Paleoecology of South African Australopithecines: Taung Revisited

The environmental context and stratigraphic position of the first australopithecine discovery, at Taung, South Africa, need to be reconsidered, since the Taung juvenile, as Australopithecus africanus, is the type specimen of the gracile lineage of Plio-Pleistocene hominids. Recent study of the site and its regional setting shows that two generalizations widely held today are either incorrect or dubious. In particular, the Taung hominid is found in deposits that clearly indicate a subhumid or humid environment and not a semidesert, thus questioning the original basis for hypotheses concerning an ecological differentiation of gracile and robust australopithecines. Furthermore, the Taung specimen relates to a younger geomorphologic cycle than postulated by F. E. Peabody, and this cycle appears to immediately predate the Middle Pleistocene "Younger Gravels" of the Vaal River. This and other, faunal criteria suggest that Taung is contemporary with or even younger than Swartkrans and Kromdraai rather than broadly coeval with Sterkfontein and Makapansgat. By implication, the Taung hominid may postdate the arrival of true Homo in southern Africa, opening up a new range of problems concerning the phylogeny and ecological adaptations of the australopithecines.