Australopithecus sediba

[aw-strey-loh-pith-i-kuhs suh-dee-buh, -puh-thee-kuhs, aw-struh-loh-]

noun

1. an extinct species of early hominin whose fossil remains were discovered in South Africa in 2008, dated at about 1.98 million years of age: remarkably complete skeletons reveal evidence suggesting a possible close ancestral link to the genus Homo .

2. a fossil belonging to this species.

Word History and Origins

Origin of Australopithecus sediba¹

Australopithecus ( def. ) + Sotho sediba “natural well, spring”; coined by American-born South African paleoanthropologist Lee Berger (born 1965)

Example Sentences

Recent decades have seen the discovery of several new hominin species, from Australopithecus sediba to Homo floresiensis.

Read more on Science Daily

They belong to Australopithecus sediba, which lived around 2 million years ago, and the roughly 250,000-year-old Homo naledi.

Read more on Scientific American

Take, for instance, Australopithecus sediba.

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Four decades later in South Africa, the researcher Lee Berger’s 9-year-old son literally stumbled across the weird flat-footed Australopithecus sediba while following his dog.

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“This suggests that one of these other human species, Australopithecus sediba, may not have been the direct ancestor of Homo erectus, or us, as previously hypothesised.”

Read more on The Guardian