Following four intensely competitive international teams of scientists in a heated race to find the “missing link”–the fossil of the earliest human ancestor–Gibbons ventures to Africa, where she encounters a fascinating array of fossil hunters: Tim White, the irreverent Californian who discovered the partial skeleton of a primate that lived 4.4 million years ago in Ethiopia; French paleontologist Michel Brunet, who uncovers a skull in Chad that could date the beginnings of humankind to seven million years ago; and two other groups–one led by zoologist Meave Leakey, the other by British geologist Martin Pickford and his French paleontologist partner, Brigitte Senut–who enter the race with landmark discoveries of their own. Through scrupulous research and vivid first-person reporting, The First Human reveals the perils and the promises of fossil hunting on a grand competitive scale.

Map: The Cradle of Humanity

"First Human " Fossil Finds by Year

Time Line: The Human Family

The Fossil Hunters

lntroduction

PART ONE ANCIENT FOOTSTEPS

 CHAPTER ONE / African Trailblazers

 CHAPTER TWO / Continental Divide

 CHAPTER THREE / The Early Ancestor

 CHAPTER FOUR / Drawing Bloodlines

 CHAPTER FIVE / Lucy, the Late Ancestor

 CHAPTER SIX / Defining Humans

 CHAPTER SEVEN / Banishment

PART TWO THE DECADE OF DISCOVERY

 CHAPTER EIGHT / The Lady of the Lake

 CHAPTER NINE / A View from Afar

 CHAPTER TEN / The Root Ape

 CHAPTER ELEVEN / West Side Story

 CHAPTER TWELVE / Turf Wars

 CHAPTER THIRTEEN / Toeing the Line

 CHAPTER FOURTEEN / Millennium Man

 CHAPTER FIFTEEN / Touma'f

PART THREE WISDOM OF THE BONES

 CHAPTER SIXTEEN / Bones of Contention

 CHAPTER SEVENTEEN / Habitat for Humanity

Acknowledgments

Glossary

Notes

Bibliography

Index