The largest ape that ever walked the Earth, Gigantopithecus blacki, lived in what is now China and went extinct between 295,000–215,000 years ago.
📏 Height: ~3 meters (9.8 ft)
⚖️ Weight: 200–300 kg (441–661 lbs)
📸 Image: Paleo-anthro sculptor Bill Munns with his Giganto reconstruction in his Los Angeles backyard.
Imagine homo florensis had managed to domesticate Gigantopithecus, riding on their shoulders like toddlers shooting arrows to hunt food.
History would have played out differently with a mini Genghis Khan and his horde riding on giant apes!
there’s room for prehistoric fantasy,
there are multiple human races: Neanderthals, Cromagnon, Nadelii, Florensis… Megafauna, endless wilderness…
however, knowing humans, chances are of one didn’t kill all the others, battle royale style, it would end up with one domesticating the others for what is basically slavery, but with 50 thousand years of artificially selecting the best most loyal ‘slaves’ it’ll end up as a extremely loyal and friendly household/and industrial labour.
Yeah that’s basically what we’ve done to wolves, horses, cats and cows/oxen through breeding. A giant ape would be a little more intelligent and sapient, but not that much. What would be unique would be a domesticated animal that can grasp and pick up and carry things, and trained to use some tools.
Hypothetically humans could have "domesticated " another group of humans, and with enough drifting, cause speciation. or at least enough difference that a “domesticate domestic/labour human” would be much different than a normal human, then breed them into countless breeds.
imagine if a slaver tribe 10k years ago existed until now, and their slaves ended up domesticated…
Only reason I doubt that could happen in long term, is because slavers will sexually assault their slaves resulting in enough intermixing to stop any genetic domestication.
sorry, I’m in a long drive and just stop in the bathroom and I’m now chatting for no reason …
Haha well that is much darker and sounds like a good premise for a science fiction / fantasy. I think star trek had a story like that. And planet of the apes / the time machine.
Crazy enough, there have been attempts to create a hybrid between an chimpanzee and a human. Luckily, none succeeded lol