Early ancestors looked nothing like chimpanzees and other primates.

A treasure trove of 4.4 million years old fossils from the deserts of Ethiopia is widespread ideas about the dramatic reversal of the early ancestors of man and how he came to walk upright, the researchers reported.

The heart of the diverse collection of primates, fossil plants and animals is nearly complete skeleton of an ancestor of man, shows that our early ancestors looked nothing like a chimpanzee, primate, or major.

Instead, the results indicate that the last common ancestor of humans and primates, there are nearly two million years, was once a primitive creature that only a few traits in common with the current members of both groups.

The findings, published in a large study group on Thursday in the journal Science, looked even our ancestors had speculated to walk upright in forests not only for grazing than previous generations of researchers.

The discovery of the sample is called Ardipithecus ramidus “one of the most important discoveries in the study of human evolution,” said paleoanthropologist David Pilbeam of Harvard University, who was not involved in research.

By Thomas H. Maugh II, Los Angeles Times-Washington Post News Service