John Hawks
@johnhawks.net
Paleoanthropologist | Chair and Professor of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin–Madison 🧪🏺💀https://www.johnhawks.net
Con Moong Cave, Vietnam, has evidence of ash, burials, and shell middens from the terminal Pleistocene. Even earlier—by 42,000 years ago—people used the cave, alternating with periods when bats were present and humans absent, evidenced by sediment geochemistry.
Photo: Thanh Hoa Newspaper
Photo: Thanh Hoa Newspaper
December 24, 2025 at 4:09 PM
Con Moong Cave, Vietnam, has evidence of ash, burials, and shell middens from the terminal Pleistocene. Even earlier—by 42,000 years ago—people used the cave, alternating with periods when bats were present and humans absent, evidenced by sediment geochemistry.
Photo: Thanh Hoa Newspaper
Photo: Thanh Hoa Newspaper
One hundred and one years ago today, a young Australian anatomist worked with knitting needles to chip the hard rock from the face of a 3-million-year-old child. Together they placed human ancestry in Africa, as Charles Darwin had predicted fifty years before.
www.johnhawks.net/p/the-circum...
www.johnhawks.net/p/the-circum...
The circumstances of the Taung discovery
The textbook story of the fossil leaves out a wider context in which scientists interpreted the first evidence of Australopithecus.
www.johnhawks.net
December 23, 2025 at 2:12 PM
One hundred and one years ago today, a young Australian anatomist worked with knitting needles to chip the hard rock from the face of a 3-million-year-old child. Together they placed human ancestry in Africa, as Charles Darwin had predicted fifty years before.
www.johnhawks.net/p/the-circum...
www.johnhawks.net/p/the-circum...
The solstice has always mattered, more to our ancient ancestors than to most of us today. I always wonder when I am under dark skies what wisdom they had that we may have forgotten.
www.johnhawks.net/p/when-did-o...
www.johnhawks.net/p/when-did-o...
When did our ancestors start looking up to the stars?
Changes in the sky have been important to peoples throughout the world. That connection may go back much further than our species.
www.johnhawks.net
December 21, 2025 at 2:23 PM
The solstice has always mattered, more to our ancient ancestors than to most of us today. I always wonder when I am under dark skies what wisdom they had that we may have forgotten.
www.johnhawks.net/p/when-did-o...
www.johnhawks.net/p/when-did-o...
The Yarımburgaz cave complex is around 22 km west of Istanbul, in the Thracian part of Turkey. An upper cave is the location of a Byzantine church, while a lower chamber has much older Middle Pleistocene record of choppers, modified flake tools, and remains of cave bears.
Photo: CeeGee (Wikipedia)
Photo: CeeGee (Wikipedia)
December 20, 2025 at 6:21 PM
The Yarımburgaz cave complex is around 22 km west of Istanbul, in the Thracian part of Turkey. An upper cave is the location of a Byzantine church, while a lower chamber has much older Middle Pleistocene record of choppers, modified flake tools, and remains of cave bears.
Photo: CeeGee (Wikipedia)
Photo: CeeGee (Wikipedia)
Reposted by John Hawks
This is a good time to talk about the TRUE genetics revolution brought in by sequencing the human genome:
The genetic underpinning of traits is not simple, will never be simple. Complex gene-gene interactions are the rule, not the exception 🧵
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
The genetic underpinning of traits is not simple, will never be simple. Complex gene-gene interactions are the rule, not the exception 🧵
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Biobanks reveal genetic complexity in human evolution
Tiny genetic variations between humans, Neanderthals and Denisovans might not be all they were cracked up to be.
