A new dating carried out by Australian and European scientists, including Spanish researchers from the UNED, the University of La Laguna (Tenerife) and the Archaeological and Ethnological Museum of Lucena (Córdoba), have concluded thatthe passage of Neanderthals through southern Iberia dates back to 42,000 years agoand not 35,000 years, as was thought until now. Therefore,homo sapiensYHomo neanderthalensisthey did not coexist in Upper Pleistocene Iberia. The dating has been made from samples found in the Jarama VI (Guadalajara) and Zafarraya (Malaga) sites, considered until now as one of the last “dwellings” of the Neanderthals in the Peninsula. The conclusions are published today in the prestigious magazinePNAS.
In the Iberian Peninsula, the main problem when it comes to dating bone remains is that “the hot climate rapidly degrades a protein necessary for radiocarbon dating,” according to the study authors. On this occasion, however, the team of researchers useda new ultrafiltration method, which consists of purifying collagen from bone samples by removing relatively recent carbon moleculesthat could have contaminated the studied bones, making them “appear younger” than they really are. The data thus obtained indicate thatNeanderthal occupation of the two sites is around 45,000 yearsback.
In view of these new results, the researcher from the Department of Prehistory and Archeology of the UNED and one of the authors of the study, Jesús F. Jordá, has predicted that“The Prehistory books should be reviewed”, above all, as new results are obtained. “Although at the moment there is a controversy to change the current theory, the new paradigm is having a good acceptance, by dint of presenting data that indicate the non-coexistence in the Iberian Peninsula of Neanderthals andhomo sapiens“says Jordá.
