The Hominidae ( /hɒˈmɪnɨdiː/; anglicized hominids, also known as great apes), as the term is used here, form a taxonomic family, including four extant genera: chimpanzees (Pan), gorillas (Gorilla), humans (Homo), and orangutans (Pongo). The term "hominid" is also used in the more restricted sense of humans and relatives of humans closer than chimpanzees. In this usage, all hominid species other than Homo sapiens are extinct.
A number of known ext...
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The Hominidae ( /hɒˈmɪnɨdiː/; anglicized hominids, also known as great apes), as the term is used here, form a taxonomic family, including four extant genera: chimpanzees (Pan), gorillas (Gorilla), humans (Homo), and orangutans (Pongo). The term "hominid" is also used in the more restricted sense of humans and relatives of humans closer than chimpanzees. In this usage, all hominid species other than Homo sapiens are extinct.
A number of known extinct genera are grouped with humans in the Homininae subfamily, others with orangutans in the Ponginae subfamily. The most recent common ancestor of the Hominidae lived roughly 14 million years ago, when the ancestors of the orangutans speciated from the ancestors of the other three genera. The ancestors of the Hominidae family had already speciated from those of the Hylobatidae family, perhaps 15 million to 20 million years ago.
On July 19, 2001, a 7-million-year-old fossil skull, classified as Sahelanthropus tchadensis and nicknamed "Toumaï"...
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