late Cro-Magnons.
The found remains of Cro-Magnons tell us that representatives of the early species were as tall as a tall modern man (about 187 centimeters) and had a large skull.
Cro-Magnons already knew how to express their thoughts with characteristic sounds, which is associated with the appearance of speech. They were all divided into hunters and gatherers, each using stone tools.
Later representatives of the Cro-Magnons already skillfully used fire and built primitive kilns in which pottery was fired. Scientists also suggest that they could use coal for these purposes.
They also progressed quite far in creating clothing that both protected them from the bites of wild animals and helped them keep warm in the cold seasons.
The feature that distinguishes this species among all early apes is the emergence of such a concept as art. The Cro-Magnons lived in caves and left in them various drawings of animals or some life events.
Due to the fact that the quantity various types activity began to grow rapidly, more and more differences appeared between the arms and legs. For example, the thumb on the hand developed more and more, with which Cro-Magnons were able to hold heavy tools as easily as small objects.
Homo sapiens
This species is the prototype of modern humans. It appeared about 28 thousand years ago, as evidenced by the finds of the most ancient people.
Even then, our ancestors learned to express their emotions in coherent speech and increasingly improved their social relationships with each other.
Different climates and weather conditions entailed the formation of different traits of a particular race that lived on different continents. It was about 20 thousand years ago that three different races began to appear: Caucasian, Negroid and Mongoloid.
Thus, in a very condensed form, one can express the Darwinian evolutionary chain, which can describe the origin of man.
Thanks to scientific research, human genes are 91% similar to chimpanzees.
Refutations of Darwin's theory and the teachings of his followers
Despite the fact that this theory is the foundation for all modern science about man, there are also findings from various researchers that refute the accepted understanding of the entire scientific world about where the first people on Earth came from.
The found footprints, which are more than 3.5 million years old, prove that anthropoid individuals began to move on straight legs much earlier than primitive labor appeared.
The evolution of man, associated with descent from apes, is unclear if we ask the question about human limbs. Why are people's arms much weaker than their legs, while the opposite is true for monkeys? What contributed to the weakening of the limbs, since strong hands are clearly more useful for hunting and other work, is not clear.
To date, all the links that could completely unite the ancient monkey with modern man have not been found.
In addition, there is a whole series of incomprehensible questions and facts that cannot be answered using the well-known scientific theory origin of man.
Religious theory of human origins
Every religion that has survived to this day says that man appeared thanks to a higher being. Proponents of this theory do not believe in all the evidence of the origin of man from animals that exists today. For example, Christians say that man descended from Adam and Eve, the first people whom God created. Everyone also knows the phrase: “God created man in his own image.”
Regardless of the type of religion, they all claim that man was not born naturally, but is a creation of the Almighty. No one has yet found evidence of the origin of man from the Creator.
Creationism
There is such a science as creationism. Scientists who study it are looking for evidence of theories about the origin of man from God and confirmation of information from religious books.
To do this, they use almost sound scientific calculations. For example, they calculated that the ark that Noah built could really accommodate all the animals (about 20 thousand different types), excluding waterfowl.
First man
Adam; Michelangelo
Religious ideas
According to the Book of Genesis: in Judaism, Christianity
According to the ideas of Kabbalah, the spiritual development of humanity began with Adam. For the first time in the history of mankind, he received a desire for knowledge spiritual world and comprehended the nature of both worlds - material and spiritual. Adam is credited with the authorship of the ancient Kabbalistic book “Sefer Raziel ha-malach” (Book of the angel Raziel).
Among the ancient Germans and Scandinavians
From sparks and melt water arose the giant Ymir and the cow Audumla, who fed him with her milk. From the sweat of Ymir a couple was born - a man and a woman, and one leg with the other conceived a son. These were the first frost giants. Ask and Embla are people whom the gods found on the seashore in the form of tree prototypes, lifeless and “devoid of fate”; having revived them, they gave them reason and speech. (See also Storms).
Based on the Sumerian epic Enuma Elish
Among the ancient Indians
Purusha - according to the mythology of Ancient India, a creature living in the human heart and at the same time inhabiting the Cosmos. Moreover, every human being carries within itself a particle of immortality. wtsvtsvtsv
Among the ancient Persians
In the culture of Ancient Persia, the first ancestor of people was Gayomart, who emitted light. After the death of Gayomart, all the metals “sprayed” from his body, the soul turned into gold, and from the seed the first married couple appeared in the form of a rhubarb bush: Mashya and Mashyana.
