Abstract
In 2009, the beginning of the Quaternary System/Period was re-set from 1.81 Ma to 2.58 Ma, newly including the Gelasian Stage/Age. A tacit recognition was behind the redefinition : that an early member of the genus Homo seems to date back nearly to the new basal boundary of the Quaternary. However, the term ‘early Homo' has not been unequivocal, and thus reconsideration of the application of the term or additional fossil findings would argue that, in practice, the emergence of the genus Homo does not correspond in age to the beginning of the Quaternary.
Another topic treated here is concerned with the first appearance of hominids outside Africa. The idea has become widely accepted and recognized as one of palaeoanthropology's most basic paradigms, that hominids first moved ‘Out of Africa' at about 1.8 Ma and dispersed rapidly to eastern Asia earlier than 1.5 Ma. This view is based mainly on the estimated age of the earliest human fossils or artifacts from China and Java (Indonesia). In China, however, the reported antiquity of the human remains (ca. 1.7 Ma) from Yuanmou and the earliest artifacts (1.66 Ma) from Majuangou, Nihewan, may still be problematic. And there is still much controversy about the age of the earliest human fossils from Java. Hence, the ‘general model' in which hominids expanded to eastern Asia prior to 1.5 Ma in the early Calabrian (the second stage/age of the revised Pleistocene) is still premature, lacking corroboration and full credibility, and may need reconsideration.
