Some Notes on Dating and Nomenclature

In recent decades paleoanthropologists have developed new means of dating hominid fossils. In matters of dating and nomenclature, I have throughout aimed for consensus and simplicity. In presenting evolutionary chronology, I have picked a median number between divergent estimates and/or rounded out the numbers: every date in the prehistoric record needs therefore to be preceded by an implicit “circa.” Scholarly nomenclature has also adapted to new evidence and revised time lines. Based on genetic and molecular evidence, new taxonomic terms, e.g., Homininae and Hominini, have been introduced. While these may prove more correct, such terms are perversely similar. Since they characterize distinctions pertaining to prehuman primate evolution, I have opted for the older, more familiar classificatory arrangement, i.e., Primates, or primate (order); Hominidae, or hominid (family); Homo (genus); Homo sapiens (species); and Homo sapiens sapiens (subspecies).