Israel Hershkovitz

DR. ISRAEL HERSHKOVITZ, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel, was awarded a grant in April 2018 to aid research on ‘New Perspectives on Middle Paleolithic Human Populations in the Southern Levant: The View from Tinshemet Cave.’ Tinshemet Cave is a recently excavated Middle Paleolithic site in central Israel. The first season (August 2017) revealed abundant evidence for human presence as well as two fully articulated hominin skeletons, a child of 3-6 years and an adult. During the second season (August 2018-sponsored by W-G Foundation), three additional individuals were recovered and excavated. All three individuals were successfully removed (intact), transported to the preservation laboratory at the university, and are now being cleaned, preserved, and reconstructed by two technicians. Their anthropological analysis is expected to start March 2020. The study of these hominins and their material culture, symbolic behavior, and subsistence strategy, as well as their relationships with other hominin groups, may provide a wealth of new information on the paleobiology of the Middle Paleolithic populations in this region, and will help in establishing a secure chronological framework for the MP Levantine fossil record.