The First Humans Were Hunted By Leopards And Weren’t The Apex Predators We Thought They Were...Homo habilis has been "dethroned".

Leopard tooth marks were found on this Homo habilis jawbone. Image credit: Vegara-Riquelme et al., Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences (2025) Around 2 million years ago, prehistoric humans in East Africa turned the tables on the carnivores that had previously terrorized them, learning not only to fend off these predators but also steal their kills, thus replacing them at the very top of the food chain. Generally, the ancient species Homo habilis is credited with making this trophic leap, yet new research suggests that this extinct hominin was actually hunted by leopards and may therefore have been...