Swartkrans

Swartkrans is a fossil-bearing cave designated as a South African National Heritage Site, located about 20 mi (32 km) from Johannesburg. It is located in the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site.

Contents

• Swartkrans cave the cradle of humankind
• Swartkrans walking tour book your place today
• References

Swartkrans is a farm near to Sterkfontein, notable for being extremely rich in archaeological material, particularly hominin remains. It was purchased by the University of the Witwatersrand in 1968. The oldest deposits present at the site are believed to be between 1.8 and 2 million years old.

Some of the earliest evidence of controlled use of fire by humans can be found at Swartkrans, up to 1.5 million years ago.

Fossils discovered in the limestone of Swartkrans include Telanthropus capensis (a variety of Homo erectus), Paranthropus and Homo habilis. S. V. Drobyshevskiy identifies remains of Homo naledi with telanthropus.

Noted paleontologist Robert Broom was a frequent digger. He was followed by C. K. 'Bob' Brain, whose excavations at the site inspired his book The Hunters or the Hunted? in which he demonstrated that instead of being bloodthirsty killer apes, the hominin fossils found at the site were themselves victims of predation by big cats. Originally, it was believed that Dinofelis was responsible for such killings, though recent evidence suggests that hominids were likely the victims of Megantereon or leopards based on carbon isotope ratios taken from each predator.