Oldest human tracks found in Arabian Peninsula

[pinball1970]

TL;DR Summary

Oldest hominin tracks found in Arabian Peninsula dated at 120,000 years.

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/38/eaba8940.full

From the abstract.
"The findings, it is argued, likely represent the oldest securely dated evidence for Homo sapiens in Arabia. The paleoecological evidence indicates a well-watered semi-arid grassland setting during human movements into the Nefud Desert of Saudi Arabia."

From the abstract. The findings, it is argued, likely represent the oldest securely dated evidence for Homo sapiens in Arabia. The paleoecological evidence indicates a well-watered semi-arid grassland setting during human movements into the Nefud Desert of Saudi Arabia. We conclude that visitation to the lake was transient, likely serving as a place to drink and to forage, and that late Pleistocene human and mammalian migrations and landscape use patterns in Arabia were inexorably linked.

 

[jim mcnamara]

I think hominin tracks are a good choice of words here. Footprints could have come from other human species, simply because humans of different species are known to have existed at the same time. Ex: Neanderthals, modern humans

I think the authors are going to have a tough time proving that the tracks definitely came from H. sapiens. It appears that they support the out-of-Africa of human migration. Hmm. I did not know there were problems with that.