Reiner Whitney B, Masao Fidelis, Sholts Sabrina B, Songita Agustino Venance, Stanistreet Ian, Stollhofen Harald, Taylor R E, Hlusko Leslea J
Department of Integrative Biology, University of California Berkeley, MC 3140, Berkeley, California, 94720.
University of Dar es Salaam, Dar es Salaam, TZ, 35091.
Am J Phys Anthropol. 2017 Nov;164(3):533-545. doi: 10.1002/ajpa.23292. Epub 2017 Aug 8.
Herein we introduce a newly recovered partial calvaria, OH 83, from the upper Ndutu Beds of Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania. We present the geological context of its discovery and a comparative analysis of its morphology, placing OH 83 within the context of our current understanding of the origins and evolution of Homo sapiens.
We comparatively assessed the morphology of OH 83 using quantitative and qualitative data from penecontemporaneous fossils and the W.W. Howells modern human craniometric dataset.
OH 83 is geologically dated to ca. 60-32 ka. Its morphology is indicative of an early modern human, falling at the low end of the range of variation for post-orbital cranial breadth, the high end of the range for bifrontal breadth, and near average in frontal length.
There have been numerous attempts to use cranial anatomy to define the species Homo sapiens and identify it in the fossil record. These efforts have not met wide agreement by the scientific community due, in part, to the mosaic patterns of cranial variation represented by the fossils. The variable, mosaic pattern of trait expression in the crania of Middle and Late Pleistocene fossils implies that morphological modernity did not occur at once. However, OH 83 demonstrates that by ca. 60-32 ka modern humans in Africa included individuals that are at the fairly small and gracile range of modern human cranial variation.
在此，我们介绍一块新发现的部分颅骨化石OH 83，它来自坦桑尼亚奥杜威峡谷恩杜图上层地层。我们展示了其发现的地质背景，并对其形态进行了比较分析，将OH 83置于我们目前对智人起源和演化的理解背景中。
我们使用来自同期化石的定量和定性数据以及W.W.豪厄尔斯现代人类颅骨测量数据集，对OH 83的形态进行了比较评估。
OH 83的地质年代约为60 - 32 ka。其形态表明是早期现代人，眶后颅骨宽度处于变异范围的低端，双额宽度处于变异范围的高端，额长接近平均值。
已有众多尝试利用颅骨解剖结构来定义智人种并在化石记录中识别它。这些努力尚未得到科学界的广泛认可，部分原因是化石所呈现的颅骨变异镶嵌模式。中更新世和晚更新世化石颅骨特征表达的可变镶嵌模式意味着形态上的现代性并非一蹴而就。然而，OH 83表明，到约60 - 32 ka时，非洲的现代人包括了处于现代人类颅骨变异相当小且纤细范围内的个体。
