A fragment of a face from a human ancestor is the oldest in Western Europe, according to the results of a new study published this week.
The incomplete skull — a section of the left cheek bone and upper jaw – was found in northern Spain in 2022 and published in the journal Nature on Wednesday.
Archaeologists believe the fossil is between 1.1 million and 1.4 million years old.
Researchers hope the discovery will provide some new insights about the first inhabitants of Western Europe during the Early Pleistocene epoch. Much of the available information from Western Europe is confined to the Iberian Peninsula.
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While a collection of older fossils from early human ancestors was previously found in the country of Georgia, the Spanish fossil is the first evidence that clearly shows human ancestors “were taking excursions into Europe” at that time, Rick Potts, director of the Smithsonian’s Human Origins Program, told The Associated Press.
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Still, there is no evidence that the earliest arrivals stayed there long, Potts said, noting that they may have ventured into other locations and then died out.
The partial skull bears similarities to Homo erectus, but there are also some anatomical differences, said study co-author Rosa Huguet, an archaeologist at the Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution in Tarragona, Spain.
Homo erectus arose around 2 million years ago and moved from Africa to regions of Asia and Europe, with the last individuals dying out around 100,000 years ago, said Potts.
It can be challenging to identify which group of early humans a fossil find belongs to if there’s only a single fragment versus many bones that show a range of features, said University of Zurich paleoanthropologist Christoph Zollikofer, who was not involved in the study.
The same cave complex in Spain’s Atapuerca Mountains where the new fossil was found also previously yielded other significant clues to the ancient human past. Researchers working in the region have also found more recent fossils of Neanderthals and early Homo sapiens.
