What happened
A fossil ape found in Egypt challenges a theory about where the ancestors of modern apes, including humans, evolved. The species, Masripithecus moghraensis, lived 17 to 18 million years ago, in the early Miocene. Its remains appeared at Wadi Moghra in northern Egypt, and it is the first definitive fossil ape found in North Africa. The study, published on March 26, 2026 in Science, is from Mansoura University and the University of Southern California.
Why it matters
For decades it was believed that the first apes and their relatives were concentrated farther south in Africa. Early Miocene monkeys had been found in the north, but never apes of that age, and that gap shaped prevailing theories. The authors think North Africa and the Middle East may have played a central role in the origin of the lineage that gave rise to all living apes.
The number
The team searched for this kind of fossil for five years.
Context
Hesham Sallam, a paleontologist at Mansoura University and senior author, said that looking at the early ape tree shows something is missing and that North Africa holds that piece. The find matters for understanding the origin of hominoids, the group that includes the last common ancestor of all living apes and its descendants: gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees and humans. There are fossils of younger apes in Africa, Europe and Asia, but their relationships and geographic origin remain debated. On related topics, Mamífero published A forgotten fossil reveals Europe’s first megaraptoran; SLAC confirms altermagnetism, a third magnetism; Coffee and less dementia after 43 years of follow-up and Gas over Alba Mons hints at a still-active Mars.
What’s next
One specimen does not rewrite the whole tree, and the authors hold that the find helps fill a gap in the map. New fossils from the same region would show whether Masripithecus was a local lineage or part of a wider group.
Bottom line
The news is not recent in the strict sense: the study came out in March, but the report circulated on November 1.
Sources
- ScienceDaily, summary of the study published in Science on March 26, 2026 (accessed November 9, 2026).
- Cover image: Vyacheslav Argenberg, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Edited by Rodrigo Cornejo. How we select and verify: who writes these notes.
