Leakey

American  

[lee-kee] / ˈli ki /

noun

1. Louis Seymour Bazett 1903–72, British archaeologist and anthropologist.

2. Mary (Douglas), 1913–96, British archaeologist (wife of Louis Leakey).

3. Richard (Erskine Frere) 1944–2022, Kenyan paleontologist and animal-rights activist (son of Louis and Mary Leakey).

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Leakey British  

/ ˈliːkɪ /

noun

1. Louis Seymour Bazett (ˈbæzɪt). 1903–72, British anthropologist and archaeologist, settled in Kenya. He discovered fossil remains of manlike apes in E Africa

2. his son Richard . born 1944, Kenyan anthropologist, who discovered the remains of primitive man over 2 million years old in E Africa

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Leakey Scientific  

/ lē′kē /

1. Family of British scientists. Louis S(eymour) B(azett) (1903–1972) is known for fossil discoveries made in close collaboration with his wife Mary (1913–1996) of early humans. In 1959, while working in Tanzania, Africa, Mary Leakey uncovered skull and teeth fragments of a species the Leakeys named Zinjanthropus, since renamed Australopithecus boisei. The next year the Leakeys discovered remains of a larger-brained species, Homo habilis. Their discoveries provided powerful evidence that human ancestors were of greater age than was previously thought, and that they had evolved in Africa rather than in Asia. Their son Richard (born 1944) and his wife Meave (born 1942) have continued the family's research and discoveries. In 2001 Meave Leakey discovered a skull belonging to an entirely new genus, called Kenyanthropus platyops and believed to be 3.5 million years old.

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Leakey Cultural  

1. A family of anthropologists whose work at Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania and elsewhere revealed that humans probably first evolved in Africa. Louis Leakey and his wife, Mary, discovered fossils of human ancestors dating back over 3.75 million years. Their son, Richard Leakey, continued to make discoveries in Kenya and Tanzania.

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Example Sentences

Leakey at the Department of Plant Biology and the Institute for Genomic Biology at the University of Illinois.

From Science Daily • Jan. 7, 2026

Although she had no qualifications, Mr Leakey saw her potential and helped arrange her first research trip to the jungles of Tanzania in 1960.

From BBC • Oct. 1, 2025

As Leakey memorably put it, “Now we must redefine ‘tool,’ redefine ‘man’ or accept chimpanzees as humans.”

From Salon • Oct. 1, 2025

Leakey, Goodall made history in 1960 when she discovered that chimpanzees, humankind’s closest living ancestors, made and used tools, characteristics that scientists had long thought were exclusive to humans.

From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 1, 2025

Leakey was an anthropologist and paleontologist who was interested in animals and Early Man.

From "My Life with the Chimpanzees" by Jane Goodall