The fossilized teeth of the earliest dogs suggest that they ate bones and other discarded food scraps in areas settled by humans, according to a study published in the March 2020 issue of the Journal of Archaeological Science. Microwear patterns in canid fossils from the Predmostí site in Czechia that likely represent the ancestors of modern-day dogs and wolves, and date back to roughly 28,500 years ago, support “the presence of two morphologically and behaviorally distinct canid types at this middle Upper Paleolithic site,” the authors write in the paper.
“Our primary goal was to test whether these two morphotypes expressed notable differences in behavior, based on wear patterns,” says anthropologist Peter Ungar of the University of Arkansas in a press release. “Dental microwear is a behavioral signal that can appear generations before morphological changes are established in a population, and it shows great promise in using the archaeological record ...
