Scientists Find Possible New Human Species

May 29, 1997 12:41 PM EDT

MADRID (Reuter) - A group of Spanish scientists said Thursday they had discovered a new species of human beings in a 780,000-year-old fossil, possibly the oldest known European.

``We believe this is a new species that we have called Homo antecessor,'' Jose Maria Bermudez de Castro of the Natural Museum of Natural Sciences in Madrid told a news conference.

``It's a species that we consider the common ancestor of modern humanity and the neandertals.''

Bermudez de Castro and a team of Spanish paleoanthropologists found the fossilised remains of a boy with a remarkably modern face in a cave in Spain's central Atapuerca mountains during an excavation from 1994 to 1996.

They said the unique combination of features, with a face like the modern Homo sapiens species and a jaw and brow similar to the extinct Neandertals, led them to name a new species, a finding to be published in the U.S. journal Science Friday.

The boy was discovered among a group of six people of almost modern height and bone size with a relatively advanced cognitive ability, as judged by the quality of tools found near them.

``This is clearly a very important new finding,'' Richard Gallagher, European editor of Science, told reporters.

``These are bold, exciting proposals that already have the field buzzing.''

The Spanish team acknowledged that the decision to name a new species based on the reconstructed remains of just one boy -- the faces of the adults in the cave were not as markedly modern -- was controversial.

``We think we have enough information to define it in the proper sense of a new species,'' said Antonio Rosas, a paleoanthropologist at the National Museum of Natural Sciences.

``But people are probably going to need some time to accommodate this proposal.''