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Smallest human relative ever found may have been devoured by a leopard 2 million years agoThe left hip and leg bones from a young female Paranthropus robustus discovered in South Africa show she was extremely short — and ended up as a leopard's lunch.
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'Mystery population' of human ancestors gave us 20% of our genes and may have boosted our brain functionA novel genetic model suggests that the ancestors of modern humans came from two distinct populations that split and reconnected during our evolutionary history.
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'The most shameful form of execution': Han warriors found dismembered in 2,100-year-old mass grave in MongoliaGenetic analysis of skeletons in a mass grave in Mongolia has revealed they were soldiers in the Han-Xiongnu Wars more than two millennia ago.
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Human ancestors arrived in Western Europe much earlier than previously thought, fossil face fragments revealFragments of the left side of the skull of a human relative have been discovered in Spain, revealing the face of the oldest human ancestor ever discovered in Western Europe.
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28,000-year-old Neanderthal-and-human 'Lapedo child' lived tens of thousands of years after our closest relatives went extinctResearchers used a novel method of radiocarbon dating to figure out the age of the Lapedo child, who had both Neanderthal and human traits.
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1.5 million-year-old bone tools crafted by human ancestors in Tanzania are oldest of their kindThe discovery of 1.5 million-year-old bone tools upends what we know about tool manufacturing in East Africa.
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1,500-year-old skeleton found in chains in Jerusalem was a female 'extreme ascetic'Archaeologists were surprised that the skeleton of a person wrapped in heavy chains was female.
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Neanderthal 'population bottleneck' around 110,000 years ago may have contributed to their extinctionA study of the inner ear bones of Neanderthals shows a significant loss of diversity in their shape around 110,000 years ago, suggesting a genetic bottleneck that contributed to Neanderthals' decline.
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Our ancient primate ancestors mostly had twins — humans don't, for a good evolutionary reasonTwins are pretty rare, accounting for just 3% of births in the U.S. these days. But new research shows that for primates 60 million years ago, giving birth to twins was the norm.
