History

The cranium and the almost complete skeleton of the woman of Peñon were discovered in 1959. Not being able, at the time being dated precisely fault from modern technologies, they were regarded as old approximately 5.000 years. The bones of the woman of Peñon took seat in the collection of the first 27 prehistoric human skeletons of the National museum of Anthropology in Mexico.

Silvia Gonzalez, a Mexican archeologist working at the university John Moores of Liverpool and person in charge of the research team, admits that its discovery revolutionizes the generally allowed idea on the settlement of Americas. The first Americans (Paléoaméricains) can have belonged to the European or Caucasian group.

“The museum understood that these human remainders had an historical value and significant but they had not been scientifically dated”, specified Silvia Gonzalez then it decided to make analyze small samples of bone coming from five skeletons (of which those of the Woman of Peñon, Chimalhuacan and the Homme of the subway Balderas), by using the last techniques of carbon dating.

Analyzes and dating

English scientists identified the skeleton, whose discovery calls in question the theory of the primitive settlement of the Nouveau World. The perfectly preserved cranium belonged to a 26 year old woman, died for the last glacial period at the edge of a prehistoric lake which occupied the current plain on which the suburbs extend now from Mexico City.

The scientists of the research laboratory of the university of Oxford and the department of archeology of the university John Moores of Liverpool dated cranium from the young woman of Peñon at approximately 13.000 years.

At that time, this woman had to cross mastodons which wandered in meadows of the area, such as the large mammoths, giant armadillos or glyptodons, of camélidés, équidés, or of the alarming carnivores such as the Smilodon or tiger with the teeth of sabers and the large black bear.

Two possible theories

Two theories prevail about the origins of the woman of Peñon. This one could be according to the archeologist Silvia Gonzales:

• is downward ancestors of the European Stone Age (Solutréen) of the Cro-Magnon type who would have crossed the Atlantic Ocean or followed cold banks there are approximately 15.000 or 20.000 years, passing from Europe towards America via a septentrional road;

• is downward a " caucasienne" of the people Aïnou whose descendants always live in the West of Japan. Its ancestors would have arrived while coasting or while skirting cold banks connecting Siberia to America there is 15 to 20.000 years. It could be an ancestor of the people Péricue having lived in since Antiquity until the XVIIIe century in the area of Baja California.

Bonds

www.nfmuseum.com/pao.htm

http://www.ljmu.ac.uk/

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/12/03/oldest.skull/index.html

http://www.scienceshumaines.com/peuplement-de-l-amerique--surprenantes-decouvertes_fr_5513.html