A 16 500 year-old cemetery was discovered a decade ago in Jordan and some of the findings are very interesting with regards to our bond with domesticated animals. At first this link was overlooked because archeologists focused more on the fact that the burial site contained 11 sets of human remains. But now another interesting finding has come to light: the remains of red foxes.

Previous burial sites dating back 15 000 to 12 000 years ago have revealed strong evidence that humans of that time period kept dogs as pets, with humans clearly being buried in intentional proximity to their dogs. But this particular site is 4 000 years older than those ones, yet the same patterns were found using foxes instead of dogs.

In one example they found a fox that was killed and buried with its owner. Later, the grave was reopened for some reason and the human’s body was moved. And so was the fox. The researchers believe that this could be evidence of an early, failed attempt at domestication of foxes. Although it is possible up to a point to tame foxes – a Soviet breeding experiment had some recent success with this – but complete domestication of foxes is thought to be impossible because the animals are too naturally timid and skittish. Dogs have proven far better domestication candidates, although these findings suggest humans only learned that through a little trial and error.

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