Vindija Cave
Vindija Cave
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 Vindija Cave in Croatia
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| Location | Donja Voća |
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| Region | northern Croatia |
| Coordinates | 46°17′57″N 16°4′14″E / 46.29917°N 16.07056°ECoordinates: 46°17′57″N 16°4′14″E / 46.29917°N 16.07056°E |
| History | |
| Periods | Paleolithic |
| Associated with | Neanderthals, Paleo-humans |
Vindija cave is an archaeological site of occupation associated with Neanderthals and modern humans, located in the municipality of Donja Voća, northern Croatia. One of these Neanderthals was selected as primary source of DNA for the Neanderthal genome project.
The cave is located roughly 20 km (12 mi) west of the city of Varaždin and 10 km (6.2 mi) north of Ivanec. It is estimated that Neanderthals lived there about 45,000-32,000 years ago.
Vindija includes a total of 13 levels dated between 150,000 years ago and the present, spanning the upper part of the Lower Paleolithic, Middle Paleolithic and Upper Paleolithic periods. Several of the levels are without hominin remains, or have been disturbed primarily through cryoturbations ice wedging, there are some stratigraphically separated hominin levels at Vindija Cave associated with humans and Neanderthals.
The earliest recognized hominid occupations date to ca. 45,000 BP, deposits at Vindija include strata that comprise a huge number of animal bones, including tens of thousands of specimens, 90% of which are cave bears, over a period of more than 150,000 years. This record of animals in the region has been used to establish data about the climate and habitat of northwest Croatia during that period. The site was first excavated in the first half of the 20th century, and more extensively excavated between 1974 and 1986 by Mirko Malez of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts. There are numerous archaeological and faunal remains with over 100 hominin discoveries that have been found at Vindija Cave.
In 2008, researchers reported that a complete mtDNA sequence had been retrieved from a thigh bone of one of the Neanderthals recovered from Vindija Cave. The bone (called Vi-80) comes from level G3, and it was direct-dated to 38,310 ± 2,130 RCYBP. Their research suggests that the two hominins who occupied Vindija Cave at different times—early modern Homo sapiens and Neanderthals—were clearly separate species.
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