2023-06-13 17:10:31
Between 86,000 and 68,000 years old
New fossil finds in a cave in Laos reveal that the first modern human migrations to Australia happened earlier than previously thought
In survival the rule of three prevails, three minutes without air, three hours without shelter, three days without water and three weeks without food can be fatal. Our ancestors were already well aware of this. Thanks to this need to have a home, even if it is temporary, we know the customs and even the trips that the first humans made from Africa to Australia.
It turns out that the Tam P Ling cave, in northern Laos, hid a secret that has remained within its stone walls for thousands of years. In this shelter from the elements and almost even from the passage of time, fossil remains that connect Australia with Southeast Asia were preserved. A finding that demonstrates how Modern humans spread through Arabia and Asia sooner than previously thought.
The research, carried out by a team of Laotian, French, American and Australian scientists, has used techniques such as radiometric dating and luminescence to establish a complete and certain chronology for the presence of A wise man (modern humans) in this cave in Laos, as suggested by an article published Tuesday in Nature Communications.
Since the first excavation in this cave in 2009, in which a skull and jawbone were found, the site has been challenging the belief that humans migrated mainly along the coasts and islands. Revealing that they also traversed wooded areas, possibly following river valleys. Some of these early migrants even settled, becoming the first modern humans to inhabit the region.
The excavations continued from 2010 until this year. Time during which they met seven pieces of human skeleton in different layers of sediment, which accumulated over tens of thousands of years. Remains that have been pushing the time line of migrations even further back in time. As highlighted in the document the main authors of the research, Fabrice Demeter, a paleoanthropologist at the University of Copenhagen, and Kira Westaway, an associate geochronologist at Macquarie University, Australia.
The new timeline established by the researchers provides valuable information about when the first humans arrived in this area, how long they were there, and what route they may have taken. For example, she shows that humans inhabited the area for more than 56,000 years.
However, the definitive clue, to determine when the first modern humans passed through the region, was hidden at a depth of seven meters. ANDl bone fragment of a legdating between 86,000 and 68,000 years old, I had the key. Thanks to the analysis of this fossil, the arrival of Homo has been delayed, approximately 40,000 years in chronology. sapiens to mainland Southeast Asia.
Dating the fossils from the Tam P Ling cave, located more than 300 kilometers from the sea, has been challenging due to a lack of animal bones or cave decorations suitable for radiocarbon dating. Since these human fossils are protected by Laotian law they preclude the kind of tampering necessary for most dating methods.
To overcome this challenge and achieve a more precise chronology, the researchers used luminescence dating techniques, uranium serial dating, and analysis of sediments under a microscope. In this way they analyzed a stalactite tip that had been buried in sediments and two bovine teeth that were 6.5 meters deep. “Without luminescence dating, this vital evidence would still not have a place on the timeline and the find site would be overlooked in the study of migration through the region,” Westaway notes.
Another interesting detail is that this cave is close to the recently discovered Cobra Cave, which was inhabited by Denisovanss approximately 70,000 years ago. This suggests that the region of mainland Southeast Asia may have been used as an early dispersal route by our ancestors, before the arrival of the A wise man.
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