Massive tooth of marine mammal unearthed at ancient Spain site — 50 miles inland
In southwestern Spain, about 50 miles inland from the nearest coastal point, archaeologists discovered the 'remarkable' tooth of a marine mammal at the site of an ancient Copper Age settlement.
Buried at Valencina de la Concepción-Castilleja de Guzmán, a site estimated to be about 5,300 years old, was an 'exceptional' and rare sperm whale tooth, according to a peer-reviewed May 14 study published in the journal PLOS One.
The large tooth with its 'massive' roots is 'the first of its kind ever found for Late Prehistoric Iberia,' the study said. At full size, it would have been nearly 10 inches long, according to researchers.
Researchers analyzed microscopic traces left by marine organisms — known as bioerosion — on the surface of the tooth to determine how the ancient people of Valencina acquired it.
The results suggest the whale was not hunted or harvested, but rather died and sank to the seafloor. As the whale's body decayed, a powerful weather event, like a storm, brought the tooth ashore, where it was discovered by people, according to the study.
This is supported by the fact that there is a notable absence of any other whale bones, which archaeologists would expect to find if that whale had been intentionally killed.
Researchers said the context in which the tooth was found 'is as interesting as the tooth itself.'
According to the study, the tooth was found in a non-burial pit, most likely as a 'highly-valuable and symbolically-charged' offering that had nothing to do with funerary practices.
The whale tooth was treated as a totem or sacred object, researchers said.
The archaeological site contains other examples of large animal remains such as elephant tusks, ostrich eggshells, deer antlers and auroch horns being 'treated with the utmost reverence,' according to the study.
Researchers said the archaeological site is 'remarkable' for its scale, covering 450 hectares, and for the number of features found there, including tombs and artifact-filled pits.
It was occupied for 1,000 years, between 3300 and 2150 BCE, according to the Autonomous University of Barcelona.
The ancient Copper Age settlement is near Seville
The research team included Samuel Ramírez-Cruzado Aguilar-Galindo, Miriam Luciañez-Triviño, Fernando Muñiz Guinea, Luis Miguel Cáceres Puro, Antonio Toscano Grande, Marta Díaz-Guardamino, Juan Manuel Vargas Jiménez, Thomas Xavier Schuhmacher, Rafael María Martínez Sánchez, Santiago Guillamón Dávila, Joaquín Rodríguez Vidal and Leonardo García Sanjuán.
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Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. Many of the Dead Sea Scrolls, some of the most widely known archaeological finds of all time, may be older than once thought, according to a new study. The fresh analysis, which paired radiocarbon dating with artificial intelligence, determined some of the biblical manuscripts date to about 2,300 years ago, when their presumed authors lived, said Mladen Popović, lead author of the report published Wednesday in the journal PLOS One. Bedouin shepherds first spotted the scrolls by chance in the Judaean Desert, near the Dead Sea, in 1947. Archaeologists then recovered thousands of fragments belonging to hundreds of manuscripts from 11 caves, all near the site of Khirbat Qumran in what is now the West Bank. 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Earlier estimates of the manuscripts' age came from radiocarbon dating conducted in the 1990s. Chemist Willard Libby developed this method — used to ascertain the age of organic materials — in the late 1940s at the University of Chicago. Also known as carbon 14 dating, a chemical analysis of a sample, such as a fossil or manuscript, determines the quantity of carbon 14 atoms it contains. All living organisms absorb this element, but it starts to decay as soon as death occurs, so looking at how much is left can give a fairly accurate age of an organic specimen as old as about 60,000 years. Carbon dating has downsides, however. The analyzed sample is destroyed during the process, and some results can be misleading. 'The problem with earlier tests (on the scrolls) is that they didn't address the issue of castor oil,' Popović said. 'Castor oil is a modern invention, and it was used in the 1950s by the original scholars to make the text more legible. 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'I wonder whether this suggests a higher level of precision, which would be extremely exciting.' The study represents a first attempt to harness AI technology to extend existing scientific knowledge from carbon 14 dating of certain manuscripts to other manuscripts, said Lawrence H. Schiffman, Global Distinguished Professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University. 'To some extent, it is not yet clear whether or not the new method will provide us with reliable information on texts that have not yet been Carbon-14 dated,' he added via email. 'The interesting comments regarding revision of the dating of some manuscripts that may be expected through further development of this approach or new carbon-14 dating, while not new to this study, constitute a very important observation about the field of Dead Sea Scrolls in general.' Commenting on the computational aspects of the study, Brent Seales, the Alumni Professor of Computer Science at the University of Kentucky, said the approach taken by the authors seems rigorous even if the sample sizes are small. Using AI to completely replace carbon dating may be premature, however. '(AI) is a useful tool to incorporate into the broader picture, and to make estimates in the absence of Carbon-14 based on the witness of other similar fragments,' Seales wrote in an email. 'Like everything with machine learning, and like a fine wine, it should get better over time and with more samples. The dating of ancient manuscripts is an extremely difficult problem, with sparse data and heavy constraints on access and expertise. Bravo to the team for this data-driven contribution that takes a massive step forward.'
