Lufengpithecus keiyuanensis

Lufengpithecus keiyuanensis is an extinct ape of the Late Miocene of East Asia and one of the three species placed in the genus Lufengpithecus, alongside L. lufengensis and L. hudienensis. It is known from the Xiaolongtan Basin near Kaiyuan in Yunnan, China, and dates to about 10 to 11 million years ago, which makes it the oldest of the three. The first fossils were ape remains collected in the 1950s at Keiyuan County and originally attributed to Dryopithecus keiyuanensis before being reassigned to Lufengpithecus. The genus is known from thousands of dental remains and a few skulls, had heavy molars and large canine teeth like Sivapithecus, and probably weighed about 50 kilograms. Its place in ape evolution is unsettled: the genus is thought to be either the sister group to the orangutan subfamily Ponginae or sister to the clade containing Ponginae and Homininae.