Upper Pleistocene Human Remains from Vindija Cave, Croatia, Yugoslavia
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY 54~499-545(1981) Upper Pleistocene Human Remains From Vindija Cave, Croatia, Yugoslavia MILFORD H. WOLPOFF, FRED H. SMITH, MIRKO MALEZ, JAKOV RADOVCIC, AND DARKO RUKAVINA Department of Anthropology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109 (MH.W.1,Department of Anthropology, University of Tennessee, Kmxuille, Tennessee 37916 (FHS.),and Institute for Paleontology and Quaternary Geology, Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts, 41000 Zagreb, Yugoslavia (M.M., J.R., D.R.) KEY WORDS Vindija, Neandertal, South Central Europe, Modern Homo sapiens origin, Evolution ABSTRACT Human remains excavated from Vindija cave include a large although fragmentary sample of late Mousterian-associated specimens and a few additional individuals from the overlying early Upper Paleolithic levels. The Mousterian-associated sample is similar to European Neandertals from other regions. Compared with earlier Neandertals from south central Europe, this sam- ple evinces evolutionary trends in the direction of Upper Paleolithic Europeans. Compared with the western European Neandertals, the same trends can be demon- strated, although the magnitude of difference is less, and there is a potential for confusing temporal with regional sources of variation. The early Upper Paleo- lithic-associated sample cannot be distinguished from the Mousterian-associated hominids. We believe that this site provides support for Hrdlicka’s “Neandertal phase” of human evolution, as it was originally applied in Europe. The Pannonian Basin and surrounding val- the earliest chronometrically dated Upper leys of south central Europe have yielded a Paleolithic-associated hominid in Europe large and significant series of Upper Pleisto- (Smith, 1976a). cene fossil hominids (e.g. Jelinek, 1969) as well This report presents a detailed comparative as extensive evidence of their cultural behavior description of a sample of fossil hominids re- (e.g.
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