
None of the researchers had dared to think it at first, but it was clear they had found the skeleton of a single individual as complete as Lucy but unlike her or anything else that had ever been seen. While most of the other bones at the site showed signs of being ravaged by hyenas after death, the hominid skeleton was miraculously untouched. After the female died, her remains apparently were trampled down into mud by passing hippos or other herbivores and protected from scavengers. After being buried for 4.4 million years, another year or two on the surface would have turned them all to dust.It would take two more years to recover the skeleton, more years to clean and prepare the bones, and still more years to prep and catalog the 6,000 other vertebrate remains from Aramis, conduct isotopic studies of teeth, and parse out the finer points of the geology. Meanwhile, Suwa, a wizard in the new field of virtual anthropology, CT scanned the bones too fragile to handle, creating digital versions that could be analyzed. For 15 years only he, White, and a handful of colleagues had access to the skeleton. Others would have to wait until the team was ready to publish.On the ride up to Adgantole, we stopped at the Ardi skeleton site itself, on a flat wash below the road, about the size of a tennis court The excavation was covered by a large mound of stones The place was silent now, but I could imagine the shouts of excitement as each bone—125 of them in all—peeked out from the earth or later emerged from its plaster jacket in the museum.
