Archaeology & anthropology

Fossils of New Ancient Ape Species Discovered in Egypt

Does the Egyptian ape fossil rewrite human origins or is it just another piece of an incomplete puzzle?

MAR 27·Updated MAR 28

Fossils of New Ancient Ape Species Discovered in Egypt

Story

Above: Worn molar fossil of newly identified ape species found at Egypt’s Wadi Moghra site. Image credit: Valerie/X

The Facts

Researchers in Egypt have identified a new ancient ape species, Masripithecus moghraensis, from fossilized jaw fragments and teeth found at Wadi Moghra in northern Egypt, dating to roughly 17 to 18 million years ago during the Early Miocene.
Chahinaz Taher on X
Science News
National Geographic
The discovery, published Thursday in the journal Science, is the first definitive ape fossil from North Africa during this period and was led by Shorouq Al-Ashqar and colleagues from Mansoura University in Egypt.
Science
Ahram Online
Scientists had long focused on East Africa as the origin of early apes, but the analysis placed M. moghraensis closer to the last common ancestor of all living apes than any similarly aged fossil from East Africa.
New Scientist
SciTech Daily
The species name combines "Masr," the Arabic word for Egypt, with the Greek word for ape, while "moghraensis" refers to Wadi Moghra. M. moghraensis is estimated to have weighed about 25 kilograms, larger than monkeys of that era.
New Scientist
Discover Magazine
Researchers used a Bayesian tip-dating method combining fossil ages, anatomical traits and DNA from living apes to build an evolutionary tree, suggesting modern apes may have originated in northern Afro-Arabia or the eastern Mediterranean.
Nautilus
SciTech Daily
Paleontologist David Alba noted the African hominoid fossil record is "geographically very biased," while co-author Erik Seiffert said the find "strongly challenges" the long-held view that the common ancestor of all living apes originated in East Africa.
Live Science
National Geographic

Sources Split

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The Spin

Narrative A

The discovery of Masripithecus moghraensis in northern Egypt suggests East Africa was never the true cradle of modern apes — North Africa was. This 17-to-18-million-year-old jawbone predates the known dispersal into Eurasia and sits closer to the ancestor of all living apes than anything found in East Africa. The fossil record has been geographically biased for too long, and this find blows that assumption wide open.

Discover Magazine

Science on X

Narrative B

Masripithecus moghraensis is a valuable find, but it doesn’t rewrite ape origins overnight. Scientists have long known the fossil record is uneven, and this discovery — while important — wasn’t entirely unexpected. With fragmentary evidence and uncertain relationships among Miocene apes, bold claims about a new origin point are premature. This is a starting point, not a conclusion.

National Geographic