The “Lapedo Boy” was finally dated

Discovered in Portugal in 1998, the “Lapedo Boy” left scientists perplexed for a long time thanks to a curious mix of characteristics. Now the child’s mysterious skeleton with traces of Homo Sapiens and Neanderthal was finally dated by archaeologists.

In 1998, archaeologists discovered the remains of a child’s skeleton in Lagar Velho, in the Lapedo Valley, located in the parish of Santa Eufémia, district of Leiria.

When the team examined more closely the spotted bones of ocher, it was surprised to find that the “Lapedo child” had a mixture of Neanderthal and Human Characteristics.

Using radiocarbon dating, archaeologists tried to find out when the child had been buried, but failed to determine A reliable period of time – only that it would have been about 30,000 years ago.

Now, using a new method of dating, an international group of researchers – including the archaeologist João Zillion and the anthropologist Cidália Duartemembers of the team that originally found the bones – deduced that the child was buried between 27,780 and 28,550 years ago.

The results of the study were presented in a published on Friday in the magazine Science Advances.

“Being able to date the child successfully was how to give him a small piece of his history, which is a huge privilege,” he says Bethan LinscottGeochemistry of the University of Miami and co-author of the study, to.

The new interval of dates contributes to the growing knowledge of scientists about the relationship between homo sapiens and neanderthals. Ancient DNA indicates that for thousands of years, before the Neanderthals disappeared, about 40,000 years ago.

Scientists have long been interrogate on the curious mixture of human and neanderthal traits of the child of Lapedo.

The skeleton Most had human characteristicsbut also presented the proportions of the body, the jaw and the occipital bone At the back of the skull, neanderthal characteristics.

At the time of the discovery of the skeleton, the idea that humans and neanderthals had hybridized it was not current; Neanderthal genome was only sequenced more than a decade later, revealing how modern humans have variable amounts of Neanderthal.

In their original 1999 study, the researchers suggested that the child laped was descendant of humans and neanderthals who had crossed much before.

The idea that a human and a Neanderthal hybridized directly to give birth to the child It is complicated by the known chronology From the extinction of the Neanderthal: the species had disappeared largely more than 10,000 years before the Laped child lived, although the neanderthals disappeared at different heights throughout Europe.

“There was something strange in the anatomy of the child. When we found the jaw, we knew that It would be a modern humanBut when we exposed the full skeleton we saw that he had the body proportions of a Neanderthal, ”in 2023 João Zillion, who led the team that in 1998 found the bones.

“The only thing that could explain this combination of characteristics is that the child was, in fact, evidence that Neanderthals and modern humans intersect,” said the researcher at the University of Lisbon.

The new chronology established for the child’s life provides additional information that archaeologists can now take into account while trying to unravel mysteries associated with the remainsand offer new knowledge about the overlap between humans and neanderthalsas well as clues about the eventual disappearance of the Neanderthals.

“The additional confirmation of the age of the site allows us to understand better, based on morphology, how the replacement process may have unfolded of the Neanderthals for Homo Sapiens ”, says Adam van arsdalePaleoAnthropologist of Wellesley College who was not involved in the study, to.

To determine the age of the child, scientists extracted an amino acid specific called hydroxyproline of the collagen of bones. This technique is good for dating contaminated archaeological samples, such as the child, explains Linscott.

Hydroxyproline is rare in nature and works essentially as a “DIGITAL PRINTING”Therefore, by dating hydroxyproline, we can be sure that the carbon we are dating comes directly from the bone and not contamination, ”the archaeologist details.

The team used the same technique to date other artifacts found in the child’s grave, including Rabbit bones, red deer bones and charcoal.

The analysis suggests that coal and red deer bones were much older than the child and They were probably already in place When the child was buried or used to position the body inside the pit.

Rabbit’s bones, on the contrary, seem to have been placed on site At the same time as the child, possibly as a funeral offering.

Prehistoric humans They used the site for about 300 years as a place of slaughter and processing of animal carcasses. But after the child’s funeral, the place was Abandoned for over 2,000 years.

Scientists are not sure why, but they say the child’s death will have played an important role. “Perhaps the event of death made the place taboo and a social rule to avoid it It was put into practice until the memory of the event faded, ”concludes João Zillion to.

More than 25 years after his discovery, the “Lapedo Boy” skeleton, which in 2021 was classified as National treasureat the National Museum of Archeology, in Lisbon – to decide if it will ever be exposed to the public.