Research Highlight - Ancient Fossils in Morocco Reveal Deep African Roots of Our Species

A groundbreaking study published in Nature reports the discovery of approximately 773,000-year-old hominin fossils from the Thomas Quarry I site in Casablanca, Morocco. Designated ThI-GH, these remains—including jawbones, teeth, and vertebrae—are proposed to represent an early African population close to the lineage that eventually gave rise to Homo sapiens.

The significance of this finding lies in its challenge to longstanding models of human evolution. For decades, the last common ancestor (LCA) of modern humans, Neanderthals, and Denisovans was often sought among European fossils like Homo antecessor or the widespread Homo heidelbergensis. The new Moroccan fossils, however, are contemporaneous with H. antecessor (~770,000 years ago) yet display a distinct mosaic of primitive traits and derived features reminiscent of later H. sapiens and Eurasian archaic hominins. This suggests that a distinct lineage leading toward modern humans may have already been established in Africa around 773,000 years ago, much earlier than previously thought.

The research provides robust support for the African origin of H. sapiens. It deepens the timeline of our species' lineage within the continent and implies that the divergence between African and Eurasian hominin branches may have begun close to one million years ago. Interestingly, some ThI-GH features resemble Neanderthals, prompting new questions about potential early gene flow across the Mediterranean or parallel evolution.

By securely placing key fossils in a well-dated stratigraphic context, this study fills a crucial gap in the African Early-Middle Pleistocene record. It repositions North Africa as a pivotal region for understanding the emergence of our species and underscores that the roots of the H. sapiens lineage run deep within the African continent. Future discoveries will continue to test this emerging narrative of our deep African ancestry.

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Reference：

Hublin, JJ., Lefèvre, D., Perini, S. et al. Early hominins from Morocco basal to the Homo sapiens lineage. Nature (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-09914-y