When our ancestors climbed down from the trees, it is quite likely they did it in South Africa - if a growing body of scientific evidence is to be believed. In 1924, the world's oldest hominid remains and the first-ever evidence of human-like creatures to be discovered in Africa were dug up in the Northern Cape and identified as a "fossilized monkey skull". After a stint as a humble paperweight, the fossil came to the attention of Professor Raymond Dart at the University of the Witwatersrand, who identified the earthshaking find as an intermediate species between apes and humans, with a small brain but an upright posture. Still a little unsteady on its feet, our ancestor trod the plains of eastern and southern Africa, perhaps three million years ago. Dart called it Australopithecus africanus : Africa's southern ape . After the emergence of A. Africanus , hominids spent the next couple of million years or so perfecting bipedal walking, tool-making, speech and got big-headed (a huge expansion in brain size took place) until they finally strode forth as Homo sapiens : the modern humans. Another first for South Africa was the unearthing of the oldest fossil evidence of Homo sapiens in a cave at the Klasies River Mouth in the Eastern Cape, reckoned to be between 50,000 and 100,000 years old.