140,000 bones reveal secrets about extinct human species

The bones of an extinct human ancestor were recovered from the seabed in Indonesia, revealing a population of Man alert Previously unknown in Southeast Asia who will have interacted with more modern humans.

Were found at the bottom of the sea, bones of Man alert – which, according to a new study, point to an unknown population of hominids that hunted in now submerged lands.

The bones of H. erectus were among a set of more than 6,000 fossils of animals collected during excavations off Island of Java, Indonesia.

As a note, it is the first time scientists have fossil from the submerged parts of the Indonesian archipelago, which connected islands like Java to the Asian continent during the last glacier era when the level of the sea was lower.

Currently, they are lost lands, but about 140,000 years ago, they were vast open plains interspersed with rivers, which earned the name of Fundor sundaic region.

The newly discovered fossils revealed that the rivers were full of fish, turtles, river sharks, hippos and other marine life forms… and not only. After all, also There were signs of a hominid population hitherto unknown.

The remains suggest that these hominids selectively hunting cows similar to their heights, something that H. erectus Indonesian, for example, is unaware.

In some of the fossils, cuts of cuts were found that confirmed that the hominids of the narrow of mature hunted turtles and large animals.

This hunting technique is associated with more modern humans on the Asian continent, which raises the possibility of the newly discovered population H. erectus have copied the strategy of other human relatives.

Harold Berghuisthe main author of the study, explains to Live Science that “the hominids of the ripe narrow may have developed this hunting strategy independently; but there is another possibility that we are facing a kind of cultural exchange.”

The researchers presented the results of their research in four articles [, , , ] published in the magazine Quaternary Environments and Human.

O H. erectus It is an important part of our evolutionary history. Emerged for at least 2 million years. It was the first species to develop body proportions similar to those of man And the first human species to migrate out of Africa, eventually reaching Southeast Asia.

The latest discovery of H. erectus It is just the tip of a mountain of documented discoveries in new studies.

Scientists identified 36 different species in a total of 6372 fossils recovered: the discovery of Man alert It was just the tip of the iceberg.

Among the 36, fossils were identified komodo dragons (Varanus Komodoensis), giant lizards capable of slowly killing large animals, including buffalo, through poisonous bites.

Currently, they are an endangered species, restricted to some Indonesia islands, but studies suggest that they may have been “Kings” of the plains Sundaland, says Berghuis: “Komodo dragons may have been the most important predators.

This discovery of fossils was on the sidelines of a major construction project in the Madura Strait. Between 2014 and 2015, about 5 million cubic meters of sand and sandstones from the sea bottom were removed near the Surabaya port city to create an artificial island.