Biotic interactions between Africa and Eurasia across the Levant have invoked particular attention among scientists aiming to unravel early human dispersals. However, it remains unclear whether behavioral capacities enabled early modern humans to surpass the Saharo–Arabian deserts or if climatic changes triggered punctuated dispersals out of Africa. Here, we report an unusual subfossil assemblage discovered in a Judean Desert’s cliff cave near the Dead Sea and dated to between ∼42,000 and at least 103,000 y ago. Paleogenomic and morphological comparisons indicate that the specimens belong to an extinct subspecies of the eastern African crested rat, Lophiomys imhausi maremortum subspecies nova, which diverged from the modern eastern African populations in the late Middle Pleistocene ∼226,000 to 165,000 y ago. The reported paleomitogenome is the oldest so far in the Levant, opening the door for future paleoDNA analyses in the region. Species distribution modeling points to the presence of continuous habitat corridors connecting eastern Africa with the Levant during the Last Interglacial ∼129,000 to 116,000 y ago, providing further evidence of the northern ingression of African biomes into Eurasia and reinforcing previous suggestions of the critical role of climate change in Late Pleistocene intercontinental biogeography. Furthermore, our study complements other paleoenvironmental proxies with local—instead of interregional—paleoenvironmental data, opening an unprecedented window into the Dead Sea rift paleolandscape.

跨越黎凡特的非洲和欧亚大陆之间的生物相互作用引起了旨在解开早期人类传播的科学家的特别关注。然而，尚不清楚行为能力是否使早期现代人类能够超越撒哈拉-阿拉伯沙漠，或者气候变化是否触发了断断续续的非洲散布。在这里，我们报告了在死海附近的朱迪亚沙漠悬崖洞穴中发现的一种不寻常的亚化石组合，其历史可追溯至 42,000 至至少 103,000 年前。古基因组学和形态学比较表明，这些标本属于东非冠鼠Lophiomys imhausi maremortum的一个已灭绝亚种。新星亚种，它在大约 226,000 到 165,000 年前的中更新世晚期与现代东非种群分道扬镳。报告的古线粒体基因组是黎凡特迄今为止最古老的，为该地区未来的古DNA分析打开了大门。物种分布模型表明，在末次间冰期~129,000 至 116,000 年前，存在连接东非和黎凡特的连续栖息地走廊，为非洲生物群落北部进入欧亚大陆提供了进一步的证据，并加强了先前关于气候的关键作用的建议晚更新世洲际生物地理学的变化。此外，我们的研究用本地（而不是跨区域）古环境数据补充了其他古环境代理，为死海裂谷古景观打开了前所未有的窗口。