A team of international researchers made a groundbreaking discovery in the Melka Wakena archaeological site, located in the southeastern highlands of Ethiopia, where excavations have been led by Professor Erella Hovers and Dr. Tegenu Gossa from the Institute of Archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HU). During the 2017 field season a fossil of a predator from the canine family, identified as the Ethiopian wolf (Canis Simensis), was recovered from deposits that are dated to about 1.5 million years ago. The first-ever discovered fossil of this animal, this significant finding challenges previous claims that the species arrived in Ethiopia from Eurasia a mere 20,000 years ago. The findings, published in the journal Communications Biology, provide compelling evidence of the Ethiopian wolf’s early presence in Africa.
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