Humans May Have Lived in Tropical Rainforests Much Earlier Than Scientists Previously Thought, Study Finds
New research suggests that humans inhabited the rainforests of West Africa roughly 150,000 years ago, providing new insights into our ancestors’ ability to adapt to challenging environments
Sarah Kuta
Daily Correspondent
March 6, 2025 5:06 p.m.
Small stone tool held in a person's fingers
Stone tools suggest humans lived in a tropical rainforest in present-day Ivory Coast roughly 150,000 years ago. Jimbob Blinkhorn, MPG
Scientists have found that early humans lived in tropical rainforests much earlier than previously thought, a discovery that sheds new light on Homo sapiens’ ability to adapt to different environments.
The rainforests of West Africa were home to humans roughly 150,000 years ago, according to a recent study published in the journal Nature. These findings suggest that our ancestors may have evolved in several different regions on the continent and were able to survive in a wide variety of ecosystems.
Previously, the earliest known evidence of humans living in rainforests dated to roughly 70,000 years ago in southeast Asia. In Africa, the earliest evidence of human rainforest habitation dated to 18,000 years ago.
“Our results push back the earliest known presence of humans in tropical forests by more than twice the previously established estimate in another region of the world and also in Africa,” says co-author Eslem Ben Arous, an archaeologist at the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology in Germany, to Live Science’s Jess Thomson.
More:
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/humans-may-have-lived-in-tropical-rainforests-much-earlier-than-scientists-previously-thought-study-finds-180986164/