The presence and pattern of peopling of Europe during the Middle Pleistocene (between 770,000 and 126,000 years ago) has long been a subject of debate among scientists. Some scholars suggest coexistence of multiple human lineages during this time in Europe, and others propose a single lineage evolving from Homo heidelbergensis to Homo neanderthalensis. Recently, researchers conducted a morphometric, biomechanical and palaeopathological study of a second right metatarsal SdD2 hominin fossil found at the Sedia del Diavolo site in Italy, and found that the fossil showed features more archaic than those of Neanderthals. From the research, the study authors were also able to suggest a revised assessment of the technology and hunting strategies adopted by Homo in the region between MIS 9 (337,000 to 300,000 years ago) and MIS 8 (301,000 to 245,000 years ago).
“These observations,” state the authors in the published study*, “when interpreted within the context of the available fossil record, may suggest the co-existence of at least two hominin clades in the Italian Peninsula during the beginning of marine isotope stage (MIS) 8”.
Moreover, according to the study authors, the Sedia del Diavolo site provides evidence for the oldest association of a hominin, in this case possibly other than Neanderthal, and Levallois technology, challenging the previously held paradigm that only Neanderthals were associated with this technology in Europe. Finally, observance of bony stress injuries in the fossil specimen, coupled with the known prevalence of such bone stress injuries in specimens found within Early and Middle Pleistocene fossil assemblages, supports the contention for persistence hunting as a common activity among early members of Homo, the genus through which modern humans have evolved.
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(a) the SdD2 fossil, a second right metatarsal with a bony callus on the distal diaphysis, interpreted as a stress fracture38. From left to right: dorsal, plantar, lateral, and medial views. Reference scale bar 10 mm. (b) the set of landmarks (large spheres) and semilandmarks (small spheres) used for the three-dimensional geometric morphometric analysis of the proximal epiphysis (dark blue), distal epiphysis (light blue) and diaphysis (purple). CC BY-SA 4.0, Riga, A., Profico, A., Mori, T. et al. The Middle Pleistocene human metatarsal from Sedia del Diavolo (Rome, Italy). Sci Rep 14, 6024 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-55045-1
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*Riga, A., Profico, A., Mori, T. et al. The Middle Pleistocene human metatarsal from Sedia del Diavolo (Rome, Italy). Sci Rep14, 6024 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-55045-1
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Text and images for this article, Riga, A., et al. (see above citation), CC-BY-SA 4.0 (Creative Commons License)
Here are the most compelling published stories of Popular Archaeology Magazine. Some have an element of controversy, some discoveries took place decades before, and others entail findings that may lead to further discoveries yet to come. In all cases, they represent the excitement and adventure of archaeology as it opens new and fascinating windows on humanity’s collective past.
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The discovery of the world’s largest trove of ancient writings opened an unparalleled window on a vanished world. Read About It Here
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The story of a forgotten explorer and his intrepid journey to discover great ancient Arabian cities of the Incense Road. Read About It Here
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How an archaeologist-sculptor is bringing bones of the dead back to life. Read About It Here
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Two remarkable sites are shedding light on a critical transitional period in human evolution. Read About It Here
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The startling discovery of million-year-old human footprints on a beach in the United Kingdom had scientists jumping. Read About It Here
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The recent controversial discoveries, and a renowned scholar’s quest to uncover the historical truth about Jesus of Nazareth. Read About It Here
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Excavations of princely tombs are shedding new light on a formative time before the high florescence of the Mycenaean civilization. Read About It Here
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An anthology of articles focusing on the findings that are informing a new paradigm about the early settling of the Americas. Read About It Here
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Archaeologists are unearthing new clues to America’s historic “lost” colony. Read About It Here
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The in-depth story about the controversial discovery of a 130,000-year-old human presence in Southern California. Read About It Here
Most of us have heard or read about the great Trojan War and the epic journey of Odysseus (otherwise known as Ulysses) through the legendary characters and events as described by Homer in his famous literary works, The Iliad and The Odyssey. Fewer, however, have a more than passing knowledge of the ancient Bronze and Iron Age peoples who many scholars suggest may have formed the historical basis for Homer’s epic mythical stories, such as the Mycenaeans and Minoans. The real story of these civilizations has slowly come to light through the painstaking efforts of archaeologists and scholars, popularized by the media over the years, but documented and studied more meticulously within the halls of academia. Despite the efforts to come to a greater understanding, mysteries still abound and there are more questions than answers.
Dr. Ester Salgarella, who received her Ph.D from Cambridge University and subsequently conducted post-doctoral research at the university, has developed and released a new podcast series, entitled Aegean Connections, that explores all facets of these civilizations, bringing the research out from the confines of the scholarly “ivory tower” and into the listening ear of the general public. She does this by conducting interviews of the very scholars who engage in the study and research, focusing on such topics as undeciphered scripts, the life-ways and origins of these Aegean peoples, and many other topics to “build a bridge between scholars (both well-established and early-career) in Aegean-oriented academic fields and the wider audience….,” according to Salgarella.
Linear B tablet Clay from Pylos end of 13th century BCE NAM Athens. Mary Harrsch, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons
The second episode of the series, released on February 6, 2024, interviews Dr. Rachele Pierini, a Senior Researcher and Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow at the Centre for Textile Research, Saxo Institute, University of Copenhagen. In this episode, the listener will learn a few fascinating things about this ancient script, used by the ancient Mycenaeans to write the earliest attested form of the Greek language. Rachele will tell us about how Linear B textual evidence is incorporated into her current research related to textile production, sustainability, gender identity and cultural identity, showing how a Bronze Age script can be used as an example of how the past can inform and explain the present.
Anyone can listen to the podcast, which is free to the public.
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Above: Fresco wall painting detail created by an ancient Minoan artist at Akrotiri, depicting a city and the seafaring adventures of this maritime civilization.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES—The migration of hominins out of Africa may have been driven by climatic changes, a study suggests. Genomic studies have suggested that humans underwent a population bottleneck around 0.9 million years ago, but a recent study* of early archaeological sites suggested that this bottleneck occurred around 1.1 million years ago. The dating discrepancy makes it challenging to identify climatic events that may have contributed to a bottleneck. Giovanni Muttoni and Dennis Kent reevaluated the stratigraphic records of early hominin sites across Eurasia to explore the timing and drivers of a hominin population bottleneck. The authors identified a concentration of Eurasian hominin sites reliably dated to 0.9 million years ago. In comparison, the stratigraphic records dating Eurasian sites to greater than 1.1 million years ago were ambiguous and disputed, making associations with climatic events less reliable. The findings are consistent with a rapid migration of hominins and other animals out of Africa around 0.9 million years ago during the first major glaciation of the Pleistocene Epoch, when a drop in sea level opened land routes out of Africa and aridity increased across Africa. According to the authors, the findings suggest that the dispersal of humans out of Africa may have been an adaptive response to a population bottleneck driven by climatic changes around 0.9 million years ago.
