New findings revealed that humans reached American soil before the end of the ice age. That’s 7,000 years earlier than the previous timeline.
Experts find footprints dating back to the Ice age
Researchers found human footprints dating back to about 21,000 to 23,000 years old. They are believed to be formed in a shallow lake’s soft sand bed. The area is a part of what is now Alkali Flat in New Mexico’s White Sands. This finding has changed the belief of when humans arrived in the Americas. Until now, researchers believed that humans took over the Americas towards the end of the ice age. It was supported by the tools they used-spears, scrapers, and needles, nearly 13,000 years ago.
“I think this is probably the biggest discovery about the peopling of America in a hundred years. I don’t know what gods they prayed to, but this is a dream find,” said Ciprian Ardelean. Ardelean is an archeologist at the Mexico’s Autonomous University of Zacatecas. However, he was not involved in the work.
More on the ‘first footprints’
“Many tracks appear to be those of teenagers and children; large adult footprints are less frequent,” reported the authors of the study. “Children accompany the teenagers, and collectively they leave a higher number of footprints,” they explained. In addition to human footprints, they also found tracks left behind by mammoths, giant sloths, and prehistoric wolves. It appears that these animals visited the lake around the same time as the humans.
The footprints were found by David Bustos, the park’s resource program manager in 2009. These prints were discovered across the 80,000 acres of the park. What do they imply? These observations prove that humans arrived in the Americas during a time when humungous glaciers covered most of the area. The footprints were left behind when humans passed from the sandy ground in the magic on the lake. Previously the area was covered like the land hardened over time. However, due to erosion, the lost footprints re-emerged.
