Morocco proudly celebrates the invention of the origin of sapiens in Africa: “It has nothing to do with the remains of Atapuerca” | Science | EUROtoday

Along with the rains that alleviated six years of drought and the victories of its nationwide staff – the native staff within the African Cup of soccer -, Morocco has celebrated as a matter of nationwide pleasure the invention of one of many oldest lineages of ancestors of the A smart man by a world staff on the coast of Casablanca. At the start of an election 12 months within the Maghreb nation, the Minister of Culture, Mohammed Mehdi Bensaid, urgently summoned the press this Wednesday to current “an unprecedented archaeological discovery” in regards to the origins of the human species, which confirms “the depth of its African roots”, and the central position of the Maghreb “in the great stages of human evolution”. The analysis has been mirrored within the newest situation of the scientific journal Nature.

“At the end of the day, we are all of Moroccan origin,” argued in a festive tone in 2017 the paleoanthropologist Jean-Jacques Hublin, director of the Franco-Moroccan staff that dated human stays to 300,000 years in the past on the Jebel Irhoud website (300 kilometers south of Casablanca), attributed because the origin of the A smart man. The director of the Franco-Moroccan Prehistory Research Mission of Casablanca, Abderrahim Mohib, cited this anecdote when detailing the brand new discovery on the headquarters of the Ministry of Culture.

Between projections of photos of jaws, groups of researchers and websites, Mohib revealed the brand new discovery of the Franco-Moroccan Prehistotry of Casablanca program, which started greater than six a long time in the past. “It combines archaic traits noticed within the The man stood up together with extra trendy options,” said this expert in paleoarchaeology, “and it has been dated with one of the crucial precise precisions obtained in a website of human stays.” “It has nothing to do with the stays of Atapuerca in Spain,” he clarified when asked by journalists, “that are from a special lineage of hominids.”

Morocco congratulates itself for having “closed an empty space in the African fossil record” by documenting the existence of ancient population groups not yet well known “in a crucial period, in the transition from the most archaic humanoid forms to the most recent lineages.” For the National Institute of Archaeological Sciences and Heritage, the discovery, which presents both primitive and evolved characteristics, establishes a point of divergence between the African line that leads to the A wise man and the Eurasian lineages that gave rise to Neanderthals and Denisovans.

The findings of the so-called Hominid Grotto, located in a quarry on the outskirts of the Moroccan economic capital, also serve to shed light on the emergence of the A wise man and reinforce the thesis, according to Moroccan experts and authorities, that its deep roots are African.

The Maghreb nation hosts exactly from mid-December to mid-January the African Cup of Football Nations, a championship that paralyzes the continent for a number of weeks and by which the Government of Rabat tries to showcase the event of its sports activities, tourism and communications infrastructure, as a preview of the World Cup that it plans to prepare in 2030 along with Portugal and Spain. Dating first to the east after which the south of the continent, Morocco now appears to rejoice the alleged origin of the A smart man in North Africa. Meanwhile, his nationwide staff – made up of gamers established in European leagues – aspires to win the continental trophy at dwelling below the coldest and rainiest winter in current a long time within the Maghreb.