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Deployment of piston corer used to recover 16 meter-long, deep-sea sediment cores. Dennis Kent
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Effects of enhanced, cyclical cooling and warming since marine isotope stage 22 shown in open-pit excavation of loess-paleosol sequence in Kostolac, Serbia. Giovanni Muttoni
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Loess section being sampled for integrated stratigraphy in Krakow-Zwierzniec, Poland, with researcher standing on level with evidence of early occupation by H. sapiens. Giovanni Muttoni
*“Hominin population bottleneck coincided with migration from Africa during the Early Pleistocene ice-age transition,” by Giovanni Muttoni and Dennis V. Kent. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 11-Mar-2024. https://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2318903121
UNIVERSITY OF LEICESTER—More than forty archaeological sites in Cyprus dating potentially as far back as the Bronze Age that were thought lost to history have been relocated by University of Leicester scientists working for the Ministry of Defence.
A small team of archaeologists from University of Leicester Archaeological Services, funded by the DIO Overseas Stewardship Project, undertook a ‘walkover survey’ – a systematic surveying and recording of visible archaeological remains – of the Eastern Sovereign Base Area at Dhekelia (ESBA) on the south coast of the island. The work, licensed by Cyprus’ Department of Antiquities in Nicosia, is to inform site management by the DIO, which is the custodian of the UK and overseas Defence estate.
Dhekelia is about 30km south-east of Nicosia, and 80km north-east of the Western Sovereign Base Area (WSBA) at Akrotiri where the University of Leicester has been working since 2015.
The task of the walkover was to relocate around 60 possible archaeological sites that had been recorded in the early 1960s prior to the development of the garrison within the Dhekelia base, and the laying out of the Kingsfield Airstrip at the western end of the area.
In preparation of the survey a Geographic Information System (GIS) record was compiled that included all the known information, and from that co-ordinate points for the possible sites were exported to standard handheld GPS units. Archaeologists then visited each site and searched for the evidence that had been previously recorded. When successfully found, each site would then be photographed, GPS located, and recorded on pro forma sheets.
In total, 51 sites including 5 historic buildings were located. Some records survived for 47 of the sites, but a further four were known only from labels on a 1:25,000 scale plan. Although the dating of most of the sites is currently unknown, they are likely to span from the Bronze Age which started c.2500 BC to the Byzantine period which ended in the 12th Century AD, and to include sites from the Hellenistic period (312 – 58 BC) and Roman periods (58 BC – 395 AD).
Particular highlights included three coastal quarries where stone was being taken off low spits running out into the sea. One quarry had a little ramp that looked like it was used for loading slabs of quarried rock into boats tied in deep water alongside, and another had dozens of very clear circular grinding stone removals which, where immediately adjacent to each other, left behind distinct clover leaf shapes in the bed rock.
Large areas of rock cut tomb extended over several hectares in one part of the inland plateau. Most of these tombs were in a very poor state and some bore clear signs of looting in the form of adjacent mounds of earth. Many tombs have been used as convenient areas for fly tipping. One tomb, part of a substantial cemetery surrounding a monastery to the west of Xylotymbou village was being used for caging cats.
Matt Beamish from University of Leicester Archaeological Services, who led the survey, said:
“Our GIS and survey methods had worked well when used for a similar survey of the Akrotiri peninsula in 2019. Many of the sites we were planning to survey had been last visited over 20 years ago, and in many instances had been reported as no longer existing or being unfindable. On reflection this had more to do with inadequate mapping, lack of preparation and lack of satellite location technologies: we found that many of the sites could be re-found with a little bit of patience.
“There were undoubtedly problems with some of the archive information which was incomplete and had been inaccurately redrawn at some stage in the past. Some sites had clearly been lost to the subsequent development of roads and buildings.”
The Dhekelia Sovereign base is around 20km wide and 7km deep and sits on the east side of Larnaca Bay. The topography is varied including a flat coastal strip meeting steep limestone cliffs and hills, with a broadly flat plateau on the interior which includes more areas of rocky outcrop and is bisected by rivers which are generally dry beds under cultivation. The coastal strip and plateau include areas of agriculture and horticulture, and areas of olive and citrus grove and scrub. In the north of the area there are large dairy and livestock farms.
Cyprus’ position on Mediterranean sea routes has led to a rich and diverse cultural heritage, and it is famed for the preservation of many archaeological sites from the Bronze Age, Hellenistic/Iron Age, Roman, and Byzantine or medieval periods. At the western end of the Dhekelia area this occupation is represented in a significant archaeological landscape comprising a large Bronze Age defended hilltop settlement at Kokkinokremnos and an adjacent Iron Age hillfort at Vikla, both sitting above the Roman harbour town of Koutsopetria: all these protected sites are subject to recent research excavations. The Roman harbour is all now infilled, possibly stemming from a catastrophic tsunami event.
Much of the known archaeology across Dhekelia is funerary, and this mostly comprises rock cut tombs, some of which were built into the limestone caves (generally Hellenistic/Iron Age), and rock cut shaft graves (generally Byzantine/Roman-Medieval).
Matt Beamish added: “The survey was very successful with the identification of significant archaeological areas. We know that many more archaeological sites will exist which are not obvious to the naked eye. Much of the area has seen no systematic archaeological survey, and the application of remote sensing or aerial survey perhaps using LiDAR would enable a wider picture of previous human activity to be drawn. The information will enable the DIO to better manage the archaeological sites within the Sovereign Base Administration Area, and allow a wider understanding of Dhekelia’s archaeological heritage.”
Alex Sotheran, Archaeology Advisor, DIO, praised the survey and the results:
“The work carried out by Matt and the team has really improved our knowledge and understanding of the archaeology across the Dhekelia area and will allow for an improved system of management of these vital and important heritage assets going forward.”
David Reynolds, Environmental Advisor (Cyprus), DIO, added:
“Along with the University of Leicester team, we would like to thank the Republic of Cyprus Department of Antiquities and the Sovereign Base Area Office (Dhekelia) for all their support and guidance in making this extremely valuable piece of work happen.”
The data created during the survey has been entered into DIO’s Historic Buildings, Sites and Monuments Record, which in turn is vital for helping to protect the historic environment across the Ministry of Defence’s UK and overseas estate.
Additionally, the archaeological data has been shared with the Republic of Cyprus Department of Antiquities (DoA) as part of a Protocol for Collaboration between British Forces Cyprus and the Republic of Cyprus DoA. The protocol will ensure that potential impacts on archaeology will be actively considered alongside military training activities and infrastructure work across the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia. It also sets out procedures for managing any archaeological remains uncovered during construction projects.
Gary M. Feinman is an archaeologist and the MacArthur curator of anthropology at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago.
David M. Carballo is a professor of archaeology, anthropology, and Latin American studies and assistant provost for general education at Boston University.
Recent archaeology emerging from ancient Mesoamerica is flipping the script of public understanding about the people and institutions that inhabited this world: the evidence tells us that cooperative and pluralistic government was at least as common as and more resilient than despotic states.
This more complex picture and the achievements of Mesoamerica’s peoples are all the more impressive given the area’s rugged terrain and resource constraints. Compared to ancient Eurasia, the inhabitants of Mesoamerica—the region stretching from Costa Rica to central Mexico—lacked beasts of burden and wheeled transport, and the use of metals was generally limited.
Until recently, our understanding of how most societies and early states developed was heavily grounded in interpretations of urban societies in Eurasia. Despotic, coercive rule was assumed (except for ancient Athens and republican Rome), the actions of the elite were ascribed great importance, and core functions of the economy were presumed to be in the hands of the ruler.
Precolonial Mesoamerica doesn’t fit this cookie-cutter framework: neither was economic production or distribution centrally controlled by despotic rulers, nor was governance in societies with very large populations universally coercive.
