The site, located near the town of Zwoleń in the Mazovia region, is providing rare insight into the daily life and survival strategies of early humans in this part of Europe.
Researchers from the State Archaeological Museum in Warsaw, the University of Warsaw and the University of Wrocław have been working at the site since 2021. Their goal is to determine exactly when Neanderthals inhabited the Zwoleńka River valley, what they ate, and how they lived.
According to Witold Grużdź, the project leader, the team has narrowed the period of Neanderthal activity at the site to between 64,000 and 75,000 years ago, during the Middle Paleolithic era.
This is currently the only active archaeological dig in Poland focusing on this time period.
The site is unusual because organic materials, including animal bones, have been preserved outside of a cave environment.
Most known Neanderthal sites in Poland are located in the south of the country, particularly in the Kraków-Częstochowa Upland and Lower Silesia, as much of central and northern Poland was covered by ice sheets during the Neanderthal era.
The Zwoleń site was first studied in the 1980s, when flint tools and large quantities of animal bones were discovered.
Recent excavations have uncovered remains of mammoths, rhinoceroses and horses, along with hundreds of stone tools and flakes from toolmaking processes.
“Through the 1980s, we found about 330 items on the site. In last year’s season alone, we recovered over 170 more. This year’s work has yielded a similar number,” said Grużdź.
The tools include flint knives and scrapers likely used for butchering large animals.
Katarzyna Pyżewicz from the University of Warsaw explained that some of the tools were brought to the site already made and were later repaired there as they wore down from use.
“We can assume these tools were used to cut up mammoths, horses and rhinoceroses, whose bones we found nearby,” she said. “This was a functioning workshop. The Neanderthals came here with tools and repaired them as needed.”
The geological layers at the site indicate that materials have shifted over time due to river erosion, meaning some artifacts may be even older than current estimates.
“We dated the layers where the artifacts were found, but those layers had already been moved from their original location,” Grużdź explained. “So the tools may be older than the soil they are in.”
“These finds are rare. Anything that adds to our knowledge of Neanderthals is valuable,” said Pyżewicz. “Many sites are buried several meters underground, which makes them hard to detect. But each discovery adds another piece to the puzzle.”
Neanderthals are an extinct branch of the human family tree, once widely considered primitive. However, recent research has changed that view.
Scientists now believe Neanderthals created some of Europe’s oldest cave art and interbred with early modern humans.
DNA studies show that most people of non-African descent today carry 1 to 2 percent Neanderthal DNA. People of East Asian, European and South Asian ancestry tend to carry slightly more Neanderthal DNA than those of African ancestry, as Neanderthals primarily lived in Europe and western Asia.
The dig in Zwoleń is now considered the northernmost known open-air Neanderthal site in Poland with preserved organic remains. Further work is planned to resolve outstanding questions about its age and significance.
There are several hundred active digs researching Neanderthal sites in Europe. Many sites are open-air locations with stone tools, butchered animal remains or partial skeletons.
Most of these are concentrated in southern and central Europe, especially France, Spain, Germany, Italy and Croatia, where climatic conditions favored preservation.
(rt/gs)
Source: naukawpolsce.pl