ARCHÆOLOGY
Feb 25, 2021
3 minutes
A MONTHLY EXCAVATION OF ODDITIES AND ANTIQUITIES
NEANDERTHAL HELP WITH COVID
In 2002, scuba-diving explorers found a male Palæolithic jawbone, c.40,000 BC, deep within the Peᶊtera cu Oase (“Cave with Bones”), near Anina, Romania. Hailed as the earliest known vestige of early modern humans in Europe, when scientists analysed its DNA in 2015, they were surprised to find it contained roughly three times the amount of Neanderthal DNA found in today’s Europeans. Because the genome contained large stretches of uninterrupted Neanderthal sequences, researchers calculated that the jawbone’s owner
You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.
Start your free 30 days