Kamoyapithecus

Kamoyapithecus
Temporal occurrence
	upper Oligocene
	27.5 to 24.2 million years
Locations
	Lothidok Hill, Turkana County , Kenya ;
Systematics
	Monkey (anthropoidea)
	Old World Monkey (Catarrhini)
	Human (Hominoidea)
	incertae sedis
	Kamoyapithecus
Scientific name
	Kamoyapithecus
	M. Leakey , Ungar & Walker , 1995
species
	Kamoyapithecus hamiltoni;

Kamoyapithecus is an extinct genus of primates that was foundin East Africa during the Upper Oligocene . According to the first description of the genuspublished in 1995, fossils discoveredin Kenya , around 30 kilometers west of Lake Turkana ,comefrom a layer of earth for whichan age of 27.5 ± 0.3 to 24.2with the help of potassium-argon dating ± 0.3 million years ago. The only so far scientifically described species of the genus is Kamoyapithecus hamiltoni .

Naming

Kamoyapithecus is a made-up word . The name of the genus honors the Kenyan Kamoya Kimeu , who, as assistant to Louis Leakey and Richard Leakey, discovered the first fragments of numerous important fossils of the early ancestors of modern humans ( hominini ) in Kenya and Tanzania . The second half of the generic name is derived from the Greek word πίθηκος (in ancient Greek pronounced píthēkos : "monkey"). Kamoyapithecus therefore means "Kamoya's monkey".

The epithet of the type species, Kamoyapithecus hamiltoni , honors the New Zealand biologist Harold Hamilton (1885–1937).

Initial description

As a holotype of the genus and also the type species Kamoyapithecus hamiltoni , the fragment of a right upper jaw with two preserved molars (M2 and M3) and part of the tooth root M1 was identified in the first description by Meave Leakey , Peter S. Ungar and Alan Walker (archive number KNM- LS 7). Two individually found teeth (KNM-LS 8, KNM-LS 18359) and one fragment each from an upper jaw and a lower jaw (KNM-LS 18352, KNM-LS 18351) were added to the holotype as paratypes .

The fossils KNM-LS 7 and KNM-LS 8 had already been discovered in 1948 and in 1978 Peter Andrews ascribed them to the species Proconsul major ; In 1980 the upper jaw fragment KNM-LS 7 was identified as a type specimen of a newly named species of the genus Proconsul , Proconsul (Xenopithecus) hamiltoni . The reference to Xenopithecus as subgenus referred in 1980 to the already in 1933 by Arthur Tindell Hopwood named genus Xenopithecus whose independence but was controversial as the specific features of their cusps in a version which also in 1933 by Hopwood first named genus Proconsul could be interpreted . From the assessment of further finds it finally emerged that Xenopithecus koruensis (the type species of the genus Xenopithecus ) is now classified as a synonym of Proconsul africanus (the type species of Proconsul ). This view also had the consequence that, according to the international rules for zoological nomenclature, the generic name Xenopithecus is a synonym for the generic name Proconsul and Xenopithecus cannot be used to name a genus different from Proconsul .

In February 1986, a team from the National Museums of Kenya , led by Richard Leakey, discovered the four additional fossils identified as paratypes of Kamoyapithecus in 1995 , which belonged to the same taxon as the maxillary fragment KNM-LS 7 described by Madden in 1950. Due to the different characteristics of the jaws and the preserved teeth from Proconsul , these finds were placed next to Madden's type specimen of the genus Kamoyapithecus and the epithet hamiltoni chosen by Madden for the type species of the genus was continued.

literature

Ashley S. Hammond, Kimberly K. Foecke and Jay Kelley: Hominoid anterior teeth from the late Oligocene site of Losodok, Kenya. In: Journal of Human Evolution. Volume 128, 2019, pp. 59-75, doi: 10.1016 / j.jhevol.2018.12.010

Individual evidence

↑ Meave Leakey , Peter S. Ungar and Alan Walker : A new genus of large primate from the Late Oligocene of Lothidok, Turkana District, Kenya. In: Journal of Human Evolution. Volume 28, No. 6, 1995, pp. 519-531, doi: 10.1006 / jhev.1995.1040 , full text
^ Peter Andrews : A Revision of the Miocene Hominoidea of East Africa. In: Bulletin of The British Museum (Natural History) Geology. Volume 30, 1978, pp. 85-224 (here: p. 100), full text
^ Cary T. Madden: New Proconsul (Xenopithecus) from the Miocene of Kenya. In: Primates. Volume 21, No. 2, 1980, pp. 241-252, doi: 10.1007 / BF02374037
↑ Arthur T. Hopwood : Miocene primates from Kenya. In: Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. Volume 38, No. 260, 1933, pp. 437-464, doi: 10.1111 / j.1096-3642.1933.tb00992.x
^ Wilfrid Le Gros Clark and Louis Leakey : The Miocene Hominoidea of East Africa. Series: Fossil Mammals of Africa , No. 1, British Museum (Natural History), London 1951.

[1] Meave Leakey , Peter S. Ungar and Alan Walker : A new genus of large primate from the Late Oligocene of Lothidok, Turkana District, Kenya. In: Journal of Human Evolution. Volume 28, No. 6, 1995, pp. 519-531, doi: 10.1006 / jhev.1995.1040 , full text

[2] Peter Andrews : A Revision of the Miocene Hominoidea of East Africa. In: Bulletin of The British Museum (Natural History) Geology. Volume 30, 1978, pp. 85-224 (here: p. 100), full text

[3] Cary T. Madden: New Proconsul (Xenopithecus) from the Miocene of Kenya. In: Primates. Volume 21, No. 2, 1980, pp. 241-252, doi: 10.1007 / BF02374037

[4] Arthur T. Hopwood : Miocene primates from Kenya. In: Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. Volume 38, No. 260, 1933, pp. 437-464, doi: 10.1111 / j.1096-3642.1933.tb00992.x

[5] Wilfrid Le Gros Clark and Louis Leakey : The Miocene Hominoidea of East Africa. Series: Fossil Mammals of Africa , No. 1, British Museum (Natural History), London 1951.