In 1868, a railway excavation in France exposed skeletons that changed what we know about Europe's first modern humans

Imagine yourself cutting through a hillside of rock in order to lay down railroad tracks for a locomotive that would be state-of-the-art, when your tools actually cut right into a cave containing the dead from long ago. Such a scenario occurred around the tiny town of Les Eyzies in southwestern France in the spring of 1868, as a team of construction workers was engaged in preparing the ground for the laying down of tracks.As they cleared away the initial layers of stone, they uncovered a massive burial floor containing several well-preserved human skeletons that had been resting in the dark for thousands of years.However, unbeknownst to the workers, they had revealed the irrefutable evidence for an entire era in the history of prehistoric Europe. Authorities immediately paused work and summoned the scientists, who excavated the skeletons of four adults and one infant. This unique site was given the title The Cro-Magnon rock shelter, and its extraordinary specimens would completely change the way the earliest modern humans were perceived forever.Erasing the image of the brutal cavemanIndeed, the discovery of these prehistoric people was bound to instantly impact the global scientific perception due to the incredibly familiar appearance of our ancestors. It is reported in The Cro-Magnon rock shelter from the French Ministry of Culture that the skeletons were discovered with finely crafted animal teeth, seashells designed as pendants, and flint artefacts.Prior to this groundbreaking finding, nineteenth-century popular belief and even scientific communities agreed unanimously that ancient man was an inferior being resembling an ape and devoid of any intelligent or emotional capabilities.This flawless state of the bones finally dispelled these wild theories. As explained in an evolutionary history of the specimen featured by the Smithsonian Institution Human Origins Program titled Cro-Magnon 1, the main fossilised head had a high and round skull, a vertical forehead. It lacked a prominent brow ridge common among more primitive hominids. It was thus evident to the academic community that these prehistoric humans had the same physical anatomy as any modern Homo sapiens and had helped show that these ancients were anatomically modern as anybody alive. Delving into the complex workings of the ancient mindThis remarkable science story only developed further as the twenty-first century approached, thanks to technological advancements in the field. Using the powerful micro-CT technology, scientists managed to look inside the human skull and virtually recreate the structure of a brain that disappeared thousands of years ago. According to a study presented in Bulletins et Mémoires de la Société d'Anthropologie de Paris, three-dimensional scans showed fascinating differences in the frontal and occipital lobes between ancient and modern brains.This computer model of the brain was proof of how adaptable the evolution of our own species could be. What’s more, an analysis in medicine showed that the society had taken care of its vulnerable members in such a way that some of them had survived with serious injuries to their skulls, as well as suffered from infections. These valuable remains can be viewed at the National Museum of Natural History in Paris and show how humane our ancestors were.The realisation that during the 19th century, when the French engineers were working frantically hard at laying down iron tracks between the modern cities of France, the key to unlocking the secrets of our own species had been lying quietly buried under the gravel all along, is absolutely awe-inspiring.