We have to start with the name, if only because it’s one of the few things we can be sure about. The species was given its moniker in 1964 by a trio of palaeoanthropologists: Louis Leakey, Phillip Tobias and John Napier. Though, as they acknowledged, it wasn’t their idea – their colleague Raymond Dart had suggested “habilis” from the Latin for “able, handy, mentally skilful, vigorous”.