Oldest latent fingerprint ?
A pebble, dated between 44600 and 41500 years before present, shows a latent fingerprint ! Handled by the last Neanderthals in Iberia, shortly before their complete disappearance.
[2025] More than a fingerprint on a pebble: A pigment-marked object from San Lázaro rock-shelter in the context of Neanderthal symbolic behavior / David Álvarez-Alonso & als.
The pebble discovered in the San Lázaro rock-shelter (Segovia, Central Spain) is the oldest known non-utilitarian object with a fingerprint made in Europe. Its morphology and the strategic position of an ocher dot, where a dermatoglyphic image has been detected, may be evidence of symbolic behavior.
The discovery is doubly exceptional because it includes the most complete dermatoglyphic image identified to date, with the exception of the partial fingerprint from Königsaue, both with a comparable minimum age. This dermatoglyphic image is not visible and it was revealed after a multispectral analysis.
This peeble was discovered in July 2022 during the excavation of the level H, at the Mousterian site of San Lázaro rock-shelter (Segovia, Central Spain).
A multispectral analysis enabled to exhibit a latent fingerprint.
Researchers tried to extract minutiae, and even tried to match 😶 😋.
B. Characteristic points detected by the ABIS system coinciding with the palm of a candidate
Is this what is called a « cold case » ?