Anthropoids establish themselves in Africa
Early monkeys appear in the Fayum forest, on the branch that leads to apes and to us.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 3 million years
- Known to
- ± 1 million years
- Era
- Eocene, Cenozoic
By the late Eocene the Fayum beds contain small anthropoids such as Catopithecus and Proteopithecus with fused frontal bones, closed eye sockets and dental formulae pointing toward later Old World monkeys and apes. They live in a coastal forest alongside prosimians, and dental microwear shows the anthropoids were largely fruit-eaters while the prosimians spread across insect-eating, leaf-eating and mixed diets. This African population is the stock from which catarrhine primates, and eventually hominids, descend.