An international team of scientists has discovered new evidence of the cosmic impact at Abu Hureyra, Syria, at the start of Young Dryas 12,800 years ago. The site consists of two settlements, two villages that archaeologists call Abu Hureyra 1 and Abu Hureyra 2, which span a chronological period of 4,000 years from the Epipaleolithic, between 13,000 and 9,000 years ago, to the Neolithic period.
Tell Abu Hureyra, the place where humans became farmers
Abu Hureyra witnessed the moment when ancient nomadic peoples first settled down and started farming – they became farmers. Today the settlement is under Lake Assad delimited by a large mound. However, before the 525 square kilometer man-made lake was formed by the construction of the Tabqa Dam that would submerge the site, archaeologists were forced to urgently excavate it and were able to carefully extract and describe much material, including parts of houses, food and tools, a wealth of evidence that allowed them to identify the transition to agriculture almost 12,800 years ago. It was undoubtedly one of the most important events in the cultural and environmental history of our Earth.
Archaeologists found melted glass among cereals and grains, as well as in early building materials and animal bones . According to experts, the characteristics of the melted glass indicate that it was made at extremely high temperatures, much higher than what humans could reach at the time, which is why it was caused by … an object from space.
“To improve perspective, such high temperatures would completely melt a car in less than a minute,” said James Kennett, emeritus professor of geology at the University of California, Santa Barbara (USA). Such intensity could only have been the result of an extremely violent, high-energy, high-speed phenomenon, something on the order of a cosmic impact.
A comet?
Experts say Abu Hureyra is the first place to document the direct effects of a fragmented comet colliding on a human settlement. All of these fragments are part of the same comet that probably struck Earth at the end of the Pleistocene and exploded in the atmosphere. This influence contributed to the extinction of most large animals, including mammoths, horses, and camels, the disappearance of the North American Clovis culture, and the abrupt appearance of the first Ice Age.
“Our new discoveries are much more significant evidence of very high temperatures that can only be associated with a cosmic influence,” says Kennett.
The cosmic impact hypothesis has grown in importance in recent years due to many recent discoveries, including a very young impact crater under the Hiawatha Glacier of the Greenland Ice Sheet, as well as high-temperature melting glass and other evidence. Similar at an archaeological site in Pilauco in southern Chile.
“The town of Abu Hureyra would have been violently destroyed,” Kennett said, thanks to this direct evidence of the catastrophe in this early human settlement. An impact or explosion had to happen close enough to send massive heat and molten glass into this human settlement.
Analysis
The researchers analyzed the glass to determine the geochemical composition, shape, structure, formation temperature, magnetic properties, and water content. The results showed that it was formed at very high temperatures and contained minerals that were rich in chromium, iron, nickel, sulfides, titanium, and even platinum- and iridium-rich cast iron, all formed at temperatures above 2,200 ° C.
According to the study, the melting glass was created “from the almost instantaneous melting and evaporation of regional biomass, soils and flood deposits, followed by immediate cooling.”
Referencia: Andrew M. T. Moore, James P. Kennett, William M. Napier, Ted E. Bunch, James C. Weaver, Malcolm LeCompte, A. Victor Adedeji, Paul Hackley, Gunther Kletetschka, Robert E. Hermes, James H. Wittke, Joshua J. Razink, Michael W. Gaultois, Allen West. Evidence of Cosmic Impact at Abu Hureyra, Syria at the Younger Dryas Onset (~12.8 ka): High-temperature melting at >2200 °C. Scientific Reports, 2020; 10 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-60867-w
