Oldest Human Hairs Found in Hyena Dung

Richard · 05-11-2009, 08:06

All the obvious jokes aside - I found it interesting.

Richard's $.02

Quote:

Oldest Human Hairs Found in Hyena Dung
Sarah Hoffman, Natural History Magazine, 11 May 2009

The oldest known human hair belonged to a 9,000-year-old mummy disinterred from an ancient Chilean cemetery.

Until now: a recent discovery pushes the record back some 200,000 years. (And the newly discovered strands received a rather less dignified burial.)

While excavating in Gladysvale Cave, near Johannesburg, South Africa, a team of researchers from the University of the Witwatersrand discovered an ancient brown-hyena latrine. Upon inspection, hyena coprolites - fossilized dung - appeared to contain uncannily hair-like structures.

Lucinda Backwell, a paleontologist in the group, took a sediment block containing several coprolites back to the lab for a closer look. She and a colleague carefully removed forty of the "hairs apparent" from one of the coprolites and subjected half to scanning-electron microscopy. Sure enough, fossilized hairs they were, and five showed remarkably preserved surface scales.

Comparing the scales to those of a variety of animals - an admittedly tricky undertaking - Backwell's team concluded that human hairs were the best match.

Dating of the cave's limestone layers showed that the dung had been deposited sometime between 257,000 and 195,000 years ago. During that period, both early Homo sapiens and a relation, H. heidelbergensis, roamed the South African landscape.

A couple of chilling explanations spring to mind as to how human hairs might have become lodged in hyena dung. Backwell thinks it most likely that a brown hyena scavenged an ancestral human's remains.

The finding was detailed in the Journal of Archaeological Science.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/...undinhyenadung

**Pete** · 05-11-2009, 08:34

Other than the obvious - the critter ate it.

200,000 years ago? Scavenged?

Without knowing "How" they lived it's a bit hard to list a reason.

Could just as well have gotten away from the group and been taken down as prey.

**Bill Harsey** · 05-11-2009, 09:32

Richard,
Good story.
small detail... Natural History Magazine needs to do their homework on previously known oldest found human hair: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0403141109.htm

tst43 · 05-11-2009, 09:37

Human hair preserved for over 200,000 years and yet mine continues to fall out. Where is the justice? Wouldn't it be something if the cure for male pattern baldness turns out to be rubbing hyena poop on your head?

Pete S · 05-11-2009, 11:27

It doesn't really say if it was human or not.

Quote:

Backwell's team concluded that human hairs were the best match.

As always, anthropologists make extravagant claims when there is no evidence to prove the contrary.
Or they simply interpret the data to justify their claim.

**Bill Harsey** · 05-11-2009, 12:16

It was DNA testing by several labs around the world that ID'd the Oregon caves find resulting in the oldest found human DNA in North America.

Testing results of said DNA extracted from the hair are stated at 14,300 years before present.

Sigaba · 05-11-2009, 12:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by tst43

Human hair preserved for over 200,000 years and yet mine continues to fall out. Where is the justice? Wouldn't it be something if the cure for male pattern baldness turns out to be rubbing hyena poop on your head?

TST--

This reply is among the funniest things I've read on ps.com.

The Green Eyed Monster has tears in its eyes.