Announcing a new shocking discovery about human origins

Researchers have long believed that humans evolved from apes that lived about 5 million years ago in Africa. However, a recent study of fossils found in Greece and Bulgaria has provided a new hypothesis.

Fossilized teeth of an ape-like creature known as Graecopithecus freybergi. (Source: DPA)

Researchers from France, Germany, Bulgaria, Greece, Canada and Australia analyzed tooth roots from two fossil specimens of an ape-like creature, known as Graecopithecus freybergi, that lived 7.2 million years ago.

Accordingly, using a CT scan of the lower jaw of a specimen excavated in Greece in 1944 and the upper molar of a specimen found in Bulgaria in 2009, scientists believe that this could be the oldest member of the human lineage - starting after an evolutionary split from the species that later evolved into chimpanzees - our closest relatives.

To date, the oldest known hominin species is Sahelanthropus, which lived 6-7 million years ago in the African Republic of Chad.

Speaking to the press, the authors of the study said this was a surprising discovery, because for a long time, the origin of humans was often known to come from apes in Africa.

Based on the age of the Graecopithecus fossils, they hypothesized that the evolutionary split from apes to the ancestors of humans and chimpanzees occurred in the Mediterranean region. Accordingly, environmental changes may have helped promote the evolutionary process from apes to the ancestors of humans.

Graecopithecus remains a mystery to this day, with fossils found scattered across the landscape. It was about the size of a female chimpanzee and lived in relatively dry grasslands and forests, similar to the savannas of modern-day Africa, alongside antelopes, giraffes, rhinoceroses, elephants, hyenas, and warthogs.

According to Vietnamplus