Archaeologists from the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW) discovered a 25,000-year-old mammoth slaughter site in Langmannersdorf, Lower Austria. During excavations near St. Pölten, the team uncovered the remains of at least five slain mammoths, along with stone tools and evidence of their processing.
At one location, remains of at least three animals were found, including complete and disassembled tusks, but almost no vertebrae and fewer long bones were present, according to the Frankfurter Allgemeine. "The humans somehow sorted [the bones]," a researcher told the Austrian news agency APA, as noted by Die Welt. This suggests that Ice Age hunters were methodical in processing mammoth remains.
"The people understood the animals and knew when they moved in this valley," a researcher stated. Hunters took advantage of the structured landscape to ambush the mammoths in the valley.
Stone tools and waste from their production were also found at the site, according to the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
Similar sites are being investigated in Poland and the Czech Republic as part of the European research project MAMBA to learn more about the hunting and use of woolly mammoths by humans and to reconstruct the history of this extinct species. The investigations aim to trace climatic and ecological changes that occurred between 35,000 and 25,000 years ago.
Between 1904 and 1907, the Natural History Museum of Vienna conducted initial excavations in Langmannersdorf, part of the municipality of Perschling. The museum became aware of the site because residents had been selling unusually large bones they found in the area to a soap factory for years. In 1919 and 1920, more systematic investigations were conducted, discovering two camps of mammoth hunters.
In February 2023, a team led by Marc Händel from the Austrian Archaeological Institute (ÖAI) conducted new excavations as part of the MAMBA project. Händel suggested that ivory was processed at the location, possibly to make spear points. The currently excavated stone tools do not differ in technology from the old finds.
Researchers are examining genetic material and isotopes from the teeth and bones of the animals. The bones were stacked closely together, but the skeletons were not complete. At one site, ribs, vertebrae, and long bones were missing; at the other site, no ribs and tusks were found.
The article was written with the assistance of a news analysis system.
