14,000-Year-Old Fossilized Feces Retested

News July 15, 2020

(John Blong)
SHARE:
Oregon Paisley Caves
(John Blong)

NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE, ENGLAND—Gizmodo reports that archaeologists John Blong and Lisa-Marie Shillito of Newcastle University and their colleagues tested 21 coprolites unearthed in Oregon’s Paisley Caves for the presence of human sterols and bile, which are not soluble in water and thus chemically stable. Previous mitochondrial DNA testing of the ancient waste indicated that all of the samples were human in origin, but critics argued that DNA from later occupation of the cave may have washed into lower, older cave sediments and contaminated the samples. “We address issues of potential DNA contamination through fecal lipid biomarker analysis, providing evidence that there likely was DNA moving from younger human occupations into older cave sediments and coprolites, but also confirming that people were camping at the caves as early as 14,200 years ago,” Blong said. In the new analysis, only 13 of the 21 samples were identified as human droppings, while one was linked to a panther and another to a lynx. The researchers are now analyzing the coprolites for clues to what those early campers had eaten. For more on Paisley Caves, go to “America, in the Beginning.”

  • Features May/June 2020

    A Path to Freedom

    At a Union Army camp in Kentucky, enslaved men, women, and children struggled for their lives and fought to be free

    Read Article
    (National Archives Records Administration, Washington, DC)
  • Features May/June 2020

    Villages in the Sky

    High in the Rockies, archaeologists have discovered evidence of mountain life 4,000 years ago

    Read Article
    (Matt Stirn)
  • Letter from Morocco May/June 2020

    Splendor at the Edge of the Sahara

    Excavations of a bustling medieval city tell the tale of a powerful Berber dynasty

    Read Article
    (Photo Courtesy Chloé Capel)
  • Artifacts May/June 2020

    Torah Shield and Pointer

    Read Article
    (Courtesy Michał Wojenka/Jagiellonian University Institute of Archaeology)