According to CNN, in late 2019, a small piece of birch pitch (pictured above) was found by archeologists on Lolland, the fourth largest island of Denmark. A study uncovered a 5,700-year-old girl's entire genome and oral microbiome, marking the first time human genetic material has successfully been extracted from something besides human bones.
Nicknamed Lola, the young girl who chewed on the birch pitch had blue eyes, dark skin and dark hair. Her last meal included hazelnuts and mallard duck but no milk. She was lactose-intolerant, which serves to validate the theory that adults evolved the tolerance after dairy farming was introduced.
It is believed that ancient humans chewed on birch pitch to relieve toothaches, and so the ancient chewing gum acted as a time capsule, storing information about Lola’s oral microbiome, the bacteria that lived in her mouth. The researchers were able to detect traces of DNA that revealed pathogens and even found the signature for pneumonia.
The discovery of the birch pitch sheds light on one person who lived at the site, which is notable because no human remains have ever been recovered there.
