Bone Tumor Identified in 120,000-Year-Old Rib of Neandertal From
Famous Cave Excavation Site of Krapina in Central Europe
PHILADELPHIA, PA, June 2013—The first-known definitive case of a
benign bone tumor has been discovered in the rib of a young
Neandertal who lived about 120,000 years ago in what is now
present-day Croatia. The bone fragment, which comes from the
famous archaeological cave site of Krapina, contains by far the
earliest bone tumor ever identified in the archaeological
record. Details of the tumor confirmation, announced by an
international research team led by Penn Museum Associate Curator
and Paleoanthropologist Janet Monge, is available in a research
paper, "Fibrous dysplasia in a 120,000+ year old Neandertal from
Krapina, Croatia," in the online scientific journal PLOS ONE.
Joining Dr. Monge on the research team were Morrie Kricun,
Department of Radiology, University of Pennsylvania; Jakov
Radovcic and Davorka Radovcic, Croatian Natural History Museum;
Alan Mann, Department of Anthropology