Lost Civilisation Underwater? 140,000-Year-Old Homo Erectus Skull May Hold The Key To Secret

Scientists may have stumbled upon a hidden civilisation at the bottom of the ocean after they discovered the skull of Homo erectus, an ancient human ancestor. The skull was preserved beneath layers of silt and sand in the Madura Strait, between the islands of Java and Madura, in Indonesia, with researchers claiming that it was buried 140,000 years ago.

The Homo erectus fossil was discovered in 2011 due to a large construction project in the Madura Strait. However, it wasn't until this month that scientists published the findings in the journal Quaternary Environments and Human.

"This period is characterised by great morphological diversity and mobility of hominin populations in the region," said study lead author Harold Berghuis.

The site could be the first physical evidence of the lost landmass known as Sundaland, which once connected Southeast Asia in a vast tropical plain. Apart from the skull, researchers also found 6,000 animal fossils of 36 species, including those of Komodo dragons, buffalo, deer, and elephant.

Some of these animals had deliberate cut marks, suggesting that early humans may have practised hunting strategies on the land that is now underwater.

"The Madura Strait hominins may have developed this hunting strategy independently. But the other possibility is that we are looking at a kind of cultural exchange," Mr Berghuis told LiveScience.

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Who were Homo erectus?

The human family tree is complicated, but scientists are of the view that Homo erectus were the first early humans to resemble modern humans more closely. They were taller, had muscular bodies, longer legs and shorter arms.

The study and its findings perhaps offer the first direct proof of the presence of Home erectus in the now-submerged Sundaland landscapes -- challenging earlier beliefs about the geographic limits of human's early ancestors. Notably, it was 14,000 and 7,000 years ago that melting glaciers caused sea levels to rise more than 120 meters, submerging the low-lying plains of Sundaland.