Mugharet el'Aliya: Affinities of an enigmatic north African Aterian maxillary fragment

Abstract

Objectives: This study uses a virtual framework to examine the left maxillary fragment of the juvenile fossil from Mugharet el'Aliya, Morocco, found in association with an Aterian lithic industry. Previously, this fossil had been ascribed to modern humans or the Neanderthal lineage based on its "archaic"/"Neanderthal-like" features and apparent large size. Here, we conducted a novel 3D shape comparative analysis of the maxillary fragment to clarify its taxonomic affinities with regard to its size and ontogeny.

The Undescribed Juvenile Maxilla from Contrebandiers Cave, Morocco—A Study on Middle Stone Age Facial Growth

“…Like the Qafzeh and Neanderthal juveniles, the Contrebandiers maxilla is large compared to the similarly aged recent H. sapiens in this study. This finding is consistent with studies on other juvenile early H. sapiens faces from Mugharet el'Aliya (Röding et al, 2022) and Herto BOU-VP-16/5 from Ethiopia (Zollikofer et al, 2022). Comparison of growth trajectories between Neanderthals and the recent H. sapiens in this study indicates a truncated growth in the latter beginning around adolescence (AG 4; cf.…”

“…Geometric morphometric analyses on the virtually reconstructed Contrebandiers juvenile maxilla reveal clear shape and size similarities to North African and Levantine early H. sapiens. The results of the GM analyses support previous studies linking North African MSA and Aterian craniomandibular and dental remains to Late Pleistocene Levantine fossils (Bergmann et al, 2022;Harvati & Hublin, 2012;Hublin et al, 2012;Röding et al, 2022). Results of our ontogenetic analyses support previous studies (e.g., Ackermann & Krovitz, 2002;Cobb & O'Higgins, 2004;Freidline et al, 2013) showing that the distinct maxillary shapes of Neanderthals and H. sapiens are present at birth and do not change substantially during development.…”

“…The overall morphological pattern in MSA North African faces suggests there was both regional continuity from the Early to Late Stone Age, as well as gene flow between H. sapiens groups living in other parts of Africa and the southwest Asia (Bergmann et al, 2022;Ferembach, 1976aFerembach, , 1976bHarvati & Hublin, 2012;Röding et al, 2022). These findings are consistent with the view that our species originated and diversified within subdivided populations that were connected by intermittent gene flow (Scerri et al, 2018;Stringer, 2016).…”

“…Future studies on facial growth and development incorporating the North African MSA mandibular remains (e.g., from Jebel Irhoud and Contrebandiers) and LSA Iberomaurusians, as well as expanding the Upper Paleolithic juvenile sample, will help elucidate the evolution of the recent human growth pattern. The results of this study and previous research on facial growth and development in early H. sapiens (e.g., Röding et al, 2022; Zollikofer et al, 2022) suggest a dissociation between the evolution of maxillary size and shape in later human evolution, by at least 300 ka in Jebel Irhoud (Richter et al, 2017). The Jebel Irhoud faces are large yet indistinguishable from recent H. sapiens using geometric morphometric analyses (Hublin et al, 2017).…”

“…However, a reexamination of this fossil by Minugh-Purvis (1993) concluded that although it probably lacked a canine fossa, its maxillary flexion was H. sapiens-like. More recently, using a combination of geometric morphometric and surface registration methods, Röding et al (2022) found that Mugharet el'Aliya shows shape affinities to H. sapiens, in particular an early H. sapiens subadult individual from Qafzeh, Israel.…”