Immature Hominin Craniodental Remains From a New Locality in the
Rising Star Cave System, South Africa.
Abstract
Homo naledi is known from the Rising Star cave system, South Africa,
where its remains have previously been reported from two localities:
the Dinaledi Chamber (U.W. 101) and Lesedi Chamber (U.W. 102).
Continued exploration of the cave system has expanded our knowledge of
the Dinaledi Chamber and its surrounding passageways (the Dinaledi
Subsystem), leading to the discovery of new fossil localities. This
paper discusses the fossil assemblage from the locality designated
U.W. 110. This locality is within a narrow fissure of the Dinaledi
Subsystem approximately 12 meters southwest of the 2013–2014
excavation. Fossil remains recovered from this locality include six
hominin teeth and 28 cranial fragments, all consistent with a single
immature hominin individual. The dental morphology of the new
specimens supports attribution to H. naledi. This is the first
immature individual of H. naledi to preserve morphological details of
the calvaria in association with dental evidence. This partial skull
provides information about the maturation of H. naledi and will be
important in reconstructing the developmental sequence of immature
remains from other H. naledi occurrences. This is the third locality
described with H. naledi material in the Rising Star cave system and
represents a depositional situation that resembles the Lesedi Chamber
in some respects.
Open access:
https://paleoanthropology.org/ojs/index.php/paleo/article/view/64
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