www.nature.com
December 19, 2025 at 5:29 PM
This is a good time to talk about the TRUE genetics revolution brought in by sequencing the human genome:
The genetic underpinning of traits is not simple, will never be simple. Complex gene-gene interactions are the rule, not the exception 🧵
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
The genetic underpinning of traits is not simple, will never be simple. Complex gene-gene interactions are the rule, not the exception 🧵
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Reposted by John Hawks
This report in Nature on the costs of competing for & administering scientific grants is shocking: "In other words, European taxpayers will have spent more on the funding process than on the funding itself, and the scientific ecosystem has been drained." www.nature.com/articles/d41... 🧪
Point of no returns: researchers are crossing a threshold in the fight for funding
With so little money to go round, the costs of competing for grants can exceed what the grants are worth. When that happens, nobody wins.
www.nature.com
December 19, 2025 at 6:46 PM
This report in Nature on the costs of competing for & administering scientific grants is shocking: "In other words, European taxpayers will have spent more on the funding process than on the funding itself, and the scientific ecosystem has been drained." www.nature.com/articles/d41... 🧪
“GenAI for Africa, a funding call from the European Union’s Horizon Europe programme…Out of 215 submissions, only two projects are expected to be funded, giving a success rate of under 1%”
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Point of no returns: researchers are crossing a threshold in the fight for funding
With so little money to go round, the costs of competing for grants can exceed what the grants are worth. When that happens, nobody wins.
www.nature.com
December 19, 2025 at 10:08 PM
“GenAI for Africa, a funding call from the European Union’s Horizon Europe programme…Out of 215 submissions, only two projects are expected to be funded, giving a success rate of under 1%”
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Good coverage in the @economist.com about the investigation of Denisovan ancestry and possible connections to the Yunxian Homo erectus group. (paywall)
www.economist.com/science-and-...
www.economist.com/science-and-...
A debate is raging over the origins of an elusive cousin to modern humans
Who were the Denisovans?
www.economist.com
December 19, 2025 at 9:46 PM
Good coverage in the @economist.com about the investigation of Denisovan ancestry and possible connections to the Yunxian Homo erectus group. (paywall)
www.economist.com/science-and-...
www.economist.com/science-and-...
Reposted by John Hawks
#FossilFriday Stack of opalised vertebrae from an Early Cretaceous ichthyosaur. Another remarkable fossil on display in the South Australia Museum, Adelaide.
December 19, 2025 at 5:55 AM
#FossilFriday Stack of opalised vertebrae from an Early Cretaceous ichthyosaur. Another remarkable fossil on display in the South Australia Museum, Adelaide.
It has been a remarkable year of discoveries. From ancient Pompeii, to the medieval Avars, to the American Southwest. Plus some advances in 3D organization of ancient genomes and an ancient disease with unexpected roots. And lots about Denisovans!
www.johnhawks.net/p/top-10-dis...
www.johnhawks.net/p/top-10-dis...
Top 10 discoveries about ancient people from DNA in 2025
In a year full of Denisovan discoveries, I look at some of the top highlights of research.
www.johnhawks.net
December 19, 2025 at 3:21 PM
It has been a remarkable year of discoveries. From ancient Pompeii, to the medieval Avars, to the American Southwest. Plus some advances in 3D organization of ancient genomes and an ancient disease with unexpected roots. And lots about Denisovans!
www.johnhawks.net/p/top-10-dis...
www.johnhawks.net/p/top-10-dis...
Reposted by John Hawks
Will an anthropologist be able to identify your sex and gender from your bones 100 years from now? I sure hope so!
Read my essay on the limited and limiting methods we currently have for sex estimation to learn where the science has room to improve.
www.prosocial.world/posts/an-ant...
Read my essay on the limited and limiting methods we currently have for sex estimation to learn where the science has room to improve.
www.prosocial.world/posts/an-ant...
An Anthropologist’s Perspective on Sex and Gender in the Skeleton
Anthropological methods show that skeletal sex is an estimate, not a certainty, revealing the limits of binary claims about human identity.
www.prosocial.world
December 18, 2025 at 3:26 PM
Will an anthropologist be able to identify your sex and gender from your bones 100 years from now? I sure hope so!
Read my essay on the limited and limiting methods we currently have for sex estimation to learn where the science has room to improve.
www.prosocial.world/posts/an-ant...
