KNM ER 3883 is the catalogue number of a fossilized skull (Partial cranium) of the species ''

Homo ergaster ''Homo ergaster'' is an extinct species or subspecies of archaic humans who lived in Africa in the Early Pleistocene. Whether ''H. ergaster'' constitutes a species of its own or should be subsumed into '' H. erectus'' is an ongoing and unresol ...

'' (alternatively referred to as African ''

Homo erectus ''Homo erectus'' ( ) is an extinction, extinct species of Homo, archaic human from the Pleistocene, spanning nearly 2 million years. It is the first human species to evolve a humanlike body plan and human gait, gait, to early expansions of h ...

''). The fossil was discovered by

Richard Leakey Richard Erskine Frere Leakey (19 December 1944 – 2 January 2022) was a Kenyan paleoanthropologist, conservationist and politician. Leakey held a number of official positions in Kenya, mostly in institutions of archaeology and wildlife cons ...

in 1976 in

Koobi Fora Koobi Fora refers primarily to a region around Koobi Fora Ridge, located on the eastern shore of Lake Turkana in the territory of the nomadic Gabbra people. According to the National Museums of Kenya, the name comes from the Gabbra language ...

, east of Lake Turkana (formerly lake Rudolf),

Kenya Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya is the 27th-most-populous country in the world and the 7th most populous in Africa. ...

Observations

KNM-ER 3883 is a significant fossil specimen of early African Homo erectus, dating to approximately 1.5–1.6 million years ago. This cranium, discovered in Kenya, has an endocranial volume exceeding 800 cc, which is substantially larger than earlier Homo species and suggests a notable increase in brain size. The cranium is long and low and it has postorbital constriction. It has a large face and

zygomatic bone In the human skull, the zygomatic bone (from ), also called cheekbone or malar bone, is a paired irregular bone, situated at the upper and lateral part of the face and forming part of the lateral wall and floor of the orbit, of the temporal fos ...

. It shows a cranial capacity greater than any previous hominid capacity which is estimated at 804 ml.

References

{{Reflist, 2 Homo erectus fossils