- physiological and behavioral/cultural characteristics appear with Homo erectus
- A variety of different physiological and behavioral/cultural characteristics appear with Homo erectus around or shortly after 2 million years ago. These have been discussed in several different lectures (especially Units 8 and 9.1). What are these traits and what sort of picture do they paint of Homo erectus’adaptations and how they differ from previous hominins?
Homo erectus is considered the largest species in the Homo family. Homo erectus is also believed to have a close resemblance to modern human beings in terms of its physical characteristics and body size. They have certain features which are termed as classical physiology as highlighted below:
-on average Homo erectus has a cranial capacity of 900cx (600-1200cc). This cranial capacity is almost similar to those human beings and much larger than Homo habilis even though they are their direct predecessor. Furthermore, the cranial bone was highly developed and much thicker to protect the larger brain size.
-comparing Homo erectus to Australopithecus, they seem to be much bigger, although their torso and arms were almost the same to Homo sapiens.
-they also had a similar arm to body ration, leg to body ratio, and arm to leg ratio as those of Homo sapiens.
-in terms of height Homo erectus was 5’6’’ and 5’0’’ for male and female respectively which almost the same as Homo sapiens 5’8’’ and 5’22’’ for male and female respectively.
-the cortical bones of Homo erectus were much thicker and stronger.
-in comparison to Australopithecus, Homo erectus had highly reduced canines and jaws.
-Homo erectus had a sufficient form of temperature regulation and was covered with less hair while the whole was able to sweat.
Homo erectus also had the following visible behavioral characteristics;
-Homo erectus is believed to be the first hominins to adapt to an open grassland environment even though there were no many forests at the time.
-Homo erectus is perceived to have lived in some sort of social system where they protected themselves within groups.
-they are believed to possess the ability and knowledge to produces tools
-they also used fire
Therefore, as a result of these characteristics we can say that;
–the brain size of Homo erectus was much larger in relation to the size of the body
-they had reduced teeth suggesting that they eat different diets
-they could travel over long distances
-they could survive and adapt in different environments
-they had better hunting methods