Youngest of their kind ever found in mainland East Asia
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  IMAGE: An artist's reconstruction of fossils from two caves in southwest China have revealed a previously unknown Stone Age people and give a rare glimpse of a recent stage of human...
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Fossils from two caves in south-west China have revealed a previously unknown Stone Age people and give a rare glimpse of a recent stage of human evolution with startling implications for the early peopling of Asia.
The fossils are of a people with a highly unusual mix of archaic and modern anatomical features and are the youngest of their kind ever found in mainland East Asia.
Dated to just 14,500 to 11,500 years old, these people would have shared the landscape with modern-looking people at a time when China's earliest farming cultures were beginning, says an international team of scientists led by Associate Professor Darren Curnoe, of the University of New South Wales, and Professor Ji Xueping of the Yunnan Institute of Cultural Relics and Archeology.
Details of the discovery are published in the journal
PLoS One. The team has been cautious about classifying the fossils because of their unusual mosaic of features.
"These new fossils might be of a previously unknown species, one that survived until the very end of the Ice Age around 11,000 years ago," says Professor Curnoe.
"Alternatively, they might represent a very early and previously unknown migration of modern humans out of Africa, a population who may not have contributed genetically to living people."
The remains of at least three individuals were found by Chinese archaeologists at Maludong (or Red Deer Cave), near the city of Mengzi in Yunnan Province during 1989. They remained unstudied until research began in 2008, involving scientists from six Chinese and five Australian institutions.
A Chinese geologist found a fourth partial skeleton in 1979 in a cave near the village of Longlin, in neighbouring Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. It stayed encased in a block of rock until 2009 when the international team removed and reconstructed the fossils.
The skulls and teeth from Maludong and Longlin are very similar to each other and show an unusual mixture of archaic and modern anatomical features, as well as some previously unseen characters.
While Asia today contains more than half of the world's population, scientists still know little about how modern humans evolved there after our ancestors settled Eurasia some 70,000 years ago, notes Professor Curnoe.
The scientists are calling them the "red-deer people" because they hunted extinct red deer and cooked them in the cave at Maludong.
The Asian landmass is vast and scientific attention on human origins has focussed largely on Europe and Africa: research efforts have been hampered by a lack of fossils in Asia and a poor understanding of the age of those already found.
Until now, no fossils younger than 100,000 years old have been found in mainland East Asia resembling any species other than our own (
Homo sapiens). This indicated the region had been empty of our evolutionary cousins when the first modern humans appeared. The new discovery suggests this might not have been the case after all and throws the spotlight once more on Asia.
"Because of the geographical diversity caused by the Qinghai-Tibet plateau, south-west China is well known as a biodiversity hotspot and for its great cultural diversity. That diversity extends well back in time" says Professor Ji.
In the last decade, Asia has produced the 17,000-year-old and highly enigmatic Indonesian
Homo floresiensis ("The Hobbit") and evidence for modern human interbreeding with the ancient Denisovans from Siberia.
"The discovery of the red-deer people opens the next chapter in the human evolutionary story – the Asian chapter – and it's a story that's just beginning to be told," says Professor Curnoe.
References:
Contact: Bob Beale
bbeale@unsw.edu.au
61-041-170-5435
University of New South Wales
Original Release:
Mystery human fossils put spotlight on China
"This From George - Civil War Letters and One Man's
Perspective on his American Civil War Experience” will be presented at the
Susquehanna River Archaeological Center (SRAC) on Tuesday, April 3rd
from 6:30pm – 7:30pm by Eileen M. Patch from Endwell, NY. The presentation is
based on a book authored by Ms. Patch recently..JPG)
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We emptied our lecture hall for the Eastern African Exhibit and now have
reloaded new cases with a very special exhibit from the Ted Keir
Collection at SRAC - with hundreds of fossils and seashells!
Your donation to SRAC will keep our prehistoric past alive for generations to come!
Items for Resale:
Certain items donated to SRAC can be resold for a donation. From items
that we can resell in our gift shop to eBay, SRAC would be happy to
talk to you about items that you may want to donate to SRAC for resale.
Once items are sold, we will be happy to provide documentation of the
resale value tax purposes. Please talk to your accountant for
additional information concerning the tax deductions available for the
items that you want to donate.
Time is running out for those of you who have not experienced the Eastern African Exhibit at the Susquehanna River Archaeological Center. The "Ordinary Objects, Extraordinary People" exhibit which represents the eight nomadic tribes of Eastern Africa will close on Saturday March 17th, 2012.
Maps of Africa pinpoint the area traversed by the tribes of the nomads
as they eke out their existence in the harsh sub-Saharan environment.
The tribes navigate the desert from one watering hole to the next,
staying for months at a time and then moving on to find a new source of
water and food. Because all tribes are constantly traveling, all
possessions must be portable. Dress consists of sandals, ornate beaded
collars and simple clothing which are represented in the exhibit.
Visitors will also see a Somali hut which is occupied by up to two
adults and three children, and although are made to be portable with its
branches thatched with raffia , it can last 25 – 30 years and can
withstand wind gusts of 40-50 miles an hour. Near the hut, a camel sits
close by with its feed and watering trough while a fire with wooden
stools invites visitors of all ages to sit and take in all that
surrounds them. Simple utensils, ornate headrests, spears and throwing
sticks, and beautifully created milk containers also adorn shelves of
the exhibit, with many more artifacts to discover around each corner.
Visitors are invited to touch, smell and experience the exhibit with a
hands-on approach not seen in many museums today.
The exhibit itself fills nearly 2,000 square feet at SRAC where they
have been redesigning their lecture hall space for weeks in order to
make this an incredible experience for all who visit the exhibit.
