Scientists at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History have discovered the earliest evidence that humans’ close evolutionary relatives killed and likely ate each other 1.45 million years ago. The research was published in the journal scientific reports.
In the study, scientists identified 11 cut marks on a relative’s left shin. homo sapiens, his remains were found in Kenya. Analysis of 3D models of the fossil made from tooth material showed that nine of them were left during butchery with stone tools. To find out, the scientists compared the scanned fossils with specimens from a database of 898 teeth marks and cuts created during controlled experiments. Two more marks remained from the bites of a big cat, most likely a saber-toothed lion.
The cuts don’t prove that the human relative who made them also ate the leg, but they are located where the calf muscle would attach to the bone – a good place to cut if the goal is to remove a piece of meat.
“The available information tells us that hominins probably ate other hominins at least 1.45 million years ago,” the scientists said.
Experts agree that they do not have enough information to understand what kind of person the bone belongs to. The authors of the study do not exclude that the owner of the bone was killed by a different species. The truth is that homo sapiens It is just one of many human species. It belongs to the genus Neanderthals, Denisovans, Heidelberg people, and Homo Erectus. Homo. For thousands of years, different species coexisted with each other.
The human genome still contains evidence of interbreeding with different species, such as Neanderthals and Denisovans. Previously, members of the genus were known to exist. Homo Not only did they interbreed, they also ate each other, but a new study has shown that cannibalism arose much earlier than previously thought.
ancient scientists discoveredThat 30,000 years ago, after humans, crows ate mammoths.