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Giants of the Ancient World! Mysterious Human Cousins Were Way Taller Than We Thought
Quick Summary
Scientists studying ancient leg bones found under the sea near Taiwan believe they belonged to Denisovans — one of our mysterious prehistoric human cousins. The bones suggest these ancient people were surprisingly tall, possibly reaching over 6 feet 3 inches. This discovery gives us our best look yet at what Denisovans may have looked like.
What Happened?
Imagine fishing up ancient bones from the bottom of the ocean. That is almost exactly what happened here. Two fossilized leg bones — one thighbone and one shinbone — were pulled from the seafloor of the Penghu Channel, a stretch of sea between Taiwan and mainland China. The bones are now nicknamed Penghu 2 and Penghu 3.
Researchers used a clever technique to figure out who those bones belonged to. They looked at ancient proteins preserved inside the fossils — like reading a faint message that survived for tens of thousands of years. The proteins matched a pattern found only in Denisovans.
Denisovans were a group of ancient humans closely related to Neanderthals. They split from Neanderthals about 550,000 years ago and spread across much of Asia. For a long time, scientists knew very little about them. The first Denisovan ever identified came from just a tiny finger bone found in a Siberian cave in 2010.
So finding two large leg bones is a big deal. And what the bones revealed was a surprise. Scientists measured the fossils carefully. They estimated that one individual may have stood about 5 feet 11 inches tall and weighed around 183 pounds. The other may have been even taller — possibly around 6 feet 3 inches — and weighed about 200 pounds.
To put that in perspective, imagine a tall modern adult basketball player. That is how big these ancient humans may have been — about 45,000 years ago. In comparison, Neanderthals were typically quite a bit shorter.
The seafloor where the bones were found used to be dry land. During the last Ice Age, sea levels were much lower, and the area was a flat coastal plain where animals and people roamed. The ocean eventually rose and covered it all.
This research is still a preprint, which means other scientists are still checking the findings. More evidence is needed before everything is confirmed.
Why Does It Matter?
Denisovans are one of the most mysterious groups in human history. Scientists have found very few physical remains. Each new fossil helps fill in the picture of who they were and how they lived.
What makes this finding especially exciting is that Denisovans did not just disappear without a trace. Their genes live on today! Many modern people in South and East Asia carry a small amount of Denisovan DNA. So learning more about them helps us understand our own human story.
Big Words
- Denisovans — an extinct group of ancient humans closely related to Neanderthals, who lived mainly across Asia until about 45,000 years ago
- Fossil — the preserved remains or traces of an ancient living thing, turned to stone or kept inside rock or sediment over thousands of years
- Preprint — an early version of a scientific study shared with the public before other scientists have fully reviewed and confirmed it
- Proteins — tiny building-block molecules inside all living things that can sometimes survive in fossils and reveal which species the animal belonged to
- Pleistocene — the scientific name for the Ice Age period, which lasted from about 2.6 million to 11,700 years ago
Fun Fact
Denisovans are so mysterious that scientists identified them entirely from DNA before ever finding a skull. They knew the species existed for years before spotting a single bone from the neck up!
Think About It
If you could travel back 45,000 years and meet a Denisovan, what is the first question you would want to ask them?
Sources
- Sci.News — Denisovans Were Surprisingly Tall, New Fossils from Taiwan Suggest
- Archaeology Magazine — Denisovans Were Much Taller Than Previously Thought
- The Cooldown / Yahoo News — Mysterious seafloor bones off Taiwan suggest Denisovans stood over 6-foot tall
- La Brujula Verde — Remains of a Denisovan Giant Found Over 60 Meters Beneath the Seafloor in Taiwan