Hominin Stature, Body Mass, and Walking Speed Estimates Based on 1.5 Million-Year-Old Fossil Footprints at Ileret, Kenya
Journal of Human Evolution 64 (2013) 556e568 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Journal of Human Evolution journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jhevol Hominin stature, body mass, and walking speed estimates based on 1.5 million-year-old fossil footprints at Ileret, Kenya Heather L. Dingwall a,*,1, Kevin G. Hatala a,b, Roshna E. Wunderlich c, Brian G. Richmond a,d,* a Center for the Advanced Study of Hominid Paleobiology, Department of Anthropology, The George Washington University, 2110 G St. NW, Washington, DC 20052, USA b Hominid Paleobiology Doctoral Program, The George Washington University, 2110 G St. NW, Washington, DC 20052, USA c Department of Biology, James Madison University, MSC 7801 Harrisonburg, VA 22807, USA d Human Origins Program, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC 20560, USA article info abstract Article history: The early Pleistocene marks a period of major transition in hominin body form, including increases in Received 30 April 2012 body mass and stature relative to earlier hominins. However, because complete postcranial fossils with Accepted 11 February 2013 reliable taxonomic attributions are rare, efforts to estimate hominin mass and stature are complicated by Available online 22 March 2013 the frequent albeit necessary use of isolated, and often fragmentary, skeletal elements. The recent dis- covery of 1.52 million year old hominin footprints from multiple horizons in Ileret, Kenya, provides new Keywords: data on the complete foot size of early Pleistocene hominins as well as stride lengths and other char- Bipedalism acteristics of their gaits. This study reports the results of controlled experiments with habitually unshod Body size Homo Daasanach adults from Ileret to examine the relationships between stride length and speed, and also fi Human evolution those between footprint size, body mass, and stature.
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