The Neanderthal in the karst: First dating, morphometric, and paleogenetic data on the fossil skeleton from Altamura (Italy)

Martina Lari, Fabio Di Vincenzo, Andrea Borsato*, Silvia Ghirotto, Mario Micheli, Carlotta Balsamo, Carmine Collina, Gianluca De Bellis, Silvia Frisia, Giacomo Giacobini, Elena Gigli, John C. Hellstrom, Antonella Lannino, Alessandra Modi, Alessandro Pietrelli, Elena Pilli, Antonio Profico, Oscar Ramirez, Ermanno Rizzi, Stefania VaiDonata Venturo, Marcello Piperno, Carles Lalueza-Fox, Guido Barbujani, David Caramelli, Giorgio Manzi

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

In 1993, a fossil hominin skeleton was discovered in the karst caves of Lamalunga, near Altamura, in southern Italy. Despite the fact that this specimen represents one of the most extraordinary hominin specimens ever found in Europe, for the last two decades our knowledge of it has been based purely on the documented on-site observations. Recently, the retrieval from the cave of a fragment of bone (part of the right scapula) allowed the first dating of the individual, the quantitative analysis of a diagnostic morphological feature, and a preliminary paleogenetic characterization of this hominin skeleton from Altamura. Overall, the results concur in indicating that it belongs to the hypodigm of Homo neanderthalensis, with some phenetic peculiarities that appear consistent with a chronology ranging from 172±15ka to 130.1±1.9ka. Thus, the skeleton from Altamura represents the most ancient Neanderthal from which endogenous DNA has ever been extracted.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)88-94
Number of pages7
JournalJournal of Human Evolution
Volume82
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 May 2015

Keywords

  • Ancient DNA
  • Geometric morphometrics
  • Scapula
  • U/TH dating

Cite this