![[Homo-Stammbaum,_Version_Stringer-en.svg.png]] *Development of Homo sapiens over the past two million years. Notice how related ancestors like Denisovans and Neanderthals merged with modern humans and contributed genes to people alive today.* So let's begin our scene-setting with a brief look at who we are and where we came from. Modern humans are all members of a species called [_Homo sapiens_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human). Archaeology and genetics tell us that this species is over 300,000 years old; the earliest remains we have found so far date to about 315,000 years ago. These were found in Morocco in 2018, reinforcing the theory that humans originated on the African continent. _Homo sapiens_ seems to have left Africa and spread into the rest of the world, beginning between 80,000 and about 50,000 years ago. That's not to say _H. sapiens_ are our only ancestors, or even that they were the first people to leave Africa. Pre-sapiens humans such as [_Homo erectus_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_erectus) left Africa about 1.8 million years ago and spread as far as China and Java. They used stone tools and fire, and were followed by other groups such as [Neanderthals](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neanderthal) and [Denisovans](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denisovan) who left Africa about 600,000 years ago and settled in Europe and Central Asia. These people were even more advanced than their predecessors, making more complex stone tools and maybe even art and musical instruments. ![[Spreading_homo_sapiens_la.svg-1.png]] ---- Next: [[1.4. - Cave Men]] Back: [[1.2 - Environmental History]]