A skull uncovered in Manot Cave in West Galilee, Israel provides evidence of modern humans immigration from Africa to Europe. It also provides evidence of possible interactions between those humans and Neanderthals.

The Manot cave is located in northern Israel close to the Lebanese border. Artifacts found there, in digs since 2010, show that the cave was inhabited by humans for more than 100,000 years. About 30,000 years ago, the cave collapsed preserving the 70,000 years of human history inside.

In previous digs a variety of tools, animal bones and a few human remains have been found inside. The most recent discovery, however, is the most noteworthy to date.

Within a small chamber of the cave, on an elevated shelf, researchers found part of a 55,000 year old skull. The bone is believed to show the migration of the ancestors of modern humans out of Africa and into Europe. It is also expected to show possible interaction between Neanderthals and modern humans.

About four percent of the genes of modern Europeans come from Neanderthals, which demonstrates interaction between the two groups but where and when this occurred has never been settled. Some studies suggested however that the mixing of DNA occurred between 50 and 60 thousand years ago. Another leading hypothesis says that the two species met in Europe about 45,000 years ago.

The area surrounding the Manot cave, however, is known to have been periodically inhabited by Neanderthals. Specificially, Neanderthal populations are known to have inhabited the area between 50 and 65 thousand years ago. This would have put the individual whose remains were found in an area inhabited by Neanderthals at roughly the time the interbreeding occurred.

“It has been suspected that modern man and Neanderthals were in the same place at the same time, but we didn’t have the physical evidence. Now we do have it in the new skull fossil,” said paleontologist Bruce Latimer, from Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine’s Department of Orthodontics in a statement.

Additionally, research published in the journal Nature shows that the female skull bone represents the first recorded instance of modern humans being in the Levant region during that time period.

“The morphology of the skull indicates that it is that of a modern human of African origin, bearing characteristics of early European Upper Palaeolithic populations. This suggests that the Levantine populations were ancestral to earlier European populations,” said Prof. Israel Hershkovitz of Tel Aviv University.

Typically, modern humans are thought to have migrated from Africa into Europe about 70,000 years ago.

The team at Manot cave however suggests that the migration may have moved more slowly than previously thought, stalled in the south by the Ice Age which gripped Europe at the time.

“When we analysed the morphology of Manot skull, we made two important discoveries. First, we found African affinities, confirming that the Manot population originated in Africa. Second, we noted many morphological peculiarities akin to early Upper Paleolitic populations in Europe, which suggest ancestral connections to earlier European populations. All of this confirms that people in Manot came from Africa, stayed in Israel for several thousand years, and later, when weather conditions improved, moved to Europe. The Manot people are indeed the ancestors of European populations,” said Hershkovitz

Work in the cave is ongoing and could reveal still more treasures.

“Most other caves are ‘disturbed caves,’ but this is untouched, frozen in time — truly an amazing find.” said Hershkovitz.