08 June 2017
Human bones discovered at Kibish in Ethiopia are the oldest known bones of a Homo Sapiens. The bones, which were first found in 1967, were initially believed to be 130,000 years old. But a re-analysis of the mineral deposits and volcanic debris surrounding the bones in 2005 by Frank Brown (of the University of Utah s College of Mines and Earth Sciences), Ian McDougall (of the Australian National University in Canberra) and John Fleagle (of New York state s Stony Brook University) pushed their age back to 195,000 years.
The previously identified oldest bones, discovered in Herto, Ethiopia, were dated to 160,000 years ago. The Kibish bones not only rob them of this record, but also effectively push back the emergence of anatomically modern man by some 35,000 years.