I know what you’re thinking, but this isn’t another cryptid article.  An international group of researchers and archaeolgists have discovered a fossilized hand of an ancient proto-human ancestor, or hominim, in a cave near Denisova Lake in the Altai Mountains in Siberia.  This woman, called X-woman, isn’t human.  She’s also not a Neanderthal, the other well-known semi-human creature from that time period.  It’s a distinct possibility she represents some newly-discovered semi-human creature who stems from the shared ancestry of humans and Neanderthals.

The creature lived in Central Asia from 48,000 to 30,000 years ago and, interestingly enough, was discovered with a bracelet and other artifacts, suggesting that she either died with the ornamentation on.  There were also tools nearby.  While researchers aren’t yet saying this is a new species, X-woman’s geological timeline doesn’t allow her to be a direct descendant of Homo erectus, and she’s too old to have been a precursor to existing proto-human like Homo heidelbergensis.

So, the mystery of X-woman persists.  Where did she come from, and why did her species (if it is a species) die out?  Did she just interbreed with cavemen and disappear?

Tags: hominim, missing link, ancient human ancestor, Denisova Lake, Altai Mountains, Russia, Siberia, X-woman, proto-humans, fossils, archaeology

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