Lagoa Santa (Holy Lake) is a municipality and region in
the state ofMinas Gerais, Brazil. It is located 37 km
north-northeast from Belo Horizonte and belongs to the mesoregion
Metropolitana de Belo Horizonte and to the microregion of Belo Horizonte.
Cradle of Brazilian Paleontology
The Danish palaeontologist Peter Wilhelm Lund, known as
the father of Brazilian paleontology, discovered a cave filled with human bones
(15 skeletons) and megafauna (very large mammals) dating to the
Pleistocene era. Eugen Warming assisted Lund 1863-1866, and
described the flora of the area and the adaptations of the plants to the
hazards of cerrado – drought and fire – in a work that still stands as a
paradigm of ecological study ('Lagoa Santa')
A century later, in the 1970s, French archeologist Annette
laming-Emperaire carried out excavations in the area and discovered the
oldest human fossil in Brazil, over 11 thousand years old, given the nickname
Luzia.
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