This may be the oldest, most complete Neandertal fingerprint ever seen

At an past stone structure successful cardinal Spain, archaeologists person unearthed a chromatic marked by a unsocial reddish dot. That spot — made utilizing reddish ochre, a earthy pigment — holds what appears to beryllium the oldest and astir implicit Neandertal fingerprint ever found.

The stone connected which it’s found is shaped benignant of similar a quality face. That reddish dot appears close wherever a chemoreceptor mightiness be. This hints that the Neandertal who made the people whitethorn person been experiencing pareidolia, the scientists say. Pareidolia is our inclination to spot acquainted shapes, specified arsenic faces, successful random objects.

When archeologists dug up this face-shaped stone marked with a reddish dot, they instantly recognized it arsenic thing exceptional.
D. Álvarez-Alonso et al/Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences 2025

Researchers shared these findings May 24. They picture them in Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences.

Archaeologists dug up the dotted chromatic successful 2022 astatine a tract not excessively acold from the metropolis of Segovia. Called Abrigo de San Lázaro, it’s a shallow cave carved into cliffs adjacent the Eresma River.

The granite stone they recovered determination is astir 20 centimeters (8 inches) across. Carbon dating shows it emerged from a furniture of world dating backmost to astir 43,000 years ago. That’s adjacent the extremity of Neandertal history.

The furniture of ungraded holding the stone held fewer different stones. Most of these showed signs they had erstwhile been hammering tools. But the potato-shaped dotted stone was different. It didn’t look similar a tool. Plus, it was larger than immoderate different chromatic successful the layer.

“From the archetypal moment, we saw that it had a reddish dot,” says David Álvarez Alonso. A historiographer and archaeologist, helium works astatine the Complutense University. It’s successful Madrid, Spain.

Álvarez Alonso’s squad recovered the dot’s precision and placement curious. So they inspected what it had been made from. Those minerals confirmed the dot was not a earthy portion of the rock. That led his squad to fishy idiosyncratic had made the mark.

Neandertal digit painting

An past idiosyncratic could person done this by dipping a fingertip into a premix of ochre pigment and water, past pressing it to the rock.

To trial the idea, Álvarez Alonso’s squad asked forensic experts successful Spain’s nationalist constabulary for help.

At first, the forensic squad doubted they could lick specified a acold case. But they agreed to  look astatine the stone with multispectral imaging. This method examines surfaces nether antithetic wavelengths of light. The resulting images revealed fingerprint ridges embedded successful the dot.

It’s not wide which digit near the smudge. But comparisons to modern fingerprint databases suggest it was apt near by a man.

Neandertal fingerprints person shown up connected different past objects. Resin balls recovered successful Germany, for instance, carnivore prints apt made during toolmaking. The newfound people is special, though, due to the fact that it looks similar it was made for some symbolic purpose.

It is intolerable to cognize what the creator intended. But to Álvarez Alonso, the stone intelligibly differs from ones utilized arsenic tools.