Wild Eva M, Teschler-Nicola Maria, Kutschera Walter, Steier Peter, Trinkaus Erik, Wanek Wolfgang
VERA (Vienna Environmental Research Accelerator) Laboratory, Institut für Isotopenforschung und Kernphysik der Universität Wien, Währingerstrasse 17, Austria.
Nature. 2005 May 19;435(7040):332-5. doi: 10.1038/nature03585.
The human fossil assemblage from the Mladec Caves in Moravia (Czech Republic) has been considered to derive from a middle or later phase of the Central European Aurignacian period on the basis of archaeological remains (a few stone artefacts and organic items such as bone points, awls, perforated teeth), despite questions of association between the human fossils and the archaeological materials and concerning the chronological implications of the limited archaeological remains. The morphological variability in the human assemblage, the presence of apparently archaic features in some specimens, and the assumed early date of the remains have made this fossil assemblage pivotal in assessments of modern human emergence within Europe. We present here the first successful direct accelerator mass spectrometry radiocarbon dating of five representative human fossils from the site. We selected sample materials from teeth and from one bone for 14C dating. The four tooth samples yielded uncalibrated ages of approximately 31,000 14C years before present, and the bone sample (an ulna) provided an uncertain more-recent age. These data are sufficient to confirm that the Mladec human assemblage is the oldest cranial, dental and postcranial assemblage of early modern humans in Europe and is therefore central to discussions of modern human emergence in the northwestern Old World and the fate of the Neanderthals.
基于考古遗迹（一些石器和诸如骨针、锥子、穿孔牙齿等有机物品），来自摩拉维亚（捷克共和国）姆拉德克洞穴的人类化石组合被认为源自中欧奥瑞纳文化时期的中期或后期，尽管人类化石与考古材料之间存在关联问题，且有限的考古遗迹的年代学意义也存在疑问。人类组合中的形态变异性、一些标本中明显的古老特征以及遗迹假定的早期年代，使得这个化石组合在评估欧洲现代人类的出现中具有关键作用。我们在此展示了对该遗址五具代表性人类化石首次成功进行的直接加速器质谱放射性碳测年。我们从牙齿和一块骨头中选取样本材料进行碳-14测年。四个牙齿样本得出的未经校正的年龄约为距今31000个碳-14年，而骨头样本（一块尺骨）给出了一个不确定的更近的年龄。这些数据足以证实姆拉德克人类组合是欧洲早期现代人类最古老的头骨、牙齿和颅后骨骼组合，因此对于讨论旧大陆西北部现代人类的出现以及尼安德特人的命运至关重要。
