Paleontologist Yves Coppens is dead

The famous French paleontologist was 87 years old. He is considered the discoverer of Lucy, a fossil of the extinct species Australopithecus afarensis discovered in 1974 in Ethiopia dated at 3.18 million years. Article written by Published on 06/22/2022 17:28 Updated on 06/22/2022 17:39 Reading time: 1 min. French paleontologist Yves Coppens died at the age of 87, his editor Odile Jacob announced on Wednesday June 22 at franceinfo. Former director of the National Museum of Natural History, holder of the chair of paleontology and prehistory at the Collège de France, he owes his notoriety above all to his discovery of the Australopithecus fossil nicknamed Lucy. “Yves Coppens left us this morning. My sadness is immense,” wrote editor Odile Jacob on Twitter on Wednesday, hailing “a very great scholar”. “I am losing the friend who entrusted me with all his work. France is losing one of its great men.” #Yves Coppens left us this morning. My sadness is immense. Yves Coppens was a very great scientist, a world-renowned paleontologist, a member of countless foreign institutions, but above all a professor at the Collège de France and a member of the Academy of Sciences. — Odile Jacob (@EditriceOJacob) June 22, 2022 On November 30, 1974 in Hadar, Ethiopia, Yves Coppens had discovered a 40% complete fossil of Australopithecus afarensis as part of the International Afar Research Expedition which he co-directed with American paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson and French geologist Maurice Taieb. Australopithecus had been nicknamed Lucy in reference to the Beatles song Lucy in The Sky with Diamonds listened to by the team at the time. Lucy has sometimes been considered the ancestor of modern humans, before research on the origins of mankind has challenged this presentation. “Lucy is three million two hundred thousand years old and the first man is three million years old, explained Yves Coppens himself. I apologize to Lucy but I don’t believe she is our grandmother!” Share: Share on Twitter Share on Facebook Share by email Share link