This new perspective is the outgrowth of a decades-long shift in archaeological research’s focus from temples and tombs to regional settlement patterns, urban layouts, house excavations, domestic economies, and agricultural production.
By concentrating on the archaeological record, recent generations of researchers have brought fresh attention to features of precolonial Mesoamerica that did not fit entrenched stereotypes, many of which had their roots in the 19th century. Mesoamerica’s cities and large-scale societies arose independently of other global regions, spawned by their own regional populations. Mesoamerican technological development never experienced the centralizing impact of the monopolization of bronze weaponry through control of scarce tin deposits, nor the “democratizing” or “decentralizing” effects of the adoption of more widely available iron.
Mesoamerica was also spared the stark inequalities in military and transportation technology that appeared in Eurasia when some societies developed the chariot, serious naval capabilities, and fortified palaces while others lagged behind. In Mesoamerica, military might came through the control of large infantries using weapons crafted primarily from widely available stone, all of which made for generally more balanced political relations than in Eurasia.
Pre-Hispanic Mesoamerica is therefore emerging as an ideal place to examine the different ways that humans coalesced in urban contexts, in both collective and autocratic political formations, without some of the key factors that earlier scholars have traditionally seen as necessary or transformative for the rise of premodern societies.
How were these large, preindustrial urban centers in Mesoamerica organized? Were they long-lasting? And if so, what accounts for their comparative degrees of resilience across time?
In a 2018 study, we coded data from a carefully selected sample of 26 precolonial Mesoamerican cities and prominent political centers. We found that more than half of them were not despotically ruled and that the more collective political centers had greater resilience in the face of droughts and floods, and warfare or shifts in trade. Cities that addressed their social challenges using more collective forms of governance and resource management were both larger and somewhat more resilient than the cities with personalized rulership and more concentrated political power.
In general, collectively organized political centers relied more heavily on internal finance generation, such as taxes, as compared to the more autocratic centers that relied more on external financing, such as monopolized trade networks and war booty. The more that political elites can support themselves without relying on financing from the general population, the less they face accountability from the people, and the greater the likelihood that governance and power are hoarded. Additionally, higher levels of internal financing and communal resources often corresponded with evidence of the wider circulation of public goods and the bureaucratization of civic offices. Collectively organized centers with these features as well as spatial layouts, such as large open plazas and wide streets, that provided opportunities for householders and urban dwellers to communicate and express themselves seem to have fostered community persistence as major centers.
In a later study that included an updated and expanded sample of 32 well-researched Mesoamerican cities, we found that centers that were both more bottom-up and collective in their governance were more resilient. While some of these cities had palaces and monuments to rulers as their focal points, others featured more shared and equitably distributed forms of urban infrastructure. This includes apartment compounds, shared terraces or walls within neighborhoods, neighborhood plazas, temples and other civic buildings, and shared roads and causeways, all of which required cooperation and collective labor for their construction and maintenance and would have facilitated more regular face-to-face interaction and periodic public gatherings.
The implications of this archaeological research are too informative and powerful to stay put in textbooks. They resonate with evolving views of our present world, which are finding that public space, open communication, fair taxation, and effective bureaucracy can be cornerstones of well-being. These parallels with and understandings from the past can be insightful for us today as models to guide our future planning and identify the social models that best position us to survive the tests of time.
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This article is a re-publication from the original source: the Independent Media Institute, under a collaborative agreement.
CHINESE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES HEADQUARTERS—A new study from the Nihewan basin of China has revealed that hominins who possessed advanced knapping abilities equivalent to Mode 2 technological features occupied East Asia as early as 1.1 million years ago (Ma), which is 0.3 Ma earlier than the date associated with the first handaxes found in East Asia. This suggests that Mode 2 hominins dispersed into East Asia much earlier than previously thought.
The study, which was conducted by a joint team led by Prof. PEI Shuwen from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Prof. Ignacio de la Torre from the Institute of History the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), was published in PNAS on Mar. 4 and provide insights into the early dispersals and adaptions of hominins in Eurasia.
By reconstructing Cenjiawan refit sets from Nihewan basin, the research team discovered organized flaking techniques that aimed at producing slender flakes by core preparation on both the striking platform and flaking surface. The standardized operational process was not only shown by refit sets: Plenty of products detached at each stage of the process, thus provide strong evidence of standardized core preparation.
Prepared core technologies were characterized by organized methods to obtain predetermined flakes that required detailed planning and a deep understanding of flaking mechanisms, which originated in the Acheulean and particularly more than 1.0 Ma.
Regarding retouched tools, technological analysis of refitted products detached from the prepared core technology indicates intentional breakage of slender flakes in two halves. One or more of the resulting fragments were then selected as blanks for retouching, with the aiming of creating tipped tools with two convergent sides, thus significantly altering the original shape of blanks.
In addition, patterns of retouching tools like points and borers, which showed standardization of tool shape, were also well documented in the Cenjiawan assemblage, thus suggesting complex mental templates among the Cenjiawan toolmakers.
The prepared core technology, standardized predetermined products and retouching tool shapes, together with the high level of manual precision, fragmented reduction sequences, long reduction sequences, and organized management of raw materials documented in the Cenjiawan assemblage, provide compelling evidence for complex technical abilities and in-depth planning behaviors among Early Pleistocene hominins in East Asia.
“The advanced technological behaviors documented at the Cenjiawan site similar to those of Mode 2 technology, rather than the technical simplicity attributed to Mode 1”, said Dr. MA Dongdong, first author of the study, who conducted the research during his Ph.D at IVPP and currently is working as a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of History of CISC.
The Lower Paleolithic technology in China has long been regarded as simple (Oldowan-like/Mode 1) and homogeneous before late Pleistocene. The compelling evidence in the Cenjiawan assemblage provides a new perspective in understanding the small debitage system in China and may force a reconsideration of current perceptions of technological stasis in East Asia.
The authors argued that the technological features, rather than the mere presence or absence of specific tool types (e.g., handaxes), should be the basis for studying Early and Middle Pleistocene assemblages in East Asia. This enables a more integrated understanding of Mode 2 technology as well as the human cultural and biological connections between East Asia and other regions of the Old World.
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(A-E) Slender flakes are intentionally broken and used as blanks for retouching tipped tools. (G-I) Unifacially retouched points. (J-M) Borers. IVPP
*Earliest Prepared core technology in Eurasia from Nihewan (China): Implications for early human abilities and dispersals in East Asia, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 4-Mar-2024. 10.1073/pnas.2313123121
Brenna R. Hassett, PhD, is a biological anthropologist and archaeologist at the University of Central Lancashire and a scientific associate at the Natural History Museum, London. In addition to researching the effects of changing human lifestyles on the human skeleton and teeth in the past, she writes for a more general audience about evolution and archaeology, including the Times (UK) top 10 science book of 2016 Built on Bones: 15,000 Years of Urban Life and Death, and her most recent book, Growing Up Human: The Evolution of Childhood. She is also a co-founder of TrowelBlazers, an activist archive celebrating the achievements of women in the “digging” sciences.