Read my essay on the limited and limiting methods we currently have for sex estimation to learn where the science has room to improve.
www.prosocial.world/posts/an-ant...
Reposted by John Hawks
Review of the use of bone technology which used to be taken as a diagnostic of modern behaviour:
'In this contribution, we present a global review of the diverse range of roles that bone tools played during the period from the Middle Pleistocene to the Early to Mid Holocene (c. 8,000 years ago) […]
'In this contribution, we present a global review of the diverse range of roles that bone tools played during the period from the Middle Pleistocene to the Early to Mid Holocene (c. 8,000 years ago) […]
Original post on c.im
c.im
December 17, 2025 at 12:44 PM
Review of the use of bone technology which used to be taken as a diagnostic of modern behaviour:
'In this contribution, we present a global review of the diverse range of roles that bone tools played during the period from the Middle Pleistocene to the Early to Mid Holocene (c. 8,000 years ago) […]
'In this contribution, we present a global review of the diverse range of roles that bone tools played during the period from the Middle Pleistocene to the Early to Mid Holocene (c. 8,000 years ago) […]
Ghar-e Boof, Iran, has Upper Paleolithic stone and faunal assemblages from 42,000–35,000 years ago. The people who used the cave over time shifted their hunting toward more difficult-to-hunt small animals, using tools made with bladelets.
Photo: Nicholas Conard
Photo: Nicholas Conard
December 17, 2025 at 3:35 PM
Ghar-e Boof, Iran, has Upper Paleolithic stone and faunal assemblages from 42,000–35,000 years ago. The people who used the cave over time shifted their hunting toward more difficult-to-hunt small animals, using tools made with bladelets.
Photo: Nicholas Conard
Photo: Nicholas Conard
“What archaeology asks of everyone is an openness to alternate worlds. An understanding that your society, with its ways of working, worshipping, learning, loving—even knowing a dog—is just one permutation of endless human and beyond human possibilities.”
www.sapiens.org/archaeology/...
www.sapiens.org/archaeology/...
Unearthing What Archaeologists Can and Cannot Know
An archaeologist studying 1,000-year-old dog burials reflects on the need for evidence and imagination in archaeology.
www.sapiens.org
December 16, 2025 at 5:59 PM
“What archaeology asks of everyone is an openness to alternate worlds. An understanding that your society, with its ways of working, worshipping, learning, loving—even knowing a dog—is just one permutation of endless human and beyond human possibilities.”
www.sapiens.org/archaeology/...
www.sapiens.org/archaeology/...
Oued Bousmane, Algeria, is a striking rockshelter on Djebel Dyr. The Late Pleistocene sediments in the site contain stone assemblages of the kind categorized as Aterian across North Africa, although with few of the tanged points that are the type indicator of that industry.
Photo: Nadia Bahra
Photo: Nadia Bahra
December 15, 2025 at 6:06 PM
Oued Bousmane, Algeria, is a striking rockshelter on Djebel Dyr. The Late Pleistocene sediments in the site contain stone assemblages of the kind categorized as Aterian across North Africa, although with few of the tanged points that are the type indicator of that industry.
Photo: Nadia Bahra
Photo: Nadia Bahra
One of the most iconic early discoveries of human origins is the skull from Kabwe, now thought to be around 300,000 years old. The human story behind the site, with its legacy of industrial lead contamination, is not often told with the paleoanthropological one.
www.johnhawks.net/p/kabwe-famo...
www.johnhawks.net/p/kabwe-famo...
Kabwe: A famous fossil and the human costs of mining
Mining led to the skull's discovery, destroyed its context, and left a century-long legacy of lead poisoning.
www.johnhawks.net
December 14, 2025 at 8:56 PM
One of the most iconic early discoveries of human origins is the skull from Kabwe, now thought to be around 300,000 years old. The human story behind the site, with its legacy of industrial lead contamination, is not often told with the paleoanthropological one.
www.johnhawks.net/p/kabwe-famo...
www.johnhawks.net/p/kabwe-famo...
