Based on research in France’s Mandrin cave, in February 2022 we published a study in the journal Science Advances that pushed back the earliest evidence of the arrival of the first Homo sapiens in Europe to 54,000 years ago – 11 millennia earlier than had been previously established.
In the study, we described nine fossil teeth excavated from all the archeological layers in the cave. Eight were determined to be from Neanderthals, but one from one of the middle layers belonged to a paleolithic Homo sapiens. Based on this and other data, we determined that these early Homo sapiens of Europe were later replaced by Neanderthal populations.
The single Homo sapiens tooth was discovered in a remarkable and rich archeological layer that also included approximately 1,500 tiny stone blades or bladelets – some were less than 1 centimeter in length. They were all part of the “Neronian” tradition, named in ...