Our species stands out from the animal kingdom in many ways. Some of them are obvious: we are big-brained primates who use tools and language, a social species with symbols, culture, and art. These are all artifacts of our evolution, the process by which our ancestors found adaptations that allowed them to succeed in a natural world that is often red in tooth and claw. Often, however, we think of evolution as affecting our physical bodies—changing the shape of our hominin ancestors so they could walk upright, or grow bigger brains. But evolution has other ways to act on a species, particularly in clever, social species like ours. It can shape the way we socialize and bond, the way we pass on learning and care, and even whom we love. This is why we find that one of the most remarkable adaptations our species has ever made lies in our very, very unlikely mating system: monogamy.
Monogamy is a strange word and an even stranger concept. The way we use it in our societies today to imply two people romantically linked for life is a far cry from what a scientist who actually observes primates like us would call it. Monogamy, simply put, is pair-bonding between two animals. Often it is pair-bonding with an eye towards reproduction, but it can also include animals that can’t reproduce together who form a pair-bonded social unit anyway. Perhaps the most famous example, though certainly not the only one, might be Roy and Silo, two chinstrap penguins from New York’s Central Park Zoo who formed a pair bond and even raised a chick together. There are other critical differences between what a scientist would define as a pair bond and what we commonly understand monogamy to be.
While humans tend to define monogamy as a once-in-a-lifetime pairing, with rituals and cultural rules that reinforce the idea of a lifetime bond, even the most pair-bonded of animals rarely are pair-bonded for life. Perhaps the most extreme animal monogamists on the planet are the far-flying seabirds albatrosses and petrels (all from the family Procellariiformes); almost every single pair is mated for life. However, even in these pairs, factors can intervene to disrupt the pair bond. Beyond simply losing one member of the pair, even allegedly mated-for-life albatrosseshave cases of ‘extra-pair paternity’—almost 10 percent of chicks surveyed in one sample had a male parent who was not their female parent’s partner.
Humans, even those with strong cultural proscriptions against adultery, have very similar rates of extra-pair paternity—about 10 percent. While some cultures, particularly those that do not allow a great deal of female agency in choosing a partner, have slightly higher rates than others, this figure seems to be broadly the same across our species. While genetic monogamy—where two individuals breed exclusively with each other—may be elusive, even in the allegedly monogamous sea birds, social monogamy is not. Social monogamy is the type of pair bonding where the partners fulfill all the social roles needed in a pair bond without necessarily producing any genetic offspring—like Roy and Silo, tending a chick that was not their own. This suggests that it is social monogamy that is the most important part of pair bonding for many species—including our own.
Why would social monogamy benefit a species? It must offer some sort of advantage to our species, or we would not have adopted it—and we have indeed adopted it. Despite our very human flair for variety and adaptation,most societies around the world set a pair-bonded couple at the heart of how their members reproduce. Of course, there are examples of polygamy—marriage of one male to multiple females—and even polygyny—one female to many males in our wide array of cultural practices, but the vast majority of our fellow Homo sapiens will have social expectations of forming a monogamous pair bond.
So why have we evolved to have these bonds? It is not at all automatic that pair-bonds would be of adaptive value. In species that have evolved to sexually reproduce, the distribution of risk and reward for breeding behavior depends on how much each partner will need to invest in reproduction in order to produce a successful offspring. For the partner that makes the small gamete (sperm), investment costs are lower from the get-go, meaning strategies that maximize opportunities for reproduction. In fact, pair bonding is an incredibly rare phenomenon in the animal kingdom. Outside of birds, who are uncommonly fond of the state—90 percent of bird species create pair bonds—only 5 percent of animal species settle for ‘the one’ and form pair bonds. About 15 percent of primates, however, opt for pair-bonding.
Here we can start to unravel part of the mystery of the human pair bond, by examining what our other clever, social primate relatives use pair bonding for. The evolution of monogamy, or pair-bonding, has beena topic of major debates in anthropology and primatology. Most of the primate species that form pair bonds are actually quite distant from our species evolutionarily—the smaller monkey species like the marmosets, titi monkeys, and owl monkeys. Many of the original investigations of primate monogamy sought to explain the phenomenon in very Darwinian terms, looking at the advantage in genetic terms gained by reproducing monogamous pairs. In the 1970s, primatologist Sarah Hrdy suggested that pair-bonding might have evolved to beprotective against infanticide because marauding male monkeys would not be motivated to harm their own genetic offspring but would be motivated to remove any offspring from a group that were not theirs.
This interpretation has been challenged in more recent times, particularly by anthropologist Holly Dunsworth. She argues that thekind of cognitive power required for a primate to understand whether offspring is genetically theirs or not is just not present in primate species. Perhaps pair-bonded species don’t have infanticide not just because the male primates are trying to maximize their genetic reproductive potential, but because primates are social animals and those male primates are simply primed to be ‘nice’ to the offspring of the females they are bonded to.
Current theories for why pair bonding exists, even though it doesn’t allow male primates to maximize their mating opportunities, follow several lines of evidence to understand what the actual adaptive benefit might be. One theory is that pair-bonding is the only way for males to keep up with females who roam over large territories; it allows them the opportunity to mate because otherwise, they wouldn’t be able to encounter any females. This is something that seems particularly applicable to the smaller monkeys like marmosets, where females hold territory.
Anothertheory for the evolution of pair bonding in primates looks at the reproductive benefit not just to the individual parent, in terms of the number of offspring possible, but to the effects on the next generation of having one more pair of helping hands. This looks at the net benefit to the offspring itself of having two parents provisioning it. In many species of primates, the offspring are helpless and a considerable burden on their carer. Having another pair of hands around may make the difference between growing an expensive, big-brained baby and falling out of the evolutionary race. Looking again at examples from the primate order we can see that the role of the male parent can be critical in the survival of the species—our male titi monkey will carry his offspring for the first year of their life, until they are old enough to move around on their own.
What does this mean for our own species? Well, we definitively have adopted a pair-bonded architecture—social monogamy is at the core of our societies. Why we have done so is less clear—but as more and more work is done on understanding the benefits of monogamy to a species we see that there are several factors that may have influenced our ancestors’ choices to develop such an outré mating system. In fact, monogamy in primates seems to have evolved multiple times, and for multiple reasons.Computational models that have examined the likelihood of different evolutionary explanations have used these multiple evolutionary episodes in our nearest relatives to predict that, for humans, multiple factors may have given us the monogamy we have now. Adaptations to pair bonding that ensure males meet roving females might have been a stepping stone to developing the kind of multiple-parental care that keeps something as extraordinarily demanding as a human baby alive. So while our cultural perceptions of monogamy might not fit the evolutionary reality, we can say that as a species, we are awfully fond of a pair bond.
NYU LANGONE HEALTH / NYU GROSSMAN SCHOOL OF MEDICINE—A genetic change in our ancient ancestors may partly explain why humans don’t have tails like monkeys, finds a new study led by researchers at NYU Grossman School of Medicine.
Published online February 28 as the cover story of the journal Nature*, the work compared the DNA of tail-less apes and humans to that of tailed monkeys, and found an insertion of DNA shared by apes and humans, but missing in monkeys. When the research team engineered a series of mice to examine whether the insertion, in a gene called TBXT, affected their tails, they found a variety of tail effects, including some mice born without tails.
“Our study begins to explain how evolution removed our tails, a question that has intrigued me since I was young,” says corresponding study author Bo Xia, PhD, a student at the time of the study in the labs of study senior co-authors Jef D. Boeke, PhD, and Itai Yanai, PhD at NYU Grossman School of Medicine. Xia is now a junior fellow of the Harvard Society of Fellows, and a principal investigator at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.