In Ancient Greece
Phoroneus is the ancestor and creator of humanity, the son of the river god Inach and the nymph Melia. The historian Akusilaus called him in the Genealogy the first "man and the first earthly king", king of the entire Peloponnese. Plato in the Timaeus and Clement of Alexandria in the Stromata also argued that Phoroneus was the first man or the “father of mortals.”
East Africa
One day, a toad crawled onto a deserted seashore - the first creature on the earth's surface. In those days there was nothing in the sky except the Moon. The Moon had an idea to create a man, and she told the Toad about it. But the toad outpaced the moon and, swelling beyond belief, gave birth to two twins - a man and a woman. These were the first people on earth.
The Moon was angry with the Toad and incinerated her. Taking into her care people - the children of Toad, she helped them bring their bodies to perfection, endowed them with intelligence and the gift of speech, giving them a resemblance to modern people. And the Moon named the man Bateta, and the woman Hannah.
Bateta and Hannah lived on earth several times longer than people live now, and when life became not a joy for them, the Moon, as promised, descended to earth and took them with it. Soon their firstborns died and were buried in the ground, and then death began to come for people more and more often.
West Africa
In heaven, Olorun, the Supreme Being, began to create the first people. Orisha Nla sculpted their forms from the earth, but only Olorun could breathe life into them. Orisha Nla hid in Olorun's workshop to spy on how this would happen. But Olorun found out about this and put Orisha Nla into a deep sleep; so that only Olorun knows the secret of reviving the body. To this day, Orisha Nla makes new human bodies through the father and mother of the unborn newborn, but it is Olorun who breathes life into them.
According to the Koran in Islam
Unlike the Bible, which gives a systematic account of Adam, the Qur'an mentions Adam in several separate suras (chapters). Individual verses (verses) mentioning his name are scattered throughout the Quran. In the thirty-second sura “Petition” it is said that Allah created Adam from clay:
“He is the One who knows the hidden and the manifest, the great, the merciful, who made beautiful all things that he created, and created man for the first time from clay” (32:6-7).
The second sura “Cow” most fully reveals the purpose of Adam:
And your Lord said to the angels: “I will appoint a governor on earth.” They asked: “Will You place on earth someone who will sin and shed blood, while we glorify You with praise and sanctify You?” Allah replied: “Verily, I know what you do not know” (verse 30). And Allah taught Adam all the names, then asked the angels about them and told them: “Explain to me [the essence] of these names, if you are sincere” (verse 31). The angels replied: “Praise be to you! We know only what You taught us. Verily, You are the omniscient, the wise” (verse 32). Allah said: “O Adam! Explain to them [the essence of] names.” When Adam explained to the angels the [essence of] names, Allah said: “Did I not tell you that I know the unseen of the heavens and the earth, I know what you do openly and what you conceal?” (verse 33). And then We commanded the angels: “Prostrate yourself before Adam.” Everyone fell on their faces except Iblis, [who] refused [to prostrate], became proud and became an unbeliever (verse 34). Then We said: “O Adam! Settle with your wife in the Garden of Eden, eat there to your heart’s content, whatever you want, but do not approach this tree, otherwise you will be among the wicked” (verse 35).
The seventh sura “Fences” tells about the reasons for Iblis’s discontent:
[Allah] asked: “What prevents you from bowing down, since I commanded you?” [Iblis] replied: “I am better than him: You created me from fire, and him from clay” (verse 12). Then Allah warned Adam: “And then We said: “O Adam! Truly, he is an enemy to you and your wife. May he not force you both to leave heaven - because [then] you will become unhappy” (twentieth sura “Ta Ha”, 117 verse). In paradise you will neither have to starve nor walk naked, there you will not suffer from thirst or heat.” But the shaitan began to whisper to him: “O Adam! Shall I show you a tree [with fruits that bestow] eternity and eternal power?” [Adam and his wife] ate [the fruit of that tree], and they saw their nakedness. They began to cover themselves with the leaves of the trees of paradise folded [together]. So Adam disobeyed his Lord and went astray from the right path. Then the Lord chose him [from among others], forgave him and directed him to the straight path. [Allah] said: “Descend from Paradise, both of you, and let some [of your descendants] be the enemies of others. If, by my will, you step on the straight path, then whoever follows it will not be in error or in disaster” (verses 118-123).
