ASIA, not Africa, was the home of the
first simians. A.group of Chinese scientists working with the Beijing-based
Chinese Academy of Sciences claim that
they have discovered evidence at
Shanghuang town in eastern Jiangsu
province which pushes the history of
simians back by 8 to 10 million years
compared with the fossils found in
north Africa in the late 1960s.
The scientists have unearthed
10,000 fossils in a quarry in
Shanghuang, which they are convinced
are 45 million years old. The fossils
belong to 63 species of mammals that
fall into 12 orders and 38 families,
including 4 fainilies of suborders of
primates. The anthropoid fossils - a
suborder of primates - have been
named Eosimias sinensis by their
discoverers, after a primitive anthropoid that lived in the middle Eocene
period and is believed to be the ancestor
of all simians.
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