More than 100 genes had been linked by past work to the development of tails in various vertebrate species, and the study authors hypothesized that tail loss occurred through changes in the DNA code (mutations) of one or more of them. Remarkably, say the study authors, the new study found that the differences in tails came not from TBXTmutations, but instead from the insertion of a DNA snippet called AluY into the gene’s regulatory code in the ancestors of apes and humans.
Profound Surprise
The new finding proceeds from the process by which genetic instructions are converted into proteins, the molecules that make up the body’s structures and signals. DNA is “read” and converted into a related material in RNA, and ultimately into mature messenger RNA (mRNA), which produces proteins.
In a key step that produces mRNA, “spacer” sections called introns are cut out of the code, but before that guide the stitching together (splicing) of just the DNA sections, called exons, which encode the final instructions. Further, the genomes of vertebrate animals evolved to feature alternative splicing, in which a single gene can code for more than one protein by leaving out or adding exon sequences. Beyond splicing, the human genome grew more complex still by evolving to include “countless” switches, part of the poorly understood “dark matter” that turns on genes at different levels in different cell types.
Still other work has shown that half of this non-gene “dark matter” in the human genome, which lies both between genes and within the introns, consists of highly repeated DNA sequences. Further, most of these repeats consist of retrotransposons, also called “jumping genes” or “mobile elements,” which can move around and insert themselves repeatedly and randomly in human code.
Pulling these details together, the “astounding” current study found that the transposon insertion of interest, AluY, which affected tail length, had randomly occurred in an intron within the TBXT code. Although it did not change a coding portion, the intron insertion, so the research team showed, influenced alternative splicing, something not seen before, to result in a variety of tail lengths. Xia found an AluY insertion that remained in the same location within the TBXT gene in humans and apes resulted in the production of two forms of TBXT RNA. One of these, they theorize, directly contributed to tail loss.
“This finding is remarkable because most human introns carry copies of repetitive, jumping DNAs without any effect on gene expression, but this particular AluY insertion did something as obvious as determine tail length,” said Boeke, the Sol and Judith Bergstein Director of the Institute for System Genetics at NYU Langone Health.
Tail loss in the group of primates that includes gorillas, chimpanzees, and humans is believed to have occurred about 25 million years ago, when the group evolved away from Old World monkeys, said the authors. Following this evolutionary split, the group of apes that includes present-day humans evolved the formation of fewer tail vertebrae, giving rise to the coccyx, or tailbone. Although the reason for the tail loss is uncertain, some experts propose that it may have better suited life on the ground than in the trees.
Any advantage that came with tail loss was likely powerful, the researchers say, because it may have happened despite coming with a cost. Genes often influence more than one function in the body, so changes that bring an advantage in one place may be detrimental elsewhere. Specifically, the research team found a small uptick in neural tube defects in mice with the study insertion in the TBXT gene.
“Future experiments will test the theory that, in an ancient evolutionary trade-off, the loss of a tail in humans contributed to the neural tube birth defects, like those involved in spinal bifida, which are seen today in one in a thousand human neonates,” said Yanai, also in the Institute for Systems Genetics.
*On the genetic basis of tail-loss evolution in humans and apes, Nature, 28-Feb-2024. 10.1038/s41586-024-07095-8
Image, Top Left: Tail loss in gorillas, chimpanzees, and humans is believed to have occurred about 25 million years ago, when the group evolved away from Old World monkeys.Courtesy of Nature (2024)
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES—The last hunter-gatherers of modern-day northwestern France avoided inbreeding, despite living in close proximity with limited mate choice, according to a study*. The interaction between human groups during the transition from hunter-gatherer to agricultural societies in Europe is not well-understood. Mattias Jakobsson and colleagues sequenced the genomes of 10 individuals, including two children, from ancient human remains in the Brittany region of France. Radiocarbon dating indicated that the hunter-gatherers lived between 7,000 and 8,000 years ago and overlapped in time with the first farmers in the region, even though the genomic data suggests that these groups maintained distinct ancestries. The genomes of the individuals buried on the present-day islands of Téviec and Hoedic showed no signs of inbreeding, even though the last hunter-gatherers of the Atlantic coast were part of a small group. Analysis of the bones revealed that although seafood was an important part of the two groups’ diets, the individuals buried at Téviec consumed more land-based protein. Together, the findings suggest that late hunter-gathers in western Europe lived in social systems that promoted mating between—rather than within—their own groups. According to the authors, the integration of the genetic data with previous research yields fresh insights into the social and cultural changes that occurred during a pivotal moment in human history.
*“Genomic ancestry and social dynamics of the last hunter-gatherers of Atlantic France,” by Luciana Simões, Rita Peyroteo-Stjerna et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 26-Feb-2024. https://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2310545121.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES—A study finds that Stone Age toolmakers likely understood the mechanical properties of rocks they selected as raw materials for toolmaking. The Stone Age is marked by the use of rocks as tools, a process that requires the selection of rocks that not only flake easily so that they can be shaped but are also tough and durable. The factors underlying the selection of rocks to make tools is not well understood. Patrick Schmidt and colleagues analyzed the mechanical properties of stone tools found at the Diepkloof Rock Shelter site in South Africa, representing the Middle Stone Age. The primary types of rocks shaped into tools at the site were hydrothermal quartz, quartzite, hornfels, and silcrete. The authors developed a physical model of rock characteristics to estimate the force needed to flake pieces of rock and to determine the rocks’ strength during projectile impact. The modeled physical properties explain the selection of quartzite, silcrete, and hydrothermal quartz raw materials at the Middle Stone Age site, suggesting that toolmakers understood the tradeoffs of ease of tool shaping and mechanical strength. According to the authors, the results* suggest that Stone Age toolmakers had the engineering skills required to fashion tools with desirable qualities at a reasonable cost.
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Researcher strikes a flake from the South African rock hornfels to demonstrate how tools were made in the Middle Stone Age. Patrick Schmidt
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A finely crafted “Still Bay point” from Diepkloof Rock Shelter, a typical stone tool from the Middle Stone Age in southern Africa. Patrick Schmidt
*“The driving force behind tool-stone selection in the African Middle Stone Age,” by Patrick Schmidt, Ioannis Pappas, Guillaume Porraz, Christoph Berthold, and Klaus G. Nickel, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 26-Feb-2024. https://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2318560121.
AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE (AAAS)—Artifacts from Le Moustier, a Middle Paleolithic site in France, offer the earliest evidence from Europe for the use of ochre – a clay pigment containing iron oxide – to produce less-sticky, “gripping” adhesives used for a variety of tools, according to a new study. Although Neanderthals are known to have produced adhesives with similar properties to make hand grips, ochre-based compound adhesives had previously only been associated with Homo sapiens in Africa, Patrick Schmidt and colleagues say. “If anatomically modern humans brought this knowledge with them during their Out-of-Africa migration, its presence at Le Moustier would document a remarkably long technological continuity,” the authors speculate, noting that these adhesives could also have been produced by Neanderthals independently. Ancient materials such as adhesives, which were used for attaching tool pieces together, are among the best evidence archaeologists have found to understand the cognitive abilities and cultural transmission of early modern humans and Neanderthals. Evidence from the Middle Paleolithic era, or Middle Stone Age, between 300,000 and 30,000 years ago, suggests that Neanderthals in Europe produced adhesives from bitumen, tree resins, and birch bark. Meanwhile, Homo sapiens in Africa concocted recipes for compound adhesives by combining Podocarpus trees or other naturally sticky substances with materials such as ochre, quartz, or bone fragments. Here, Schmidt et al. report some of the earliest evidence that ochre-based adhesives were also produced in Europe in the Middle Paleolithic. The researchers examined five well-preserved artifacts, including flakes, a blade, and a scraper containing traces of red, yellow, and black residue, all of which were originally found at Le Moustier, a site associated with the Mousterian stone tool industry. Chemical and structural analyses revealed that the residue was made by mixing bitumen – a black, sticky, petroleum-based substance – with goethite ochre, similar to Middle Stone Age adhesives found in Africa. Experiments confirmed that mixing bitumen and goethite ochre could produce an adhesive that was ideal for gripping rather than gluing parts together.