See also
Links
Literature
- Lafargue P., The Myth of Adam and Eve, [trans. with German], St. Petersburg. 1906;
- Trencheni-Valdapfel I., Social background for two myths about Adam, in the book: Origin of the Bible, M., 1964;
- Gunkel N., Die Urgeschichte und die Patriarchen, Gott., 1911;
- Hubner P., Vom ersten Menschen wird erzählt in Mythen, Wissenschaft und Kunst, Düsseldorf, ;
- Patai R., Adam we-Adamah, Jerusalem, 1942;
- Quispel G., Der gnostische Anthropos und die jüdische Tradition, “Eranos Jahrbuch”, 1953, Bd 22;
- Röhrich L., Adam und Eva, 1968;
- Schûöpfungsmythen, Darmstadt, 1977;
- Strothmann F., Die Anschauungen von der Weltschöpfung im alten Testament, Münster. 1933;
- Westermann C., Der Mensch im Urgeschehen, “Kerygma und Dogma”, 1967, Jg. 13, H. 4.
- Beck E., lblis und Mensch, Satan und Adam: der Werdegang einer koranischen Erzählung, “Le Museon”, 1976, v. 89, fasc. 1-2.
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First Man Le Premier homme Genre: Romance
The appearance of Homo sapiens was the result of a long evolutionary development that took tens of millions of years.
The first signs of life on Earth arose about 4 billion years ago, later plants and animals arose, and only about 90 million years ago the so-called hominids appeared on our planet, which were the earliest predecessors of Homo sapiens.
Who are hominids?
Hominids are a family of progressive primates that became the ancestors of modern humans. Appearing about 90 million years ago, they lived in Africa, Eurasia and.
About 30 million years ago, a global cooling began on Earth, during which hominids became extinct everywhere, with the exception of the African continent, southern Asia and America. During the Miocene era, primates experienced a long period of speciation, as a result of which the early ancestors of humans, the australopithecus, separated from them.
What are Australopithecines?
Australopithecine bones were first found in 1924 in Africa's Kalahari Desert. According to scientists, these creatures belonged to the genus of higher primates and lived from 4 to 1 million years ago. Australopithecines were omnivores and could walk on two legs. 
It is possible that by the end of their existence they learned to use stones for cracking nuts and other needs. About 2.6 million years ago, primates split into two branches. The first subspecies, as a result of evolution, was transformed into Homo habilis, and the second into Australopithecus africanus, which subsequently became extinct.
Who is a skilled person?
Homo habilis (Homo habilis) was the very first representative of the genus Homo and existed for 500 thousand years. Being a highly developed australopithecus, he had a fairly large brain (about 650 grams) and quite consciously made tools.
It is believed that it was a skilled person who took the first steps towards submission surrounding nature, thus crossing the boundary that separated primates from humans. Homo habilis lived in sites and used quartz, which they brought to their homes from distant places, to create tools.
A new round of evolution turned skilled man into working man (Homo ergaster), who appeared about 1.8 million years ago. The brain of this fossil species was much larger, thanks to which it could make more advanced tools and kindle fire. 
Later, the working man was replaced by Homo erectus, whom scientists consider as the direct ancestor of humans. Erectus could make tools from stone, wore skins and did not disdain to eat human flesh, and later learned to cook food over a fire. Subsequently, they spread from Africa throughout Eurasia, including China.
When did Homo sapiens appear?
To this day, scientists believe that Homo sapiens replaced Homo erectus and its Neanderthal subspecies about 400–250 thousand years ago. According to DNA studies of fossil humans, Homo Sapiens originated from Africa, where Mitochondrial Eve lived about 200 thousand years ago.
Paleontologists gave this name to the last common ancestor of modern humans on the maternal side, from which people inherited a common chromosome.
The ancestor in the male line was the so-called “Y-chromosomal Adam”, who existed somewhat later - about 138 thousand years ago. Mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosomal Adam should not be identified with biblical characters, since both of them are only scientific abstractions adopted for a more simplified study of the emergence of man. 
In general, in 2009, after analyzing the DNA of the inhabitants of African tribes, scientists came to the conclusion that the oldest human branch in Africa were the Bushmen, who probably became the common ancestors of all humanity.
