It literally means an ape from the south. Based on the evidence collected by paleontologists and archaeologists, Australopithecus developed 4 million years ago, and spread to the continent before it went extinct 2 million years later. Allegedly one of the australopithecus species then evolved into the genus homo. Australopithecus robustus and Australopithecus boisei themselves are still debating whether this genus belongs not, and they are sometimes called Paranthropus.
Australopithecus has a general characteristic of about 1.2-1.4 m tall, with a brain volume of 35 percent modern humans, larger than Ardipithecus which is about 20 percent of the volume of modern human brains. Australopitheucs are bipedal better than ardipithecus. Allegedly there is a difference between males with females, where the males tend to be larger than females.
Some Australopithecus species are Australopithecus anamensis, Australopithecus afarensis, Australopithecus sediba, and Australopithecus africanus. The first fossil discovery of this genus was in 1924 in Taung, South Africa, also known as Taung Child (this fossil is also an indication of the contradiction with fake fossils Piltdown man).
But the main fossil finding of this genus is the fossil Australopithecus afarensis female called Lucy, one of the most complete fossils found in 1974 in Hadar, Ethiopia. With about 40 percent completeness, Lucy who came from 3.2 million years ago showed Australopithecus afarensis was bipedal, walking on two legs rather than quadrupedal (walking with fist as a lever) as a non-human ape family.
Another finding related to Australopithecus is the Laetoli trail in Laetoli, Tanzania, which is estimated to have originated from about 3.5 million years ago. This trail is formed when a hominid walks over volcanic ash, indicated by two or three individuals, one being traced above the traces of the previous individual. Discovered by mary Leakey in 1976.
The Laetoli trail is thought to have been made by Australopithecus afarensis. But this allegation was rejected by Russell H Tuttle, who concluded the trail was made by a species younger than afarensis. And somehow, Tuttle's view was conjured up by HY, who engineered as though Tuttle had made the mark made by the boy of modern man. Though Tuttle himself said that the traces could not be made genus Homo that has not existed in that period.
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