The Laetoli Footprints Quiz

Laetoli is a pre-historic site in Tanzania famous for its Hominina footprints preserved in volcanic ash, discovered by Mary Leakey and her team in 1976, which provided convincing evidence for the theory of bipedalism in Pliocene Hominina. The site is a registered National Historic Sites of Tanzania. The footprints are the oldest known evidence of hominin bipedalism at that time, dated to 3.7 million years ago. The identity of the Hominina who made the trace is difficult to construe precisely; Australopithecus afarensis is the species most commonly proposed. The footprints indicate the characteristics of obligate bipedalism. The location and tracks were discovered by archaeologist Mary Leakey and her team in 1976, and were excavated by 1978. Other prints show the presence of twenty different animal species besides the hominin A. afarensis. Before the discovery of the Laetoli footprints, there was much debate as to which developed first in the human evolutionary time line: a larger brain or bipedalism. The discovery of these footprints settled the issue, proving that the Laetoli hominins were fully bipedal long before the evolution of the modern human brain, and were bipedal close to a million years before the earliest known stone tools were made. The footprints were classified as possibly belonging to Australopithecus afarensis. The findings also provide insight into the climate at the time of the making of the footprints. In 1979, after the Laetoli footprints were recorded, they were re-buried as a then-novel way of preservation. In 1993, measures were taken to prevent erosion. The original trackway was remolded and new casts were made.