Prehistory: Arrowheads and a milk tooth upend the known timeline of human occupation

The Mandrin cave, in the Drôme, has been excavated for decades.

This week, the discovery of arrowheads and a milk tooth highlighted its occupation by Homo sapiens while Neanderthal was still present.

AFP - LUDOVIC SLIMAK

Text by: RFI Follow

2 mins

The discovery of a milk tooth in a cave in the South of France and the whole history of the settlement of Europe is called into question.

The adventure of Homo Sapiens in this region of the world could have started much earlier than expected.

This discovery is due to an international team led by CNRS researchers from the University of Toulouse, in the Southwest, published in the journal

this week.

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So far, the story was quite simple: 40,000 years ago, Neanderthals disappeared from Europe, ousted by their more modern cousin, Homo Sapiens, who arrived from the Near East 5,000 years earlier.

And no clue betrayed a cohabitation between these two human species.

But this scenario has wavered since the discovery of this team of archaeologists led by the paleoanthropologist Ludovic Slimak, the fruit of more than thirty years of excavation of a rock shelter, the

in Drôme, in Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes.

It was occupied in the Middle and Upper Paleolithic and its archaeological layers tell of more than 80,000 years of occupation, a priori by Neanderthals.

The examination of the different layers, well preserved "in very regular sand deposits, carried by the mistral", tells the researcher to AFP, is rich in discoveries: one of them contains hundreds of flint points very finely cut, of an almost standardized execution, which has nothing to do with the more summary Neanderthal techniques.

The discovery of a baby tooth confirms it: modern man occupied the cave well, 54,000 years ago.

Or 10,000 years earlier than imagined.

These discoveries of the Mandrin cave show that it was occupied by the two groups, Sapiens and Neanderthals, where usually the first replaced the last for good.

Modern man would therefore have attempted several incursions into Europe, before colonizing the continent.

The Mandrin cave and its surroundings could be one of the meeting places between these two settlements. 

Many avenues remain to be explored.

The role of the Rhône corridor in population movements, for example.

The fine arrowheads found at Mandrin are cousins ​​of those found at the site of Ksar Akil, at the foot of Mount Lebanon (Lebanon).

One of the high places of the expansion of Homo sapiens to the east of the Mediterranean.

And also, it still remains to be understood how Homo Sapiens led Neanderthals to extinction, and became the only human species on earth.

  (and with AFP)

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