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Reconstruction of how the stone artifact with the handle could be held by a Neanderthal. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Museum für Vor- und Frühgeschichte, illustration: Daniela Greinert.
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Stone artifact with remains of the bitumen-ocher mixture that come from the upper rock shelter of Le Moustier. Inventory number Va 7158.7. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Museum für Vor- und Frühgeschichte, photo: Gunther Möller
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Experiments investigating the benefit of goethite ochre in bitumen-based adhesives. Schmidt et al., Sci. Adv. 10, eadl0822 (2024)
*Ochre-based compound adhesives at the Mousterian type-site document complex cognition and high investment, Science Advances, 21-Feb-2024. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adl0822
UNIVERSITAT AUTONOMA DE BARCELONA—The first Neolithic farmers and shepherds in Andalusia settled permanently on the island of San Fernando, Cadiz, 6,200 years ago, where they continued to collect and consume shellfish throughout the year, preferably in winter. This is the conclusion of an archaeological study* led by Asier García-Escárzaga, researcher at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology (ICTA-UAB) and the Department of Prehistory of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), which shows that these populations occupied the island throughout the year.
The research carried out in recent decades in the south of the Iberian Peninsula has revealed many aspects of the life of the first Neolithic groups in Andalusia. These populations were the first to base their subsistence mainly on agriculture and livestock, rather than hunting and gathering. However, there were still questions to be answered about the patterns of occupation of sites (annual or seasonal) and the exploitation of marine resources after the adoption of a new economic model.
In a new study, published in the prestigious international journal Archaeological and Anthropological Science, oxygen stable isotope analysis was applied to marine shells to address both questions. The shells analyzed were recovered from the sites of Campo de Hockey (San Fernando, Cadiz).
The necropolis of Campo de Hockey, excavated in 2008, is located on the ancient island of San Fernando, just 150 metres from the ancient coastline. The excavations, directed by Eduardo Vijande from the University of Cadiz, allowed to document 53 graves (45 single, 7 double and 1 quadruple). Most of them were plain (simple graves in which the individual is buried), but what stood out the most was the existence of 4 graves of greater complexity and monumentality, made with medium and large stones considered to be proto-megalithic. The Campo de Hockey II site, annexed to the first site and whose excavation and research was conducted by María Sánchez and Eduardo Vijande in 2018, allowed for the identification of 28 archaeological structures (17 hearths, two shell heaps, four tombs and five stone structures).
The high presence of hearths and mollusk and fish remains in the middens suggests that the area was used for the processing and consumption of marine resources. Among the information that can be obtained from the analysis of stable oxygen isotopes in marine shells is the possibility of reconstructing the time of year when the mollusks died, and therefore when they were consumed by prehistoric populations in the past.
The results of this research indicate that the first farmers occupying the island of San Fernando collected shellfish all year round, but more in the colder months of autumn, winter, and early spring, that is, from November to April. This information allowed the scientific team to conclude that these populations occupied the island throughout the year. “The size of the necropolis already led us to believe that it was an annual habitat, but these studies confirm the existence of a permanent settlement 6,200 years ago,” said Eduardo Vijande, researcher at the University of Cadiz and co-author of the study.
The greatest exploitation of shellfish during the coldest months of the year coincides with the annual period of maximum profitability of this food resource due to the formation of gametes. A seasonal pattern of shellfish consumption based on energetic cost-benefit principles which is similar to that developed by the last hunter-gatherer populations of the Iberian Peninsula. “That is to say, there is a greater exploitation of these topshells in the winter months, since this is the time when these animals present a greater quantity of meat,” points out Asier García-Escárzaga. This suggests that, although these new Neolithic groups had changed their economic model, living from agriculture and livestock, in this settlement located in an insular environment, the exploitation of the marine environment continued to be of great importance.
The study forms part of four research projects coordinated from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (PID 2020-115715 GB-I00) and the University of Cadiz (FEDER-UCA18-106917 and CEIJ-015 [2018-2019]) in Spain, and the Max Planck Institute in Germany.
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Excavation of human remains at Campo de Hockey. SalvadorGA96, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons
*García-Escárzaga, A.; Cantillo, J.J.; Milano, S.; Arniz-Mateos, R.; Gutiérrez-Zugasti, I.; González-Ortegón, E.; Corona, J.M.; Colonese, A.C.; Ramos-Muñoz, J.; Vijande-Vila, E. 2024. Marine resource exploitation and human settlement patterns during the Neolithic in SW Europe: Stable oxygen isotope analyses (δ18O) on Phorcus lineatus (da Costa, 1778) from Campo de Hockey (Cádiz, Spain), Archaeological and Anthropological Science. DOI: http://doi.org/10.1007/s12520-024-01939-0
Most of us have heard or read about the great Trojan War and the epic journey of Odysseus (otherwise known as Ulysses) through the legendary characters and events as described by Homer in his famous literary works, The Iliad and The Odyssey. Fewer, however, have a more than passing knowledge of the ancient Bronze and Iron Age peoples who formed the historical basis for Homer’s epic stories, such as the Mycenaeans and Minoans. The real story of these civilizations has slowly come to light through the painstaking efforts of archaeologists and scholars, popularized by the media over the years, but documented and studied more meticulously within the halls of academia. Despite the efforts to come to a greater understanding, mysteries still abound and there are more questions than answers.
Dr. Ester Salgarella, who received her Ph.D from Cambridge University and subsequently conducted post-doctoral research at the university, has developed and released a new podcast series, entitled Aegean Connections, that explores all facets of these civilizations, bringing the research out from the confines of the scholarly “ivory tower” and into the listening ear of the general public. She does this by conducting interviews of the very scholars who engage in the study and research, focusing on such topics as undeciphered scripts, the life-ways and origins of these Aegean peoples, and many other topics to “build a bridge between scholars (both well-established and early-career) in Aegean-oriented academic fields and the wider audience….,” according to Salgarella.
Tablet inscribed with Cypro-Minoan 2 script. Late Bronze III Provenance: Enkomi, Cyprus. Louvre, Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons
The first and opening episode of the series, released on February 13, 2024, interviews Dr. Cassandra Donnelly, a post-doctoral researcher working on Cypro-Minoan (CM) inscriptions at the University of Cyprus. Otherwise known as the Cypro-Minoan Syllabory, the script is still undeciphered but was used on the island of Cyprus and its trading partners during the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age (c. 1650–1050 BC). The term “Cypro-Minoan” was coined by archaeologist and explorer Arthur Evansin 1909 due to its visual similarity to Linear A, an undeciphered script of the ancient Minoans, discovered on Crete. CM is theorized to have been derived from that script. Several hundred CM inscriptions have been recovered by archaeologists on clay balls, votive stands, cylinders, and clay tablets Discoveries were made primarily on Cyprus but also at the site of the ancient city of Ugarit on the coast of Syria.
