DNA study reveals 8,500-year-old skeleton was a Native American

(Image credit: AP Photo/Kevin P. Casey)

published 18 June 2015

Although the 8,500-year-old skeleton named the Kennewick Man, or the Ancient One, was unearthed in Washington State in 1996, a newly published analysis of the skeleton's DNA will likely reignite the debate over his origins.

The DNA evidence, published in the journal Nature, proved that the Kennewick Man is of Native American descent. That finding refutes previous studies, which had concluded that he resembled populations from Japan, Polynesia, or Europe.

The news offers Native Americans renewed hope in a battle that they thought they had already lost: When scientists first discovered the skeleton, Native Americans protested its removal from their land, saying that the bones were remains of an ancestor and therefore deserved a proper burial. The dispute even went to court — where the Native Americans lost because they couldn't definitively prove the Kennewick Man was their ancestor. But the new evidence could bolster the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation's efforts to finally lay the Kennewick Man to rest.