Scientists Unearth Oldest Homo sapiens in Jebel Irhoud in Morocco

Paris – An international research team led by Pr. Jean-Jacques Hublin from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (Leipzig, Germany) and Pr. Abdelouahed Ben-Ncer from the Rabat National Institute for Archaeology and Heritage discovered fossils of the oldest Homo sapiens ever in Jebel Irhoud, Morocco.

The finds date back to about 300 thousand years ago and represent the oldest securely dated fossil evidence of our own species.

This date is 100 thousand years earlier than the previous oldest Homo sapiens fossils and reveals a complex evolutionary history of mankind that likely involved the entire African continent.

Up to now, the earliest fossils of humankind were from Ethiopia (Omo Kibish site) in eastern Africa and were dated to be approximately 195,000 years old.