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Home All Questions What is the oldest known fossil? Noah (6)

What is the oldest known fossil? Noah (6)

The oldest fossil in the world is a smelly little microbe that was found in Australia – and this is 3.5 billion years old. But archaeologists are interested in humans and the oldest human fossil, one of our very early ancestors, is a jawbone and some teeth that were found in Ethiopia which are 2.8 million years old. So this is a fossil of part of one of our earliest human ancestors.

Answered by:

Julian Richards

Julian Richards is best known as the TV archaeologist from Meet the Ancestors and Blood of the Vikings. He loves Stonehenge – and has even written a pop-up book about it!

More questions answered by Julian Richards

What does an undergraduate of archaeology need to know? Okoye Daniel

Now that’s a very big question…I would say that if you are going to study archaeology at undergraduate level then you do need to have a genuine fascination […]

What happened to King Tut that caused him to die? Jack

It used to be thought that Tutankamum died as a result of falling off a chariot but recent investigations have shown that he was probably weakened by some […]

What is your favourite moment of archaeology ever? Dylan

That’s a difficult one. There have been lots of times when something fascinating has been discovered on one of my digs, special things like a bronze dagger, an […]

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