The Dikika is an area of the

Afar Region The Afar Region (; ; ), formerly known as Region 2, is a Regions of Ethiopia, regional state in northeastern Ethiopia and the homeland of the Afar people. Its capital is the planned city of Semera, which lies on the paved Awash, Ethiopia, Awash� ...

Ethiopia Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Ken ...

. A

hominin The Hominini (hominins) form a taxonomic tribe of the subfamily Homininae (hominines). They comprise two extant genera: ''Homo'' (humans) and '' Pan'' (chimpanzees and bonobos), and in standard usage exclude the genus '' Gorilla'' ( gorillas) ...

fossil named Selam, a specimen of the ''

Australopithecus afarensis ''Australopithecus afarensis'' is an extinct species of australopithecine which lived from about 3.9–2.9 million years ago (mya) in the Pliocene of East Africa. The first fossils were discovered in the 1930s, but major fossil finds would not ta ...

'' species, was found in this area. Papers also propose the earliest evidence of stone tool use at this site in the form of cut marks on animal bone. However there has been argument about this proposal. Dikika is located in Mille

woreda Districts of Ethiopia, also called woredas (; ''woreda''), are the third level of the administrative divisions of Ethiopia – after ''List of zones of Ethiopia, zones'' and the ''Regions of Ethiopia, regional states''. These districts are f ...

.Based on the map of the findsite printed in Alemseged, Z. et al. A new hominin from the Basal Member of the Hadar Formation, Dikika, and its geological context. ''J. Hum. Evol.'' 49 (2005), 499–514. Dikika is also given to name a basal member of the Hadar formation, a series of

sedimentary Sedimentary rocks are types of rock formed by the cementation of sediments—i.e. particles made of minerals (geological detritus) or organic matter (biological detritus)—that have been accumulated or deposited at Earth's surface. Sedime ...

rocks deposited approximately 3.4 million years ago, which have been exposed by the erosive action of the

Awash River } The Awash River (sometimes spelled Awaash; Oromo language, Oromo: ''Awaash OR Hawaas'', Amharic: ዐዋሽ, Afar language, Afar: ''Hawaash We'ayot'', Somali language, Somali: ''Webiga Dir'', Italian language, Italian: ''Auasc'') is a major river ...

. Although sometimes called "Lucy's Child" Dikika was in fact older than Lucy or Dinkʼinesh at 3.4 million years.

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