Homo erectus thus presents paleoanthropologists with the challenge of trying to interpret fossil variation in the context of both widespread geographic and temporal distribution.
There are a number of fascinating evolutionary questions that can be asked of H. erectus. The species was not only geographically widespread, it also had a long temporal span in the hominin fossil record (Antón 2003). With its earliest appearance in the fossil record from localities in the Lake Turkana Basin, Kenya, sometime around two million years ago, H. erectus populations persisted until near the end of the Pleistocene, as evidenced by fossils from Southeast Asia. Homo erectus thus presents paleoanthropologists with the challenge of trying to interpret fossil variation in the context of both widespread geographic and temporal distribution.