Deep beneath the North Sea, scientists have discovered a fossilized forest that could hold traces of prehistoric early humans who lived there around 10,000 years ago, before the land slipped beneath the waves a few thousand years later.

The discovery gives the researchers new hope in their search for “lost” Middle Stone Age — or Mesolithic — settlements of hunter-gatherers, because the find shows that they have found a particular type of exposed ancient landscape.

The scientists took sediment samples from the submerged fossilized forest during their 11-day voyage in the North Sea aboard the research ship RV Belgica, in the Doggerland region known as Brown Bank or Brown Ridge. The scientists say they are certain they are close to finding traces of a prehistoric human settlement in the submerged lands.

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