Oldest human burial discovered in Africa sheds light on 78,000-year-old burial practices

Scientists have uncovered the earliest modern human burial in Africa, which changes what we know about social behaviors in Homo sapiens, according to a new study.

The discovery offers new insight into how these ancient people from 78,000 years ago treated their dead.

The child, estimated to have been about 3 years old, seems to have been carefully arranged in a deliberately excavated pit and then covered by sediment scooped up from the cave floor, the journal Nature reported Wednesday.

The arrangement of surviving bone fragments indicates that the body was placed on its side with legs drawn up to its chest, the study found.

These features – along with evidence that the body was rapidly covered and decomposed – indicate that the burial was intentional.

“We could infer this child… was really put there in a specific position with a pillow under his head,” said study co-author María Martinón-Torres, director at the National Research Center on Human Evolution in Burgos, Spain, CNN reported.

Source USA Today

Article submitted by, Adamas.

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