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  • New evidence for a 67,000-year-old human presence at Callao Cave, Luzon, Philippines

    Author(s)
    Salvador Mijares, Armand
    Detroit, Florent
    Piper, Philip
    Grun, Rainer
    Bellwood, Peter
    Aubert, Maxime
    Champion, Guillaume
    Cuevas, Nida
    De Leon, Alexandra
    Dizon, Eusebio
    Griffith University Author(s)
    Aubert, Maxime
    Year published
    2010
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    Abstract
    Documentation of early human migrations through Island Southeast Asia and Wallacea en route to Australia has always been problematic due to a lack of well-dated human skeletal remains. The best known modern humans are from Niah Cave in Borneo (40-42 ka), and from Tabon Cave on the island of Palawan, southwest Philippines (47 ᠱ1 ka). The discovery of Homo floresiensis on the island of Flores in eastern Indonesia has also highlighted the possibilities of identifying new hominin species on islands in the region. Here, we report the discovery of a human third metatarsal from Callao Cave in northern Luzon. Direct dating of the ...
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    Documentation of early human migrations through Island Southeast Asia and Wallacea en route to Australia has always been problematic due to a lack of well-dated human skeletal remains. The best known modern humans are from Niah Cave in Borneo (40-42 ka), and from Tabon Cave on the island of Palawan, southwest Philippines (47 ᠱ1 ka). The discovery of Homo floresiensis on the island of Flores in eastern Indonesia has also highlighted the possibilities of identifying new hominin species on islands in the region. Here, we report the discovery of a human third metatarsal from Callao Cave in northern Luzon. Direct dating of the specimen using U-series ablation has provided a minimum age estimate of 66.7 ᠱ ka, making it the oldest known human fossil in the Philippines. Its morphological features, as well as size and shape characteristics, indicate that the Callao metatarsal definitely belongs to the genus Homo. Morphometric analysis of the Callao metatarsal indicates that it has a gracile structure, close to that observed in other small-bodied Homo sapiens. Interestingly, the Callao metatarsal also falls within the morphological and size ranges of Homo habilis and H. floresiensis. Identifying whether the metatarsal represents the earliest record of H. sapiens so far recorded anywhere east of Wallace's Line requires further archaeological research, but its presence on the isolated island of Luzon over 65,000 years ago further demonstrates the abilities of humans to make open ocean crossings in the Late Pleistocene.
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    Journal Title
    Journal of Human Evolution
    Volume
    59
    Issue
    1
    DOI
    https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhevol.2010.04.008
    Subject
    Evolutionary biology
    Anthropology
    Archaeology
    Archaeological science
    Archaeology of Asia, Africa and the Americas
    Publication URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/10072/61347
    Collection
    • Journal articles

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    • Gold Coast
    • Logan
    • Brisbane - Queensland, Australia
    First Peoples of Australia
    • Aboriginal
    • Torres Strait Islander