Lapedo child
The Lapedo child is a complete pre-historical skeleton found in Portugal. In 1998, the discovery of an early Upper Paleolithic human burial at Abrigo do Lagar Velho, by the team led by pre-history archeologist João Zilhão, has provided evidence of early modern humans from the west of the Iberian Peninsula. The remains, the largely complete skeleton of an approximately 4-year-old child, buried with pierced shell and red ochre, is dated to ca. 24,500 years BP.[1] The cranium, mandible, dentition, and postcrania present a mosaic of European early modern human and Neanderthal features.[1] This (morphological) mosaic indicates admixture between late archaic and early modern humans in Iberia, refuting hypotheses of complete replacement of the Neanderthals by early modern humans and underlining the complexities of the cultural and biological processes and events that were involved in modern human emergence.[1]
This is contested by several scientists including Prof. Dr. C.P.E. Zollikofer of the University of Zurich who concluded the skeleton does not reveal Neanderthal affinities.[2] Genetic work from a decade later have shown that there has indeed been instances of admixture between Neanderthals and modern humans, bringing the hybrid hypothesis back within the realm of the possible. [3]
[edit] References
- ^ a b c Duarte et al.; Maurício, J; Pettitt, PB; Souto, P; Trinkaus, E; Van Der Plicht, H; Zilhão, J (1999). "The early Upper Paleolithic human skeleton from the Abrigo do Lagar Velho (Portugal) and modern human emergence in the Iberian Peninsula". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS) 96 (13): 7604–7609. doi:10.1073/pnas.96.13.7604. PMC 22133. PMID 10377462. http://www.pnas.org/content/96/13/7604.full. Retrieved 2009-06-21.
- ^ http://www.ifi.uzh.ch/~zolli/res_db/lv.htm
- ^ Callaway, E. (2010): Neanderthal genome reveals interbreeding with humans. New Scientist online, May 6th, 2010. article
[edit] External links
- Article in Athena Review (from WayBack Machine). Accessed on June 21st, 2009.
- Images in Instituto Português de Arqueologia. Accessed on June 21st, 2009. - page is no longer available
- Computerized reconstruction and geometric-morphometric analysis of the Lagar Velho child skeleton. Accessed on June 21st, 2009.
