Evolution Diary

Excavations in a cave in the mountains of northern Spain have uncovered the oldest known remains of human ancestors in Western Europe, scientists reported Wednesday.

A jaw bone, which could belong to the oldest known European, excavated by Spanish researchers in a cave at the Atapuerca site near the city of Burgos.

The fossils of a lower jaw and teeth, more than 1.1 million years old, were found in sediments along with stone tools and bones of animals that appeared to have been butchered. The remains have been attributed to the previously known species Homo antecessor, a possible ancestor of Neanderthals and modern humans.

The discovery is described in the current issue of the journal Nature by Spanish and American scientists led by Eudald Carbonell of the Catalan Institute of Human Paleontology and Social Evolution at Tarragona, Spain. The scientists, noting that the earliest presence of human ancestors in Europe is “one of the most debated topics in paleoanthropology,” said the site, Sima del Elefante in the Atapuerca Mountains, held the “oldest, most accurately dated record” of both fossils and artifacts of human occupation in Western Europe.

Other sites on the Continent yielded artifacts of a roughly comparable age, but no fossil bones. Until now, the earliest remains of Homo antecessor, from the same mountains, were 800,000 years old.

“It’s great to have confirmation that there was early human penetration in Western Europe this early,” said Ian Tattersall, a paleonanthropologist at the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan, who was not involved in the research.

Dr. Tattersall said in an interview that it was too soon to tell where these cave occupants “fit in the larger scale” of early human settlement in Europe.

Dr. Carbonell’s group conceded that the identification of the fossils as Homo antecessor was provisional. But those in the cave had been busy making crude tools from chert, a tough rock. A few pieces survived, along with knapping flakes. The animal bones showed cut marks and other signs of processing.

News reposted from New York Times