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Source: ONE News -
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A New Zealand anthropologist working in Kenya has made the sort of discovery scientists dream about - the fossilised footprint of an ancestral hominid, or early man.
Professor Jack Harris' extremely rare find is believed to be 1.5 million years old and is the oldest known example of modern human foot anatomy.
The area of Kenya where the discovery was made is considered the field laboratory of the world for human evolution, and it has been Harris' "office" for four decades.
During a large scale excavation, the human prints were found. They are believed to be from a homo erectus and have the hallmarks of a modern foot - parallel toes, an arch and a heel, which means some of the earliest humans walked like us.
The discovery is big news in the world of science and it helps explain changes in behaviour.
"It's at this time that our ancestors leave Africa and populate the other places of the old world, Europe and Asia," Harris says.
It's a unique snapshot marking a time when our ancestors were forced to seek food from further afield. Bipedalism, or walking upright, is considered a key development in human evolution.
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