Was the fox prehistoric man’s best friend? Early humans may have preferred the fox to the dog as an animal companion, new archaeological findings suggest. Researchers analyzing remains at a prehistoric burial ground in Jordan have uncovered a grave in which a fox was buried with a human, before part of it was then transferred to an adjacent grave. The University of Cambridge-led team believes that the unprecedented case points to some sort of emotional attachment between human and fox. Their paper, published today, suggests that the fox may have been kept as a pet and was being buried to accompany its master, or mistress, to the afterlife. If so, it marks the first known burial of its kind and suggests that long before we began to hunt foxes using dogs, our ancestors were keeping them as pets - and doing so earlier than their canine relatives." The cemetery, at Uyun-al-Hammam, in northern Jordan, is about 16,500 years old, which makes the grave 4,000 years older than the earliest known human-dog burial and 7,000 years earlier than anything similar here involving a fox. What we appear to have found is a case where a fox was killed and buried with its owner. Later, the grave was reopened for some reason and the human's body was moved. But because the link between the fox and human had been significant, the fox was moved as well, so that the person, or people, would still be accompanied by it in the afterlife." "The Cambridge-led team spotted a connection between Grave I on the site and Grave VIII, which lies beside it but was only opened more recently. In the first, they identified the remains of two adults, probably a man and a woman. The man had been buried earlier than the woman, and alongside him were the skull and humerus of a fox, as well as other grave goods." "It was only when Grave VIII was opened, however, that the researchers found both human remains that may have belonged to the same man, and the skeletal remnants of what was, almost certainly, the same fox.The fox skeleton was complete apart from its skull and right humerus - which is exactly what they had already found in the adjacent grave. Further studies indicated that the remains were indeed those of a red fox." "Studies carried out on foxes suggest that they can be brought under human control, but that the process is not easy because they are skittish and timid by nature. Perhaps for that reason, the researchers suggest, dogs ultimately achieved "best friend" status among humans instead." Read Article
Ancient humans: What we know and still don’t know about them The story of human evolution is a complicated one (2017) DonSmith/Alamy "In recent weeks, we have explored the brain of a species called Homo naledi, speculated on the idea that Neanderthals might have made it to North America deep in prehistory, and found signs of Denisovan DNA in layers of dirt in a Siberian cave that don’t actually contain any fossil bones." "But who were these ancient humans? And what about the other species that pop up in the news on a regular basis? Here is New Scientist’s primer to help you understand a little bit more about seven of the most important human species in our evolutionary tree." (READ MORE) Why everything you've been told about evolution is wrong