Human skull of female individual

Material recovered in the grotto known as Lapa Vermelha IV in the 1970s during a Franco-Brazilian research mission coordinated by archaeologist Annette Laming-Emperaire and with the participation of researchers from the National Museum. Dates of this skull and the site where it was found suggest an antiquity between 11,000 and 11,500 years from the C14 dating. This is the oldest skeleton discovered in the Americas, popularly known as Luzia. It presents peculiar characteristics in the cranial morphology, which have been interpreted as evidences of a migration previous to the occupation of the American continent by populations with morphological characteristics close to the present Asian populations.