'Story of human origin is still not figured out or over'

Fifty years ago, the discovery of a partial skeleton amid the barren desert landscape of northern Ethiopia transformed our understanding of where humans came from, and how we developed into Homo sapiens. "Lucy" was first spotted on November 24, 1974, by the American paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson and his student assistant Tom Gray. Named after the Beatles' Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, a popular song in the their team's camp at the time, it was immediately clear she was a female, because of her small adult size, and that she had walked upright, unlike chimpanzees. Lucy was also very old-at almost 3.2 million years, she was anointed as the then-earliest known (distant) ancestor of modern humans. Over the following decades, rather fittingly given her name, she became a "paleo-rock star", going on a US tour from 2006 following a deal with the Ethiopian authorities.

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Lucy's discovery marked a critical moment in our understanding of the origins of humanity-and of Ethiopia's place at the heart of this story. Many other important fossils have since been discovered in the same Afar region—including by Yohannes Haile-Selassie, one of Ethiopia's leading paleoanthropologists and the director of the Institute of Human Origins at Arizona State University (ASU) in the US. His two Ardipithecus discoveries in the 1990s-while still a student-pushed understanding of our ancient origins back beyond 5 million years, changing some of the widely accepted beliefs about human evolution.

Yet in this interview, Haile-Selassie is critical that the study of ancient humans still fails to acknowledge and support the fundamental role of African scientists and institutions. Like many of his colleagues, he is now calling for paleoanthropology to be "decolonised", warning that otherwise, some African countries could take action to restrict future exploration of key sites across the continent:

Yohannes, you were a 14-year-old schoolboy in Ethiopia when Lucy was discovered. What are your memories of this landmark moment in your country’s history?

In fact, on the day Lucy was found —Sunday, November 24, 1974— Ethiopians woke up to some other devastating news. The previous night, Ethiopia’s military regime had executed more than 60 ministers and generals of Emperor Haile-Selassie’s regime. The announcement of Lucy’s discovery probably came up later that week, but I doubt many people paid attention to it amid all the turmoil, with the military regime taking control of Ethiopia.

Personally, I have no recollection of the announcement of Lucy’s discovery. I grew up in a Christian family, so as far as I knew at that time, it was God who created humans and I wouldn’t have understood the significance of Lucy.