Indonesia: DNA from 7,200-year-old skeleton questions human origin in region

Illustration of a DNA sequence © iStock / Svisio

Text by: Gabrielle Maréchaux Follow

6 mins

It is only the third skeleton from this era whose DNA could be exploited in Southeast Asia.

Found on the island of Celebes, it has made it possible to discover a new human group that is now extinct and makes the arrival of man in this region of the world even more mysterious.

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It is a discovery that is a little miracle and that quickly had to be preserved.

Deep in a cave, surprisingly well protected from tropical humidity and human intrusions, in 2015, on

the island of Celebes

, a team

of archaeologists

discovered bones dating from at least 7200 years ago.

Quickly, this find made noise and found itself threatened recalls Akin Duli, archaeologist at Hasannuddin University in Makassar: “ 

It was a fairly large cave, cool, sheltered from the rain and the sun.

This is also why these bones have been preserved.

But nature is so splendid there that soon after this discovery, people started to come there and a water park project was launched.

Fortunately we reported that this would damage the research and therefore the authorities stopped this project.

 "

"The hypothesis of a unique prehistoric life"

Once this discovery has been preserved, the work of archaeologists benefits from that of geneticists and a second small miracle occurs. By exploiting a very hard part of the found skull, it is possible to analyze 2% of its genome and the skeleton then begins to speak. It belongs to a teenage girl who died at 17 or 18 who was immediately baptized Bessé (pronounced 

bersik

), a name reserved for young girls from royalty in the local Bugis civilization. 

Under the eyes of a team of scientists from all over the world, this prehistoric princess allows us to learn more about the first human beings in

Southeast Asia

and Australia, explains Akin Duli: “ 

This discovery could confirm the hypothesis of a unique prehistoric life on the island of Celebes, of which we had already had proof with the discovery of the oldest figurative paintings in the world which date back at least 45,000 years. But until then, it was difficult to say what kinds of men populated the island, where they came from, where they were going. Thanks to Bessé's skeleton, we were able to analyze her DNA, and thus discover that she shared a good half of it with the Aborigines of Australia and the Papuans.

 " 

But only half of it, and that is the whole mystery of this discovery.

Because the Bessé genome has also revealed an unknown lineage from continental Asia that looks like no other and upsets everything we know about the Asian origins of the peoples of Southeast Asia.

Until then, only the arrival of Austronesians at the beginning of the Neolithic era was scientifically attested.

Bessé's skeleton is proof that a human group from the Asian continent had previously arrived in the region. 

But if the exact origin of this human group is eminently mysterious, its destiny is also, because the current inhabitants of the island of Celebes descend from the Austronesians, people possessing a significant know-how such as agriculture and domestication of animals.

"

Points of Maros 

"

Bessé belonged to a group of hunter-gatherers.

Found with small jagged arrows called " 

Maros points 

", it also remains the first skeleton discovered belonging to the Toalean civilization, named by Swiss archaeologists at the beginning of the 20th century.

Until then, the traces of this people of hunter-gatherers had only taken the form of artefacts found in the south of the island of Celebes, the oldest of which dates from 8,000 years ago. 

If Bessé was thus able to reveal some of his secrets to archaeologists, his discovery ultimately raises countless unanswered questions: Why did the Toalians disappear?

Could they navigate?

Could they be at the origin of the introduction of certain animals like the dingo in Oceania?

Are they the descendants of the men who painted on the caves of the island of Celebes the oldest figurative paintings discovered to date?

Only future discoveries could shed light on the history of the Toaliens, and they remain particularly rare in Southeast Asia, where the ambient humidity and the weather considerably damage all traces of prehistoric life.

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