Peștera cu Oase
Peştera cu Oase ( German bone cavity ) is called a system of twelve caves, which lie at 45 ° 01 'N, 21 ° 50' O ⊙ 45.01777777777821.833333333333 in the historical Banat region, in the circle Caras -Severin in southwest Romania. There, the oldest remains of anatomically modern humans in Europe (40,500 years old ) have been discovered.
Paleoanthropological findings
In February 2002, cavers discovered that in the southwestern Carpathian Mountains near Anina, in the Anina Mountains, explored the karst system in the minis - valley, a previously unknown chamber with numerous mammalian skeletons. The cave appears to be mainly upper pleistocene cave bears (Ursus spelaeus ) to have served for the winter. The unusual arrangement of some bones that lay about on elevated rocks, pointing to a human impact.
The cavers Ştefan Milota, Adrian Laurentiu Sarcina Bîlgăr and found a complete human mandible. The karst cave they called Peştera cu Oase and the human mandible Oasis 1
Two laboratories independently determined the radiocarbon age of 35,000 years, that is equivalent to around 40,500 years in calibrated calendar years for the lower jaw. The fossil belongs to the few finds in Europe, which could be dated directly; it is regarded as the oldest known fossil of modern humans in Europe. Since the reference is located near the Iron Gate in the Danube corridor, the fossil could represent one of the earliest human populations who colonized Europe.
Some characteristics and proportions of Oase 1 move the lower jaw into the relationship of modern, upper pleistocene humans, but it also shows features of archaic Homo sapiens and possibly Neanderthal.
In June 2003, another group of researchers from Ştefan Milota, Ricardo Rodrigo and Mircea Gherase discovered more human remains on the cave floor. It was a complete facial skeleton together with an almost complete temporal bone and a number of frontal, parietal and occipital bone fragments.
During the lower jaw Oase 1 comes from an adult, was one of the facial skull, which is called the oasis 2, a 15 -year-old adolescents. Further analyzes were initially suspect that the left temporal bone belonged to a third person, presumably a grown woman, hence called Oasis 3. Later work, however, have shown that the temporal bone belongs to the same skull as the other two oasis - bone. The absence of further archaeological finds such as charcoal or tools could mean that the human remains have been flushed through the columns in the cave.
Oasis oasis 2 and 3 confirm a pattern that was already known from the probably as old Oase 1 mandible, a mixture of archaic, early modern and Neanderthal features. The "modern" features include a prominent chin, lack of Überaugenwulst rounded head and skull. These features are associated with numerous archaic features of the skull and dentition, which put him outside the variation of modern humans, such as a large face, a bone comb behind the ears and big teeth, even the increase in size backwards. Anatomical features that are interpreted in particular by Erik Trinkaus and João Zilhão as a result of mating of anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens) and Neanderthals, were also used for the 25,000 -year-old child of Lagar Velho (Portugal) and 31,000 -year-old fossils of Mladeč (Czech Republic) asserted.
In Peştera cu Oase research continues. The finds from the campaign of 2005 are currently being investigated in the Romanian Speleology Institute " Emil Racovita ", also at the Australian National University ( electron spin resonance and uranium -thorium dating of 21 bone and tooth samples and 29 sediment samples ), Bristol University, (uranium - thorium dating of 22 bone samples ), the University of Bergen, (uranium -thorium dating of seven samples), the University of Oxford ( accelerator mass spectrometry radiocarbon dating of eight bone and tooth samples), the Max Planck Society ( isotope analysis and DNA analysis of 37 bone and tooth samples) and the University of Vienna ( radiocarbon dating of 25 bone and tooth samples).
Importance to paleoanthropology
The special importance of Peştera - cu - oasis - finds is the combination of "modern" and archaic ( Neanderthal ) characteristics, as well as the fact that the fossils could be dated directly. The oasis fossils overlap over a period of about 3000 years with late Neanderthals as those from the Vindija Cave ( Croatia), which have been dated to around 32,000 radiocarbon years or less, or in Arcy- sur-Cure (France) with around 34,000 radiocarbon years. The oasis - people could thus have come into contact with Neanderthals.
Since it can not be excluded from the genetic results that it has come to a gene flow of Neanderthal genome to modern humans, the Peştera - cu - oasis - finds by Erik Trinkaus and João Zilhão were interpreted to mean that such an admixture actually took place. Thus, modern humans would have encountered Neanderthals already on their arrival in Europe, would have mixed with them and paired. In the much larger gene pool of the modern human mitochondrial DNA of Neanderthals would be lost with time.