New Dating for Denisova Cave

Angela

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"Denisova Cave is the only site in the world known to have been occupied by both Denisovans and Neanderthals at various times. Two new studies published in the journal Nature, now put a timeline on when the two groups of archaic humans (hominins) were present at the site and the environmental conditions they faced before going extinct. The studies identify the age of the earliest Denisovans and Neanderthals in Southern Siberia. One of the studies, was led by Dr Katerina Douka from the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, while the other one was led by Zenobia Jacobs of the University of Wollongong in Australia."

"The new studies show that the cave was occupied by Denisovans from at least 200,000 years ago, with stone tools in the deepest deposits suggesting human occupation may have begun as early as 300,000 years ago. Neanderthals visited the site between 200,000 and 100,000 years ago, with “Denny”, the girl of mixed ancestry, revealing that the two groups of hominins met and interbred around 100,000 years ago.Most of the evidence for Neanderthals at Denisova Cave falls within the last interglacial period around 120,000 years ago, when the climate was relatively warm, whereas Denisovans survived through much colder periods, too, before disappearing around 50,000 years ago.
Modern humans were present in other parts of Asia by this time, but the nature of any encounters between them and Denisovans remains open to speculation in the absence of any fossil or genetic traces of modern humans at the site.
Oldest known artifacts from Northern Europe that are associated with modern humans
Douka’s team also identified the earliest evidence thus far in northern Eurasia for the appearance of bone points and pendants made of animal teeth that are usually associated with modern humans and signal the start of the Upper Palaeolithic. These date to between 43,000 and 49,000 years ago.
Professor Higham commented that “it is an open question as to whether Denisovans or modern humans made these personal ornaments found in the cave. We are hoping that in due course the application of sediment DNA analysis and further direct dating of such ornaments might enable us to identify the makers of these items, which are often associated with symbolic and more complex behaviour in the archaeological record.”

See:
https://www.shh.mpg.de/1192251/denisovan-neanderthal-douka

It's full of excellent information. Thanks to Iosif Lazaridis for the heads up.

See also the Science article:
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/201...se-siberian-cave-100000-years-earlier-thought

The link says it. The dating is 100,000 years earlier than thought.
 
Denisova cave is an ongoing story, probably for more decades to go
strange no other traces nearby
this cave must have been very attractive to humans
 
Denisova cave is an ongoing story, probably for more decades to go
strange no other traces nearby
this cave must have been very attractive to humans

Or it might have been the only cave available for averge human use. The more small caves nearby might have been under ice, fill with predators, or difficult to use because of different geographical realities. Or maybe it just had a specific meaning for the people leaving nearby.
 
the denisovans who came back to denisova cave 90 ka and crossbred with Vindija-like neanderthals must have lived elsewhere
the same for the 55-50 ka denisovan in the denisova cave who was unadmixed with the Vindija-like neanderthals
 

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