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Evidence of mobiliary art and body augmentation are associated with the cultural innovations introduced by Homo sapiens at the beginning of the Upper Paleolithic. Here, we report the discovery of the oldest known human-modified punctate ornament, a decorated ivory pendant from the Paleolithic layers at Stajnia Cave in Poland. We describe the features of this unique piece, as well as the stratigraphic context and the details of its chronometric dating. The Stajnia Cave plate is a personal 'jewellery' object that was created 41,500 calendar years ago (directly radiocarbon dated). It is the oldest known of its kind in Eurasia and it establishes a new starting date for a tradition directly connected to the spread of modern Homo sapiens in Europe.

89th Annual Meeting of the American-Association-of-Physical-Anthropologists (AAPA), Los Angeles, CA, APR 15-18, 2020; International audience; Well-preserved collagen, an organic component of bone, can reveal much about the human past. While archaeological collagen can help illuminate the history of past populations, diagenetic processes can result in rapid and sometimes inconspicuous collagen degradation. As a result, recent sites may have poor preservation, while ancient sites may have some specimens that are surprisingly well-preserved. Consequently, there has been considerable interest in potential methods to prescreen bone for collagen content. Here we compare the efܪcacy of FTIR-ATR, whole bone percent nitrogen (%N), and NIR to select well-preserved samples from collections of unprocessed bone. FTIR utilizes the presence of Amide I (1651 cm-1) and Amide II (1553 cm-1) peaks and the Amide I/Phosphate peak-to-peak ratio to identify well-preserved specimen. A threshold of 0.76 %N suggests a sample preserves a sufܪcient amount of collagen. NIR uses chemometric models, built using PCA and PLSR of from specimens of known collagen yield, to characterize well-preserved specimens. Here, we compare FTIR-ATR and NIR spectra taken on samples from the Judean Desert, Israel, and the northern Saqqara region of Egypt. We then compare %N to NIR spectra from specimens from Zafarraya, a Neanderthal cave site in Spain. The results show agreement between FTIR-ATR and NIR, but among the Zafarraya collection, NIR correctly characterizes collagen content in 78.6% of samples compared to only 72.0% for %N. Near-infrared light proves to be advantageous because it penetrates deeply and can predict the collagen yield of unprocessed bone in a timely, cost-efficient, and non-destructive manner.

Evidence of mobiliary art and body augmentation are associated with the cultural innovations introduced by Homo sapiens at the beginning of the Upper Paleolithic. Here, we report the discovery of the oldest known human-modified punctate ornament, a decorated ivory pendant from the Paleolithic layers at Stajnia Cave in Poland. We describe the features of this unique piece, as well as the stratigraphic context and the details of its chronometric dating. The Stajnia Cave plate is a personal 'jewellery' object that was created 41,500 calendar years ago (directly radiocarbon dated). It is the oldest known of its kind in Eurasia and it establishes a new starting date for a tradition directly connected to the spread of modern Homo sapiens in Europe.

Bone collagen is an important material for radiocarbon, paleodietary, and paleoproteomic analyses, but it degrades over time, making such analyses more difficult with older material. Collagen preservation between and within archaeological sites is also variable, so that much time, effort, and money can go into the preparation and initial analysis of samples that will not yield meaningful results. To avoid this, various methods are employed to prescreen bone for collagen preservation (e.g., %N, microporosity, and FTIR spectroscopic analyses), but these are often destructive and/or require exportation for analysis. Here, we explore near-infrared spectroscopy as a tool for gauging the collagen content of ground and whole bone from about 500 to 45,000 years ago. We show that a portable spectrometer’s ability to quantify collagen content and classify specimens by preservation status is comparable to that of other popular prescreening methods. Moreover, near-infrared spectroscopy is non-destructive and spectra can be acquired in a few seconds.