He is about to end up run over, his mother saves him
These newly discovered footprints in New Mexico are the oldest trace of human presence in America and prove that humans lived there even before the last Ice Age.
Researchers from Bournemouth University, in collaboration with the US Geological Survey, have discovered footprints inside White Sands National Park, New Mexico. They would represent the first unequivocal attestation of human presence and activity in the American continent - before the last Ice Age (about 23.000 years ago). The footprints were left in the soft mud at the bottom of a lake, where they then solidified and preserved for all these millennia, trapping even primitive plant seeds inside. The glaciation of the lake, due to the period of intense cold, has crystallized the footprints that have come down to us.
Our dating of ancient seeds are very precise and demonstrate a stratification of seeds belonging to different historical periods within the same imprint - he explained Kathleen Springer of the US Geological Survey. - Radiocarbon analysis made it possible to date them.
Consider that so far the oldest human settlements discovered on the American continent date back to about 16.000 years ago, and archaeologists believed the presence of man before this period is unlikely. The new traces just discovered, however, show that the presence of man goes back a long way. The footprints tell us what life was like at the time - not only human life, but also that of some animal species that coexisted with them such as birds, mammoths and wolves. It is possible to imagine an interaction between humans and animals - both those already extinct, such as mammoths, and those still living at the time - but also the natural environment.
@Bournemouth University
These footprints give us an idea of what was happening at that moment, of the interaction of children with children and adults - explains the professor Matthew Bennett. - We can speculate that our ancestors were pragmatic, dedicated to hunting and adopting survival strategies, but what we see through these footprints is a play activity involving individuals of different ages. A real insight into the daily life of the time. While traditional archeology, the remains of bones and artifacts, are often difficult to interpret, these footprints give us unequivocal proof of the presence and behavior of individuals in this territory.
@Bournemouth University
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Fonte: Science / Bournemouth University
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