Ardipithecus kadabba: Late Miocene Evidence from the Middle Awash, Ethiopia
Haile-Selassie Y & G WoldeGabriel (eds.) 2009. Ardipithecus kadabba: Late Miocene Evidence from the Middle Awash, Ethiopia. University of California Press. 664 pp. ISBN 978-0520254404
Contributors:
Ambrose SH, Asnake M, Bernor RL, Bibi F, Black MT, Boisserie J-R, DeGusta D, Frost S, Giaourtsakis IX, Haile-Selassie Y, Hart WK, Hlusko L, Howell FC, Lehmann T, Morgan LE, Pehlevan C, Renne PR, Rook L, Saegusa H, Su D, Suwa G, Vrba ES, Wesselman HB, White T, WoldeGabriel G.
Description:
This book is the second in The Middle Awash Series (editor Tim White), with intended later editions focusing on Ardipithecus. ramidus, Homo sapiens idaltu, and possibly other topics. Much of the work in this volume derives from Yohannes Haile-Selassie’s PhD thesis (UC Berkeley), but there are considerable contributions from others, resulting in a collaborative monograph addressing the geology, geochronology, paleontology, paleogeography, paleobiochronology, and paleoecology of the Middle Awash late Miocene Adu-Asu Formation and lower Sagantole Formation. Following a Forward and two Prefaces, the volume opens with an introductory chapter, providing an overview of the site history, methodological approaches to fieldwork, and general layout of the chapters. Chapters 2-4 detail the stratigraphy, geology, and geochronology of the deposits. The chapters that follow (5-16) are dedicated to the description and comparative analysis of the mammalian fauna, including a chapter on small mammals as well as the following major mammalian goups: Cercopithecidae (4 taxa), Hominidae (1 taxon), Carnivora, Bovidae, Suidae, Hippopotamidae, Giraffidae, Equidae, Rhinocerotidae, Proboscidae, and Tubulidentata. Of these, Chapter 7 provides detailed description of the fairly limited but still very important Ardipithecus kadabba fossil materials and their context. Chapters 17-19 focus on the paleoenvironment, paleobiogeography, and biochronology of the region, providing further insight into the mosaic of habitats (dominated by dense woodland) represented here. The volume concludes with a summary of the presented material. In addition to the descriptions and analysis presented in the volume, the text is supplemented throughout with images of sites and discoveries that provide a rarely published glimpse into the endeavour of paleoanthropology and its rigours in the remote regions of Africa. The volumes in this series are also accompanied by online digital resources (middleawash.berkeley.edu), most notably an online specimen-based catalogue providing detail for the vertebrate fossils and high quality (for the most part) digital images. (This online catalogue is also touted as having micro-CT animations of select hominin fossils, but I was not able to find any.) All in all, this volume stands as an important resource for researchers in the field of paleoanthropology as well as other scientists studying the late Miocene mammals of eastern Africa.