This opening podcast explores what we now know, and what we don’t know, about this mysterious script. Anyone can listen to the podcast, which is free to the public.
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Above: Fresco wall painting detail created by an ancient Minoan artist at Akrotiri, depicting a city and the seafaring adventures of this maritime civilization.
PLOS—Vittrup Man was born along the Scandinavian coast before moving to Denmark, where he was later sacrificed, according to a study* published February 14, 2024 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Anders Fischer of the University of Gothenburg, Sweden and colleagues.
Vittrup Man is the nickname of a Stone Age skeleton recovered from a peat bog in Northwest Denmark, dating to between 3300-3100 BC. The fragmented nature of the remains, including a smashed skull, indicate that he was killed in a ritualistic sacrifice, a common practice in this region at this time. After a DNA study found Vittrup Man’s genetic signature to be distinct from contemporary, local skeletons, Fischer and colleagues were inspired to combine additional evidence to reconstruct the life history of this Stone Age individual at an unprecedented resolution.
Strontium, carbon and oxygen isotopes from Vittrup Man’s tooth enamel indicate a childhood spent along the coast of the Scandinavian Peninsula. Corroborating this, genetic analysis found a close relationship between Vittrup Man and Mesolithic people from Norway and Sweden. Additional isotope and protein analysis of the teeth and bones indicate a shift in diet from coastal food (marine mammals and fish) in early life to farm food (including sheep or goat) in later life, a transition that happened in the later teen years.
These results suggest that Vittrup Man spent his early years in a northern foraging society before relocating to a farming society in Denmark. It isn’t clear why this individual moved, though the authors suggest he might have been a trader or captive who became integrated into local society. Mysteries remain about Vittrup Man, but this detailed understanding of his geographic and dietary life history provides new insights into interactions between Mesolithic and Neolithic societies in Europe.
The authors add: “To our knowledge, this is the first time that research has been able to map a north European inhabitant’s life history in such a high degree of detail and in such high distance of time.”
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The cranial remains of Vittrup Man, who ended up in a bog after his skull had been crushed by at least eight heavy blows. Photo: Stephen Freiheit. Fischer et al., 2024, PLOS ONE, CC-BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
*Fischer A, Sjögren K-G, Jensen TZT, Jørkov ML, Lysdahl P, Vimala T, et al. (2024) Vittrup Man–The life-history of a genetic foreigner in Neolithic Denmark. PLoS ONE 19(2): e0297032. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0297032
AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE (AAAS)—Scientists from Chile and Argentina have dated cave art from northern Patagonia to as early as 8,200 years ago, predating prior records from the region by thousands of years. The findings* suggest that the earliest human Patagonian inhabitants transferred traditional knowledge across generations during a period when arid climate conditions threatened their survival. “This diachronic rock art emerged as part of a resilient response to ecological stress by highly mobile and low-density populations,” Guadalupe Romero Villanueva and colleagues conjecture. Homo sapiens have been producing cave art for many thousands of years (see the 2021 Science Advances study referenced below). These visual expressions can reveal insights into past human societies, including the ways they interacted with each other and passed down knowledge. Patagonia, which encompasses southernmost South America, was among the last regions in the world to be settled by modern humans around 12,000 years ago. Several instances of ancient rock art have been discovered across Patagonia, but it’s been difficult to determine when they were created. Here, Romero Villanueva et al. evaluated motifs and pigments from 895 rock art paintings, along with artifacts such as shell beads and guanaco bones recovered from Cueva Huenul 1, a cave site located in the inland desert of northwestern Patagonia in Argentina. The paintings, which consisted of various geometric shapes and patterns, including comb-like shapes and human forms, were painted in different hues of reddish black, white, and yellow. Some pigments were derived from carbonaceous material, potentially wood from desert shrubs. The paintings spanned around 3,000 year,s and some were dated to as early as 8,200 years ago, making these the earliest known, and perhaps the longest, records of Patagonian rock art. The site was likely used to transmit knowledge across more than 100 generations, the authors speculate.
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View from the rock art site Cueva Huenul 1 (northwestern Patagonia, Argentina) of the surrounding volcanic desert environment. Guadalupe Romero Villanueva
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Example of a rock art panel at the site Cueva Huenul 1 (northwestern Patagonia, Argentina). Guadalupe Romero Villanueva
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Archaeologist and rock art specialist Ph.D. Guadalupe Romero Villanueva registering painted motifs from the rock art site Cueva Huenul 1 (northwestern Patagonia, Argentina). Anahi Re
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Views of the rock art site Cueva Huenul 1 (northwestern Patagonia, Argentina). Guadalupe Romero Villanueva
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Archaeologist and rock art specialist Ph.D. Guadalupe Romero Villanueva collecting motif samples at the rock art site Cueva Huenul 1 (northwestern Patagonia, Argentina). Ramiro Barberena
*Earliest directly dated rock art from Patagonia reveals socio-ecological resilience to mid-Holocene climate, Science Advances, 14-Feb-2024. 10.1126/sciadv.adk4415
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES—Researchers uncovered a submerged Stone Age wall that is almost a kilometer in length and may have been used to hunt reindeer. Submerged archaeological sites can remain well-preserved but are often challenging to study in detail. Jacob Geersen and colleagues used hydroacoustic data of up to a centimeter-scale resolution, sedimentological samples, and optical images to characterize a Stone Age megastructure located at a depth of 21 meters in the Bay of Mecklenburg, Germany. The authors used shipborne measurements, an autonomous underwater vehicle, and divers to examine the site. The structure was composed of around 1,670 individual stones, largely less than 1 meter in height and less than 2 meters in width, placed side by side over 971 meters. Geological analysis revealed that the structure was adjacent to the shoreline of a now-submerged lake or bog. The shape and location of the structure were not consistent with a natural origin. The structure was likely constructed by regional hunter-gatherers more than 10,000 years ago and subsequently submerged around 8,500 years ago. The structure may have been used to direct the movements of herds of large ungulates, such as Eurasian reindeer (Rangifer tarandus), to facilitate hunting. According to the authors, the site may represent one of the oldest known hunting structures on Earth and the largest known late Pleistocene/early Holocene structure in Europe.
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Section of a Stone Age megastructure in the Bay of Mecklenburg, Germany. Philipp Hoy
*“A submerged Stone Age hunting architecture from the Western Baltic Sea,” by Jacob Geersen et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 12-Feb-2024. https://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2312008121
Beneath the protective man-made structural shroud that overhangs and envelopes this natural rockshelter, an archaeologist from St. John’s College of the University of Cambridge dons a hazmat suit, multiple hairnets, and a respirator. He proceeds to incise into a vertical profile of sediment with a scalpel to extract a cube of an ancient deposit before placing it carefully into a centrifuge vial. The sediment cube sample comes from what has been dubbed the “deep hole,” consisting of some of the earliest and deepest excavated cultural layers within the famous site of Meadowcroft, a rockshelter located within a remote forested area of the western Pennsylvania Appalachian mountains. Meadowcroft is long known to have revealed evidence of what scientists arguably suggest to be among the sites that feature the earliest presence of humans in North America — an almost continuous of-and-on, come-and go human occupation that may go back as far as 16,000 radiocarbon years ago, or 19,000 calendar years. The purpose of the sampling, among other things, is to test the possible presence of human DNA still remaining in the soil.
