Paranthropus robustus

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Just as the name suggests, Paranthropus robustus is an example of a robust australopithecine. This species was first discovered by Robert Broom in 1938 when he found a fossil jaw fragment and molar from Kromdraai, South Africa. When he realized that the fossils didn’t look anything like some of the Australopithecus africanus fossils he’d found during his career, he knew he was on to something different.
Later,many more bones and teeth were collected from the site where the curious fossil came from, that together convinced him he had a new species which he named Paranthropus robustus and he estimated this species to have lived about 1.8 to 1.2 million years ago.Specimens showed that this new species had very large megadont cheek teeth with thick enamel that focused their chewing in the back of the jaw.
A large sagittal crest provided a large area to anchor these chewing muscles to the skull. They also had large cheekbones and large chewing muscles that gave them a wide dish-shaped face. These adaptations provided Paranthropus robustus with the ability of grinding down tough, fibrous foods. It has been made clear that ‘robust’ refers solely to tooth and face size, not to the body size of P. robustus.

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