New researches on the ”Altamura man”: morphology of the scapular glenoid cavity of a Neanderthal skeleton

In 1993 an archaic (i.e., non modern) human skeleton was discovered inside the Lamalunga karstic system, in the countryside nearby Altamura, Southern Italy (Bari, Puglia). The conditions of preservation of the skeleton are exceptional, so that each bony element belonging to a single adult male are virtually preserved. Most of the visible skeletal features – observed with the bones still in situ – are close to the Neanderthal morphology (e.g., Manzi 2011). In the past couple of decades, unfortunately, with the exception of some photographic and laser 3D documentations (eg, Pesce-Delfino and Vacca 1993a, 1993b, 1994; Vacca and Pesce-Delfino, 2004; Vacca, 2006; Manzi et al. 2010a), no direct studies have been carried out so far on the Altamura skeleton, due to the fact that its remains are yet incorporated within a curtain of calcite concretions of various thickness, which prevent from any direct intervention and hide the genuine morphology of bones and teeth. It follows that the international scientific community has been less and less concerned about this important finding and its significance for human evolution. However, in 2008-2009 a new scientific endeavour coordinated by a new commission of experts (appointed by the Direzione Re- gionale per i Beni Culturali e Pa-esaggistici della Puglia, in col-laboration with the Soprinten-denza per i Beni Archeologici della Puglia and assisted by speleo-logists of the Centro Altamura-no Ricerche Speleologiche) allowed to perform a survey in the cave with the aim to physically remove a skeletal fragment to be used for high-quality investigations (including aDNA extraction and dating attempts). The choice of the specimen to be extracted fell among those identified after a previous photographic recognition (Micheli et al. 1996) within the small empty space behind the so called “apse of man” (i.e., the small chamber where the main skeletal remains are enclosed). This choice was justified as follows (Manzi et al. 2010b): 1) the need to obtain a bony element with a minimum contamination due to the human presence in the cave after the discovery; 2) the need to not touch (as requested by the Authorities) the human skeletal remains enclosed in the apse; 3) the relative simplicity of sampling, intrinsic to the fact that the selected specimen appeared to lie without any contact with concretions like those present on the “apse of man”. The fossil specimen was removed from the cave in sterile condition and revealed to be free from any important calcite concretions; it represents a portion of the right scapula, where the glenoid cavity (showing only a modest fracture along the axillo-ventral margin), the neck, and both the roots of the acromion and the coracoid process are preserved. After the extraction, while maintaining sterile conditions, the portion of scapula was subjected to professional photographic documentation and medical tomographic scan (CT), performed in order to preserve its morphology before it was submitted to paleogenetic and dating analyses. A total of 119 slices in DICOM format were recorded with a resolution of 0.25 mm and an increment of slice of 0.65 mm. From these, 3D high-resolution (mm slicing 0.25) digital and stereolithograpic replicas were also obtained. The virtual reproduction was analyzed with ordinary morphometric methods, using the length (GAL), the breadth (GAB), and the maximum depth (GFD) of the glenoid cavity, selected as variables to be compared with data available from the literature (Vrba 1979; Churchill and Trinkaus 1990; Carrettero et al. 1997); comparative samples include: A. africanus (STS 7), H. heidelbergensis (Atapuerca - Sima de los Huesos), H. neanderthalensis (Near-Eastern and European Würmian Neanderthals), and H. sapiens (Upper Paleolithic and recent) specimens. A 2D geometric morphometrics a-nalysis was also performed on the outline of the gle-noid cavity, using 60 sliding landmarks and semilandmarks, treated according to the methodology described in Di Vincenzo and colleagues (2012). The Altamura glenoid cavity was compared with those of 66 specimens belonging to the following OTUs: A. africanus, H. floresiensis, H. georgicus (Dmanisi), H. heidelbergensis (Atapuerca SH), H. neanderthalensis, H. sapiens (Upper Paleolithic and recent), having distinguished the Neanderthal sample from Krapina (> 100 ka) from the European Würmian and Near-Eastern Neanderthals. Overall, the results of these morphometric analyses (see figures) show that the scapula from Altamura – as regards both metric (GAB/GAL ratio and GFD) and geometric (shape) available variables – falls within or in continuity with the variability of H. neanderthalensis, in accordance with general observations on the morphology of the skeleton still in situ. In addition, phenetic relationships obtained from the Euclidean distances of the Procruste’s coordinates of the glenoid outline intercept an additional phylogenetic signal, suggesting the scapula from Altamura as interposed between the early Neanderthals from Krapina and more derived Neanderthal samples. References: Carretero J.M. et al. 1997. Journal of Human Evolution 33:357-408 – Churchill S.E., Trinkaus E. 1990. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 83:147-160 – Di Vincenzo F. et al. 2012. Journal of Human Evolution 62:274-285 – Manzi G. et al. 2010a. DiRe, Direzione Regionale BCA della Puglia 2:35-39 – Manzi G. et al. 2010b. DiRe, Direzione Regionale BCA della Puglia 2:41-46 – Manzi G. et al. 2011. Quaternary Science Reviews 30:1420-1438 – Micheli M. et al. (a cura di). 1996. L'Uomo di Altamura e la Grotta di Lamalunga ABACO, Forlì. Pesce Delfino V., Vacca E. 1993a. Rivista di Antropologia 71:249-257 – Pesce Delfino V., Vacca E. 1993b. Anthropologie (Brno) 31:157-158 – Pesce Delfino V., Vacca E. 1994. Human Evolution 9:1-9 – Vacca E. 2006. Ricerche Speleologiche 1:28-54 – Vacca E., Pesce Delfino V. 2004. Collegium Antropologicum 28:113-119 – Vrba E.S. 1979. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 51:117-129.