A single, broken molar found in southeastern France could push back the first evidence of modern humans in Europe by nearly 10,000 years. WeekendReads
The discoveries that could change that picture come from a rocky overhang known as Grotte Mandrin in the verdant Rhône River Valley. Since 1990, excavations of the cave’s floor have delved into 12 sedimentary layers deposited between 80,000 and 35,000 years ago.
Layer E’s stone tools back up the tooth’s identification, Slimak says: They are smaller, more precisely made, and more standardized than the tools from the layers bearing Neanderthal teeth, which resemble Neanderthals’ characteristic Mousterian tools. “With Neanderthal tools, every tool is a creation,” Slimak says. “If you look at 1000 tools, each will be completely different.
But the layer E molar is key to the argument. Shara Bailey, a dental paleoanthropologist at New York University who developed methods to distinguish modern and Neanderthal teeth, isn’t certain the molar came from a modern human. Too much of it is missing, she says. “It would be so cool if it were true … but it’s not a slam dunk.”
Tiny chunks of mineral fell from the cave wall into each excavated layer. The sequence of soot layers in wall chunks from layer E overlapped with the sequence in chunks from the layer immediately beneath it, which held Neanderthal tools. That suggests only a brief period passed between the formation of the layers and therefore between the exit of the Neanderthals and the entrance of moderns—perhaps no more than a single calendar year.
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