Question

1. If you found an almost complete fossilized skeleton – cranial and postcranial – and it is from a site in East Africa dated to around 4 to 5 MYA, how would you determine if this paleospecies was bipedal? And, if a biped, did they retain arboreal capabilities?

2. Why does context matter when we find a fossil or material cultural items? Why do we “care” about provenience? Also, in paleoanthropology, in fact, in all disciplines of anthropology, how do we “know what we know”? What is the approach used to develop models of past primates ecology, locomotion, social organization, activity, etc. How is it done?

Answer 1

Answer:

Q-1):

• We can identify bipedality by looking at the post cranial skeleton.
• If the foramen magnum is anteriorly placed and illiac blades are laterally flaring along with a lumbar curve, we can say that the found fossil was having bipedality.
• If tgey retained arboreal features then they would be having rotating shoulder joints and big separate toes for grasping.
• The said fossil could be of "LUCY". Australopithecus afarensis.

Q-2):

• Context matter in the following ways-

1. Context helps archeologists to understand cultures of the past.

2. Context provides important information about biological remains.

• Proveniance is three-dimensional context of an archaeological find, giving information about its function and date.
• The three dimensions are- north/south coordinates, east/west coordinates and depth of the object in soil.
• Thus, it gives the exact location where the artifact was found by the excavators.
• So proveniance is taken ' care ' of. From the provenianc map, activities at the site could be determined.

• To know “How do we know what we know?” archaeologists and paleoanthropologists establish
  dates for artifacts, fossils, and sites.
• Dating techniques are divided into two broad categories: relative dating methods and chronometric (or absolute) dating methods.

$\rightarrow$ Approach to develop models of past primates:-

• 1. Model building is key to scientific progress, and important for understanding primate evolution.
• 2.The models of primate origins are developed to date focus on anatomical features related to locomotion and feeding.
• 3. The broad outline of primate evolutionary relationships are agreed, than the recognition of particular genera or species, or relationships between species.
• 4.The models should consider both two major approaches to explaining patterns of primate socioecology have focused on identifying environmental and/or physiological factors.
• 5. Models of primate brain evolution have to complex feeding behaviour or social relationships.
• 6.Models for human origins and evolution are controversial. Models of primate evolution are continuously subject to reevaluation as new data from living and fossil species are found.
• 7. Models of primate evolution should consider their subjects in a holistic sense, instead of focusing on a small subset of anatomical and/or behavioural characters.

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