The team announced the discovery of a partial skull and teeth of a child of the extinct genus Homo naledi, who died approximately 250,000 years ago, when he was approximately four to six years old.
The announcement, issued on Thursday, stated that the remains were found in a remote part of the cave, which indicates that the body was placed there on purpose, in what could be a kind of grave.
Prof Jay Berger of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, who led the team and made the announcement Thursday, said the site “adds to mystery how these many remains appeared in these remote and dark spaces in the Rising Star Cave System”, one of South Africa’s caves.
Homo naledi is an ancient hominin that was found in Rising Star Cave, the cradle of humanity, 50 kilometers (30 miles) northwest of Johannesburg.
The history of Homo naledi dates back to the middle Pleistocene period, 335 thousand – 236,000 years ago.
The initial discovery, first announced in 2015, consisted of 1,550 samples, representing 737 different elements, and at least 15 different individuals.
In the context, Berger said: “Homo naledi remains one of the most mysterious relatives of ancient humans ever. It is clearly a primitive species, existing at a time when we previously thought only modern humans were in Africa. Its existence at that time and in this place complicates our understanding of who did what first in connection with the invention of complex stone tool cultures and even ritual practices.”
The new discovery was described in two papers in the journal Paleoanthropology.
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