Abstract
A human partial maxillary dentition and a fragmentary cranium were recovered from Obi-Rakhmat Grotto in northeastern Uzbekistan in 2003. Initial descriptions of this single juvenile (OR-1) from a Middle Paleolithic archaeological context have emphasized its mosaic morphological pattern; the dentition appears archaic, while certain morphological aspects of the cranial fragments may be more ambiguous. The present study provides a systematic and comparative analysis of the dental morphology and morphometrics of OR-1 to provide a more refined appraisal of its phenetic affinity vis á vis Neandertals and modern humans. Two analyses were performed. The first uses 28 non-metric dental traits scored from Neandertals, Upper Paleolithic, and Middle Paleolithic modern humans to assess the posterior probability of group membership for the Obi-Rakhmat individual. The second is a morphometric analysis of the first upper molar of OR-1. The results of both analyses suggest the dentition of OR-1 is essentially Neandertal.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 238-248 |
Number of pages | 11 |
Journal | Journal of Human Evolution |
Volume | 55 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Aug 2008 |
Keywords
- Central Asia
- Dental morphology
- Dental morphometrics
- Modern humans
- Neandertals
- Upper first molar
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics
- Anthropology