In a cave in northern Spain, researchers have discovered pieces of a fossilized face that belongs to an old human ancestor, the oldest human fossil ever found in Western Europe.
The remains, which the team nicknamed “Pink”, have between 1.1 million and 1.4 million years. But they are mysterious: facial fragments do not seem to come from any kind that is in the same area in the past, nor can they be conclusively identified as a particular species.
“We are documenting a previously unknown human population in Europe,” said María Martinón-Torres, co-author of the study and paleoanthropologist of the Spanish Center for Spanish Human Evolution, said in a call with journalists. “This fossil represents the first human fossil found so far in Western Europe.”
The fragment, discovered in 2022, was first reported in Nature magazine on Wednesday with new details.
The researchers tentatively suggested that pink is probably related to the human ancestor. Homo erect. (The fossil was appointed, in part, for the band Pink Floyd, and also after Rosa Huguet, the main author of the study and the coordinator of the archaeological site where she was found).
The finding is significant because it gives researchers a better schedule of when Western Europe was first established by human ancestors. It could also help close a gap in the evolutionary space between the fossils of older human ancestors that are found in Europe, which have approximately 1.8 million years and were discovered in a place in the Republic of Georgia called Dmanisi, and a species called Homo Antecorador, dating back to approximately 900,000 years.
“It’s not like Dmanisi fossils, who are older, and it’s not like the youngest Homo Sapien-Meco Anatomy of Homo Antecorador. It is something intermediate, “said Rodrigo Lacruz, a professor of Molecular Patobiology at the University of New York, who did not participate in the new discovery, but has studied the evolution of the human face.
Therefore, discovery can help researchers better understand the history of early human evolution and migration in Europe.
“We can begin to rebuild how that population could have been, and that is a great value, because you begin to see how anatomy changes over time,” Lacruz said.
The team that discovered Pink said that the fossil is an adult, but they are not sure if a man or woman. The pink was found about 60 feet under the upper sedimentary rock layer, in a cave inside the Sierra de Atapuerca archaeological site, which is known by the rich historical record in its rock layers.
Within the same sedimentary level as the pink, the researchers found stone tools and animal bones with cut -made marks, which suggests that these first ancestors massacred animals for the meat.
The evidence suggests that the human ancestors established Europe in multiple waves, but that most of those populations were subsequently contracted and extinct. The fossil record is discontinuous at the Atapuerca site and in Western Europe as a whole, indicating that there were probably long periods without human presence.
The study postulates that the pink species belonged could have briefly superimposed with Homo Antecorador. It is also possible that the species has been eliminated during a climate change that began about 1.1 million years ago and has only been identified by researchers.
Chris Stringer, professor and leader of human evolution at the Museum of Natural History of London, who did not participate in the discovery of Pink, said the climate event “may have caused an important and perhaps complete human depopulation of Western Europe.”
The cave where pink was discovered, called the elephant, or elephant abyss, has produced convincing fossils before. In 2007, the researchers found a small piece of Jawbone that is believed to be approximately 1.2 million years old, which seems to be closely related to pink. However, Pink was found approximately 6 feet deeper than that fossil, which makes scientists believe it is older.
Martinón-Torres said the researchers were surprised to find a new and even deeper fossil. His first reaction to the discovery, he said, was: “Am I dreaming?”
The impressive collection of fossils in the region probably has to do with its geography.
“Atapuerca was a natural corridor between the different mountain systems,” said Martinón-Torres, added that there was wide water. “It was probably an ideal place for hominids to settle. They have the resources, they have the animals that pass. ”
Scientists are still digging on the archaeological site.
“We are going to continue excavating,” said Martinón-Torres. “We can have more surprises.”
