JAKARTA - A recent re-examination of artifacts from the archaeological excavation site Boker Tachtit in Israel's central Negev desert has found that humans probably coexisted with neanderthals around 50,000 years ago.
The study also found that Boker Tachtit was the earliest known migration point from Africa for early Homo sapiens (humans) in the Levant region.
The study, published Monday 14 June in the scientific journal 'Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences', led by researchers from the Weizmann Institute of Science and the Max Planck Society, Prof. Elisabetta Boaretto, along with Dr. Omry Barzilai of the Israeli Antiquities Authority (IAA).
"Boker Tachtit is the first site outside Africa, which modern humans penetrated on their journeys around the world. Therefore the importance of the site, as well as the importance of dating it accurately," Dr. Tachtit said. Barzilai, director of excavations at the Boker Tachtit site on behalf of the IAA, said in a statement, citing The Jerusalem Post.
"The age of the site as dated in the study, around 50,000 years, suggests modern humans existed in the Negev area at the same time as Neanderthal humans, who are known to have lived in it during this period," he explained.
"There is no doubt that both species, living and roaming the Negev, are aware of each other's existence. Our research Boker Tachtit site places an important and unequivocal point of reference on the timeline of human evolution," explains Barzilai.
According to the theory of 'recent African origin', Homo sapiens originated in Africa about 270,000 years ago, at different times taking a northern route to Eurasia, through the Levant, or several possible southern routes to remote corners of Asia and even Oceania, reaching Australia via land.
DNA research shows the migration of modern human groups began from Africa to Asia and Europe, and from there to the rest of the world about 60,000 years ago, causing Neanderthals to disappear and be assimilated into modern human populations.
During the Middle Paleolithic period (50,000-250,000 years ago), two different human species lived in the world at the same time, Neanderthal man and modern man.
Neanderthals lived in Europe and Central Asia, while modern humans lived in Africa. The Middle East and Israel in particular are the limits of the distribution of this species, so they also contain the remains of two populations at different time periods.
Boker Tachtit, located in the Wadi Zin basin in what is now Ein Avdat National Park, is considered a key site for tracking migration out of Africa.
It is considered a major site in the Levant for documenting an important period in human prehistory, the transition from a prehistoric culture dominated by Neanderthals to the beginning of modern human rule. This transition was marked by technological innovations such as the production of blades and the introduction of standard tools made of bone and horn.
American archaeologist Anthony Marks, who first excavated and published his analysis of Boker Tachtit in the early 1980s, defined the site as a transitional industry from the Middle Paleolithic to Upper Paleolithic and, based on one radiocarbon dating, concluded that the site dates back 47,000 years.
The problem is, the additional dates obtained from the site, some as far back as 34,000 years ago, make the timing of the transition particularly problematic.
"If we follow this timeline, then the transition period could last more than 10,000 years, but artifacts excavated from northern sites in Israel, Lebanon and even Turkey show that the transition happened much more quickly," said Boaretto, who heads D-REAMS. (The Dangoor Research Accelerator Mass Spectrometry), a laboratory at the Weizmann Institute specializing in advanced archaeological dating methods.
To answer this question, Boaretto, Barzilai and their multidisciplinary team carried out advanced dating methods on specimens obtained from Boker Tachtit during their new excavations in 2013–2015.
These methods include newer techniques, such as high-resolution radiocarbon dating of single pieces of charcoal found at the site and optically stimulated luminescence dating of quartz sand grains, carried out at the Weizmann Institute and at the Max Planck Institute.
The researchers also integrated a detailed study of the sediments, used micro-archeological methods to understand how the site was physically formed, and to contribute the necessary data for the construction of its chronological framework.
"We can now conclude with greater confidence that the Middle Upper Paleolithic transition was a fairly fast-growing event that began at Boker Tachtit about 50-49,000 years ago. Ended about 44,000 years ago," Boaretto said.
This dating allows for some overlap between the transition that occurred in Boker Tachtit and the Mediterranean forest region (Lebanon, Turkey) between 49,000 and 46,000 years ago.
"The dating results prove, for the first time in prehistoric research, that there is indeed a spatial overlap between the late Mostar culture, which is identified with Neanderthal humans, and the Emir culture, related to the emergence of modern humans in the Middle Ages," said Barzilai.
According to the new dating scheme, the early phase at Boker Tachtit also overlaps with the earlier Middle Paleolithic culture locally in the region, namely the Neanderthals.
"This suggests that Neanderthals and Homo sapiens in the Negev Desert coexisted and most likely interacted with each other, resulting in not only genetic crossbreeding, as postulated by the 'recent African origin' theory, but also in cultural exchange," Boaretto and Barzilay conclude. .
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