Explain the place of Africa and Ethiopia in human evolution shortly. ?

Africa is widely recognized as the birthplace of humanity and the continent where human evolution began. Fossil evidence suggests that our earliest ancestors, such as Australopithecus, lived in Africa around 4-5 million years ago. Ethiopia, specifically, holds great significance in human evolution as it is home to numerous important fossil discoveries, including the famous Lucy skeleton, a 3.2 million-year-old Australopithecus afarensis. These findings have provided crucial insights into the evolutionary journey of our species, Homo sapiens, and have helped shape our understanding of human origins.