Selam is our most complete skeleton of a three-year-old girl who lived and died 3.3 million years ago. She belongs to the species known as Australopithecus afarensis.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
While researching my ancestry I have unearthed many skeletons. It would seem that I come from a long line of ne'er-do-wells, especially on my mother's side.
But it really wasn't until three to four years later, when we had an opportunity in the lab to make very detailed observations, and comparisons with other fossil discoveries, that we realized she was a new species of human ancestor.
You see, every creature alive on the earth today represents an unbroken line of life that stretches back to the first primitive organism to appear on this planet; and that is about three billion years.
One should not forget that there are very few surviving items from this period, often just single, small bones, a tooth, a sliver of the skull. Categorizing these pieces can be very difficult.
You have to remember that not every creature that was evolving left behind its skull or its tools for our convenience tens of thousands of years later. Most bones or most tools rot or get buried and are never found again.
It is to the Riddle of the Sphinx that I have devoted fifty years of professional life as an anthropologist.
I feel like we all have our skeletons.
Paleoanthropology is not a science that ends with the discovery of a bone. One has to have the original to work with. It is a life-long task.
Lucy brought with her an image of our human ancestors that you don't get when you find a jaw or an arm bone or a leg bone. Here was 40 percent of a single skeleton.
The world dies over and over again, but the skeleton always gets up and walks.