Cueva de Nerja, Spain, has many paintings from Magdalenian (around 15,000 years ago) and earlier periods. These include depictions of fish, rare in the cave art of other sites. Remains of fish are also well represented in the bone assemblage from the cave.
Photo: Diputación de Málaga
Photo: Diputación de Málaga
December 14, 2025 at 8:00 PM
Cueva de Nerja, Spain, has many paintings from Magdalenian (around 15,000 years ago) and earlier periods. These include depictions of fish, rare in the cave art of other sites. Remains of fish are also well represented in the bone assemblage from the cave.
Photo: Diputación de Málaga
Photo: Diputación de Málaga
Amud Cave, Israel. Years ago I hiked to the site, named for the striking natural pillar of rock, just north of the Sea of Galilee. Here, archaeologists unearthed the remains of several Neandertals, who lived between 50,000 and 70,000 years ago.
December 13, 2025 at 3:08 PM
Amud Cave, Israel. Years ago I hiked to the site, named for the striking natural pillar of rock, just north of the Sea of Galilee. Here, archaeologists unearthed the remains of several Neandertals, who lived between 50,000 and 70,000 years ago.
The pyrite from the chunks hasn't survived, there's no evidence either sparked this particular fire, and there's no flint with sparking traces. The evidence of firestarting is only indirect. And that's no surprise: Evidence for sparking fires is hard to find!
www.johnhawks.net/p/sparking-a...
www.johnhawks.net/p/sparking-a...
Sparking ancient fires
New research helps to show the challenges of documenting ancient firemaking
www.johnhawks.net
December 11, 2025 at 9:47 PM
The pyrite from the chunks hasn't survived, there's no evidence either sparked this particular fire, and there's no flint with sparking traces. The evidence of firestarting is only indirect. And that's no surprise: Evidence for sparking fires is hard to find!
www.johnhawks.net/p/sparking-a...
www.johnhawks.net/p/sparking-a...
Maybe we got up to some nonsense at the end of semester gathering
December 10, 2025 at 3:07 AM
Maybe we got up to some nonsense at the end of semester gathering
Such an amazing visit this morning to our teaching lab at @uwmadison.bsky.social by students from Clark Street Community School. Always great to share the fossil record with students, and these were so well prepared with great questions!
December 10, 2025 at 3:03 AM
Such an amazing visit this morning to our teaching lab at @uwmadison.bsky.social by students from Clark Street Community School. Always great to share the fossil record with students, and these were so well prepared with great questions!
This is a fascinating piece looking at how a century of clever people found ways to reduce disease without modern epidemiological ideas.
healthchecksonhistory.substack.com/p/italy-buil...
healthchecksonhistory.substack.com/p/italy-buil...
How Renaissance Italy fought plague
Venice, Milan, Florence and other Renaissance cities forged the earliest public-health states, which still shape how we govern disease today.
healthchecksonhistory.substack.com
December 9, 2025 at 2:29 PM
This is a fascinating piece looking at how a century of clever people found ways to reduce disease without modern epidemiological ideas.
healthchecksonhistory.substack.com/p/italy-buil...
healthchecksonhistory.substack.com/p/italy-buil...
Reposted by John Hawks
December 9, 2025 at 2:53 AM
Sometimes I’m in caves for nonprofessional reasons. Beautiful a capella holiday concert last night.
December 8, 2025 at 12:57 AM
Sometimes I’m in caves for nonprofessional reasons. Beautiful a capella holiday concert last night.
Reposted by John Hawks
Big implications of a small hip fossil
lawnchairanthropology.com/2025/11/30/h...
lawnchairanthropology.com/2025/11/30/h...
December 1, 2025 at 8:37 PM
Big implications of a small hip fossil
lawnchairanthropology.com/2025/11/30/h...
lawnchairanthropology.com/2025/11/30/h...