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hominin

American  
[hom-uh-nin] / ˈhɒm ə nɪn /

noun

Anthropology, Zoology.
  1. any member of the group consisting of all modern and extinct humans and their immediate ancestors, specifically members of the tribe Hominini.


Etymology

Origin of hominin

First recorded in 1985–90; from New Latin Hominīnī, equivalent to Latin homin- (stem of homō ) “human being, man” + -īnī (plural of the adjective suffix -īnus indicating origin or affiliation); see origin at Homo ( def. ), -ine 1 ( def. ) )


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Example Sentences

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See Examples For:

The new discovery is part of a much larger collection of hominin footprints found in ancient lakeshore environments around Lake Turkana.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 30, 2026

"Here we have two hominin species that are together. And human evolution is not linear, it's a bushy tree, there are life forms that go extinct."

From Science Daily ● May 16, 2026

Instead of needing to assume major contributions from an unknown archaic hominin population in Africa, the model shows how patterns in modern DNA could have emerged from structure within ancestral human populations themselves.

From Science Daily ● Apr. 26, 2026

The Turkana Rift has produced more than 1,200 hominin fossils from the past 4 million years, accounting for about one third of all such finds in Africa.

From Science Daily ● Apr. 25, 2026

The hominin fossils were deposited during this narrow window, a conclusion further supported by animal remains found at the site.

From Science Daily ● Feb. 7, 2026

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