Binghamton anthropologist Rolf Patis says: “Eight small teeth found in an Israeli cave raise big questions about the earliest existence of humans and where we may have originated”.
Excavated at Qesem cave in 2000, the teeth are similar in size and shape to those of modern man, Homo sapiens, which have been found at other sites in Israel, such as Oafzeh and Skhul but they’re a lot older than any previously discovered remains.
The Qesem teeth come from a time period between 200,000-400,000 years ago when human remains from the Middle East are very scarce. So these teeth are providing us with some new information about who the earlier occupants of this region were as well as their potential evolutionary relationships with the later fossils from this same region.”
The teeth also present new evidence as to where a modern man might have originated. Anthropologists believe that modern humans and Neanderthals shared a common ancestor who lived in Africa more than 700,000 years ago. Some of the descendants of this common ancestor migrated to Europe and developed into Neanderthals. Another group stayed in Africa and evolved into Homo sapiens, later migrating out of the continent.
But according to Patis, the verdict is still out as to what species is represented by these eight teeth, which poses a challenge for any kind of positive identification.
“We know for sure that we’re dealing with six individuals of differing ages. Two of the teeth are actually deciduous or ‘milk’ teeth, which mean that these individuals were young children. But the problem is that all the teeth are separate so it’s been really hard to determine which species we’re dealing with.”
According to Patis, rather than rely on individual features, anthropologists use a combination of characteristics to get an accurate reading on species type. For instance, Neanderthals have relatively large incisors and distinctive molars and premolars, whereas Homo sapiens’ teeth are smaller with incisors that are straighter along the “lip” side of the face. Sometimes the differences are subtle, but it’s these small changes that make having a number of teeth from the same individual that much more important.
But even though Patis and his colleagues don’t know for sure which species the teeth belong to, these dental “records” still tell them a lot about the past.
“Teeth are evolutionarily very conservative structures,” Patis says. “And so any differences in their features can provide us with all sorts of interesting information about an individual. It can tell us what they ate, what their growth and development patterns looked like as well as what their general health was like during their lifetime. They can also tell us about the evolutionary relationships between species, all of which adds to our knowledge of who we are and where we came from.”