December 23, 2024

Ancient Human Discovery: New Fossils Reveal a Mysterious Hominin Lineage From the Levant

Credit: Tel Aviv UniversityThe Nesher Ramla Homo, an archaic hominin group discovered in Israel, exposes a complex intermingling of African and eurasian hominins 140,000 years back, changing perceptions of Neanderthal origins.Researchers have discovered a formerly unknown population of antiquated hominins, called “Nesher Ramla Homo,” at a recently excavated website in Israel. According to Hershkovitz et al., the recently found Nesher Ramla Homo displays anatomical features that are more antiquated than contemporaneous Eurasian Neanderthals and the modern people who also lived in the Levant. Regardless of, the age of the Nesher Ramla material, the mismatched morphological and historical affinities, and the location of the site at the crossroads of Africa and Eurasia make this a major discovery,” composes Marta Lahr in an accompanying Perspective.For more on this research, see A Prehistoric Human Type Previously Unknown to Science.References:” A Middle Pleistocene Homo from Nesher Ramla, Israel” by Israel Hershkovitz, Hila May, Rachel Sarig, Ariel Pokhojaev, Dominique Grimaud-Hervé, Emiliano Bruner, Cinzia Fornai, Rolf Quam, Juan Luis Arsuaga, Viktoria A. Krenn, Maria Martinón-Torres, José María Bermúdez de Castro, Laura Martín-Francés, Viviane Slon, Lou Albessard-Ball, Amélie Vialet, Tim Schüler, Giorgio Manzi, Antonio Profico, Fabio Di Vincenzo, Gerhard W. Weber and Yossi Zaidner, 25 June 2021, Science.DOI: 10.1126/ science.abh3169″ Middle Pleistocene Homo habits and culture at 140,000 to 120,000 years earlier and interactions with Homo sapiens” by Yossi Zaidner, Laura Centi, Marion Prévost, Norbert Mercier, Christophe Falguères, Gilles Guérin, Hélène Valladas, Maïlys Richard, Asmodée Galy, Christophe Pécheyran, Olivier Tombret, Edwige Pons-Branchu, Naomi Porat, Ruth Shahack-Gross, David E. Friesem, Reuven Yeshurun, Zohar Turgeman-Yaffe, Amos Frumkin, Gadi Herzlinger, Ravid Ekshtain, Maayan Shemer, Oz Varoner, Rachel Sarig, Hila May and Israel Hershkovitz, 25 June 2021, Science.DOI: 10.1126/ science.abh3020.