A Collège de France coproduction - CNED - Doriane Films
Abstract
In 2002, Michel Brunet and his team unearthed the oldest hominid known today: "Toumaï". This discovery turned the history of our origins on its head.
Until then, the appearance of the first humans in East Africa, three or four million years ago, was thought to be linked to a change in climate: the replacement of forest by savannah would have favored bipedalism. This attractive scenario has to be abandoned: Toumaï is seven million years old; he lived in Chad, then covered with lakes and forests, and probably walked on both feet.
This is the story of Michel Brunet's discovery, and of the upheaval of our theoretical schemes.
