Department of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany.
Chaire Internationale de Paléoanthropologie, Collège de France, Paris, France.
Nature. 2020 May;581(7808):299-302. doi: 10.1038/s41586-020-2259-z. Epub 2020 May 11.
The Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition in Europe witnessed the replacement and partial absorption of local Neanderthal populations by Homo sapiens populations of African origin. However, this process probably varied across regions and its details remain largely unknown. In particular, the duration of chronological overlap between the two groups is much debated, as are the implications of this overlap for the nature of the biological and cultural interactions between Neanderthals and H. sapiens. Here we report the discovery and direct dating of human remains found in association with Initial Upper Palaeolithic artefacts, from excavations at Bacho Kiro Cave (Bulgaria). Morphological analysis of a tooth and mitochondrial DNA from several hominin bone fragments, identified through proteomic screening, assign these finds to H. sapiens and link the expansion of Initial Upper Palaeolithic technologies with the spread of H. sapiens into the mid-latitudes of Eurasia before 45 thousand years ago. The excavations yielded a wealth of bone artefacts, including pendants manufactured from cave bear teeth that are reminiscent of those later produced by the last Neanderthals of western Europe. These finds are consistent with models based on the arrival of multiple waves of H. sapiens into Europe coming into contact with declining Neanderthal populations.
在欧洲中更新世至晚更新世过渡期，当地的尼安德特人群被非洲起源的智人群体取代和部分吸收。然而，这个过程可能在不同地区有所不同，其细节在很大程度上仍然未知。特别是，这两个群体之间的时间重叠的持续时间存在很大争议，这种重叠对尼安德特人和智人之间的生物和文化相互作用的性质的影响也是如此。在这里，我们报告了在保加利亚 Bacho Kiro 洞穴的发掘中发现的与初始上部旧石器时代人工制品有关的人类遗骸的发现和直接年代测定。通过蛋白质组筛选鉴定的来自几个人类骨骼碎片的牙齿形态分析和线粒体 DNA 将这些发现归因于智人，并将初始上部旧石器时代技术的扩展与智人在 45000 年前之前扩散到欧亚大陆的中纬度地区联系起来。这些发掘出土了大量的骨制人工制品，包括由洞熊牙齿制成的吊坠，这些吊坠让人联想到后来西欧的最后一批尼安德特人制作的吊坠。这些发现与基于智人多次进入欧洲并与衰落的尼安德特人群接触的模型是一致的。
