Human bones found in Argentina more than 8,000 years old

Buenos Aires, Agency
Argentine anthropologists found human skeletal remains some 8,270 years old on a lakeside beach in the central province of Santa Fe, the scientists said from their university offices.

The remains were found together with the bones of guanacos from 7,000 years ago and ceramics between 1,500 and 2,300 years old near the town of Venado Tuerto, 375 kilometers (230 miles) northwest of Buenos Aires.

The anthropologists from the National University of Rosario, Argentina's third-largest city, made the find in 2003, when heavy flooding from the lake left the remains on the surface.

"From the characteristics of the materials, the technology and the lack of any elements connected with European populations, we judged their antiquity to be a minimum of 500 years old and a maximum of 3,000 years," one of the directors of the project, Juan David Avila, told the state news agency Telam on Thursday.

The remains were then sent to a U.S. laboratory in Arizona that studied the bones and discovered that their antiquity was far greater than the Argentine archaeologists had thought.

"What is interesting is that this is the first dating of such antiquity ever made here in Santa Fe. This is the oldest material recovered in the province up to now," Avila said.

The scientists are now doing research to determine to which native peoples the skeletal remains belonged.