Did the human lineage begin in the Mediterranean rather than in Africa?

Nature · Published 3 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: A controversial study of 7.2-million-year-old fossils from Greece and Bulgaria suggests our ancestors split from apes in Southern Europe. By analyzing fused dental roots, researchers propose a North Side Story, challenging the long-held belief that the cradle of humanity was exclusively in sub-Saharan Africa during the late Miocene.

For decades, palaeoanthropologists have operated under the assumption that the human lineage diverged from chimpanzees five to seven million years ago in Africa. This East Side Story, popularized by Yves Coppens in 1994, posits that climate-driven environmental changes in East Africa spurred this evolutionary split. However, a 2017 study led by Madelaine Böhme of the University of Tübingen challenges this narrative by re-examining Graecopithecus freybergi, a species known from a jawbone found in Greece in 1944 and a premolar discovered in Bulgaria in 2012.

Using computer tomography, the team visualized the internal structures of these specimens, noting that the premolar roots are partially fused. This feature is characteristic of pre-humans, including Australopithecus and Ardipithecus, rather than great apes, which typically possess diverging roots. Dated to 7.24 and 7.175 million years ago, these fossils are older than Sahelanthropus, previously considered the oldest potential pre-human. The researchers argue that a spreading Sahara desert and the formation of a savannah biome in Europe created the environmental pressure necessary for the human-chimpanzee divergence to occur in the Mediterranean.

The findings have sparked intense debate. Critics, including Rick Potts of the Smithsonian’s Human Origins Program, argue that the evidence is too thin to support such sweeping claims. Some experts suggest that the fossils are more likely related to European apes like Ouranopithecus, noting that dental traits alone are insufficient to classify a specimen as a hominin. Others contend that the geographical location does not align with the known migration patterns of early hominins. While the North Side Story remains a provocative hypothesis, it highlights how scarce fossil evidence can lead to radically different interpretations of our origins.

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