Oreopithecus

Oreopithecus Temporal range: Miocene
Oreopithecus bambolii fossil
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Primates
Superfamily:	Hominoidea
Family:	Hominidae?
Subfamily:	Homininae?
Tribe:	Dryopithecini?
Genus:	†Oreopithecus
Species:	†O. bambolii
Binomial name
†Oreopithecus bambolii Gervais, 1872

Oreopithecus is an extinct hominoid primate from the Miocene epoch whose fossils have been found in today's Tuscany and Sardinia in Italy; (from the Greek , oros and , pithekos, meaning "hill-ape"). It existed 9 to 7 million years ago in the Tusco-Sardinian area when this region was an isolated island in a chain of islands stretching from central Europe to northern Africa in what was becoming the Mediterranean Sea.

Oreopithecus was one of a large number of European immigrants that settled this area in the Vallesian-Turolian transition and one of few hominoids, together with Sivapithecus in Asia, to survive the so-called Vallesian Crisis. To date, dozens of individuals have been discovered at the Tuscan localities of Montebamboli, Montemassi, Casteani, Ribolla, and, most notably, in the fossil-rich lignite mine in the Baccinello Basin, making it one of the best-represented fossil apes.

Oreopithecus bambolii was first described by French paleontologist Paul Gervais in 1872. In the 1950s, Swiss paleontologist Johannes Hürzeler discovered a complete skeleton in Baccinello and claimed it was a true hominin—based on its short jaws and reduced canines, at the time considered diagnostic of the hominin family; and claimed it was a biped—because the short pelvis was closer to those of hominins than those of chimpanzees and gorillas. Hominin affinities claimed for Oreopithecus remained controversial for decades until new analyses in the 1990s reasserted that Oreopithecus was directly related to Dryopithecus. The peculiar cranial and dental features were explained as consequences of insular isolation.

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