The paleoanthropological site self-proclaimed as the Cradle of Humankind is located about 50 km northwest of Johannesburg, South Africa, in the Gauteng province. Declared a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1999, the site currently occupies 47,000 hectares and contains a complex of limestone caves. The registered name of the site in the list of World Heritage sites is Fossil Hominid Sites of South Africa.
According to existing archaeological and fossil evidence, however, the Cradle of Humankind is the Afar Triangle in East Africa, which is often referred to as the Cradle of Humanity.
The Sterkfontein Caves were the site of the discovery of a 2.3-million-year-old fossil Australopithecus africanus, found in 1947 by Robert Broom and John T. Robinson. The find helped corroborate the 1924 discovery of the juvenile Australopithecus africanus skull known as the "Taung Child", by Raymond Dart, at Taung in the North West Province of South Africa, where excavations still continue.
Nearby, but not in the site, the Rising Star Cave system contains the Dinaledi Chamber, in which were discovered fifteen fossil skeletons of an extinct species of hominin, provisionally named Homo naledi.