section_path: History/Human prehistory
section_name: Human prehistory
paragraph_text: Human prehistory
  
  Hominids such as Homo habilis (1.8 to 2.5 million years ago) and Homo erectus (1.9 million to 350,000 years ago) are possible direct ancestors of modern Homo sapiens, and lived in Kenya in the Pleistocene epoch. During excavations at Lake Turkana in 1984, palaeoanthropologist Richard Leakey, assisted by Kamoya Kimeu, discovered the Turkana Boy, a 1.6-million-year-old Homo erectus fossil. East Africa, including Kenya, is one of the earliest regions where modern humans (Homo sapiens) are believed to have lived. Evidence was found in 2018, dating to about 320,000 years ago, of the early emergence of modern behaviours, including long-distance trade networks (involving goods such as obsidian), the use of pigments, and the possible making of projectile points. The authors of three 2018 studies on the site suggest that complex and modern behaviours had already begun in Africa around the time of the emergence of Homo sapiens.