“All the way through that long sequence of a human presence,” says James Adovasio, the archaeologist who led excavations at the site, “….the people are using this site the same way—to collect wild plant and animal food….”
Adovasio makes clear that he is not hanging his hat on the DNA samples, just one small chapter in the investigations of this site. “We stress that the absence of any human, animal, or plant DNA in no way undermines previous conclusions about the site,” he emphasizes. The archaeological investigations have historically churned up too much other data to be overturned by any new, single sampling. Moreover, investigations are not finished. “More than one-third of the site remains unexcavated,” Adovasio adds. But there are no plans to conduct on-site investigations in the immediate future. Despite the carefully meticulous and scientific excavations and analysis already conducted for the site, further excavation will be left to future generations with new techniques and technology….
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View of interior of Meadowcroft rockshelter. Sue Ruth, CC-BY-4.0 Deed, Wikimedia Commons
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Peering up at it from below, I could see this wouldn’t be a leisurely stroll. This flight of seemingly countless steps, ascending with rails almost like scaffolding to a destination high above, invited a sense of adventure. But I could envision that, long before this modern, convenient construction, human visitors surely had a more challenging task. I was told that casual visitors once had to ascend with the aid of a rope assemblage, and long before that, Native Americans had to reach it using whatever devices or efforts at their disposal. Carved by nature in a bluff overlooking a tributary of the Ohio River known as Cross Creek, the ancient rockshelter above had remained tucked away for millennia within a lush green, hilly landscape of what is today called the Allegheny Plateau of western Pennsylvania. Thousands of years of weathering and erosion made this place a cave-like shelter for prehistoric human sojourners—affording them protection from outside elements and a space to rest, sleep and eat within.
Once I reached the top of the steps, I could move freely over a spacious, human-made platform, designed to hold small capacity crowds. I could now see the interior of the rockshelter clearly laid out before me, left as it was after the latest large-scale archaeological excavations closed out. But long before archaeologists and others came to investigate and work at the site, nature’s hand had already morphed its appearance many times over through thousands of years of weathering and erosion. I could see the visible reminders of this in the face of the sandstone cliffs surrounding it. Slowly sculpted by water, wind and ice, it was an almost surrealistic picture of what time and the elements could do to otherwise seemingly impermeable and impenetrable stone. Today, the rockshelter is enveloped in an impressive, protective overhanging wooden construction, an architectural wonder by itself.
For those who know something about the site, the Meadowcroft rockshelter is now widely thought to have yielded evidence of a very early human presence in North America, along with the longest sequence of continuous human occupation. It was first systematically excavated by Dr. James M. Adovasio, now senior scientist at APTIM and director of archaeology at Senator John Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His efforts at the site included a team of colleagues and field school students in the early 1970’s. As a team, they uncovered evidence of a human presence they suggested dated thousands of years before the time of the advent of what for decades was considered the first broadly recognized human culture in the Americas—the Clovis—and its implied first peopling of the North American continent.
But this stature and acceptance didn’t come quickly and easily for Meadowcroft and its chief archaeologist. It challenged the prevailing paradigm, radically pushing back the dates on human occupation of the continent. From the very beginning, the validity of his findings related to the early human modified stone objects and other features of human habitation found at the site were marked with controversy. Decades later, however, the story of the Meadowcroft controversy has evolved to one of broad acceptance. Partly due to the mounting evidence from other sites with Pre-Clovis artifacts across the Americas, and in no small measure to the meticulous and scientifically rigorous methods used in the Meadowcroft research, the site has arguably become a kingpin in a new mainstream of scientific inquiry that has increasingly legitimized the ‘Pre-Clovis’ way of thinking.
The Interview
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Popular Archaeology took the opportunity to interview Dr. Adovasio (pictured) about the site and its significance within the context of the ongoing search and debate on the first peopling of the Americas. What follows are the details of that interview:
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Q1: Would you describe your personal route/experience, attributes and interests that drove you to your current occupation or career?
As I indicated in my book, “The First Americans,” I was essentially programmed to be an archaeologist by my mother, Lena M. Adovasio. She was a four-field major in college, one of which was history and another of which was chemistry. She taught me to read well before kindergarten with geology, paleontology, and archaeology books. As a consequence I never really wanted to do anything else except pursue an archaeology career. I knew where I wanted to go to undergraduate school in the 6th grade and, in fact, attended that institution (The University of Arizona). The attributes which I brought to the “archaeology table” were and remain, extreme attention to detail, a high degree of organization leavened with intense self-discipline, and, I suppose, the ability to absorb and synthesize oftentimes very diverse data sets. It probably helped that, like my mother, I was endowed with a near perfect memory.
Q2: What is the story of how Meadowcroft first came to your attention?
When I assumed a faculty position at The University of Pittsburgh in 1972, I was told that one of the parameters of that position was the establishment of an archaeological and geoaracheological field training program in western Pennsylvania. What I had hoped to locate was an area with little or no previous archaeological or geoarchaeological research coupled with relatively easy striking distance of Pittsburgh for obvious logistical reasons. I also sought an area which contained at least one cave or rockshelter site because these were the sites I was most familiar with from my graduate career at The University of Utah. Because I had previous research commitments on the Island of Cyprus in the eastern Mediterranean, I did not have the time to locate a suitable study area myself. So I circulated word amongst my colleagues in the profession, and as a result, a now deceased historian/amateur archaeologist from what was then California State College, California, Pennsylvania, informed me about Meadowcroft Rcokshelter in the early spring of 1973. His name was Phil Jack, a longtime friend of the landowner, Albert Miller, who discovered the site. I arranged with both of them to visit the site in the later spring of 1973 and upon viewing it decided to solicit permission from the landowners to begin excavations there in June of 1973. The rest is, literally, history.
Q3: While excavating at Meadowcroft in the 1970’s, what was it that made you realize that there was something special or unusual about this site?
We initially believed that the deposits at Meadowcroft would be something less than a meter in thickness and that the oldest occupation would be Late Archaic or Early Woodland, at best. These estimates were based on excavations at other rockshelters in southwestern Pennsylvania and adjacent portions of Ohio and West Virginia. However, early in the 1973 season it became clear that the deposits at the site were well in excess of a meter in thickness and the recovery of Middle and Early Archaic materials signaled an older occupation than we had imagined. Of course, when the first radiocarbon dates were run after the 1973 season was over, it was evident that the site was initially occupied earlier than we suspected.
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General view of Meadowcroft Rockshelter facing west before excavation in 1973; vegetation marks the limits of the vegetation current overhang; large block in lower left represents a roof detachment ca. 12,500 years ago. Image courtesy James M. Adovasio
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Q4:What finds convinced you that you had uncovered evidence of human occupation at this site going back possibly 16,000 years or more?
The answer to this question is more complicated than it seems. The deposits at Meadowcroft are characterized by a series of roof spalling and block collapse events which dramatically altered both the configuration of the rockshelter, as well as the availability of “livable” floor space through time. One such spalling event marks, in effect, the Pleistocene-Holocene boundary as well as, for all intents and purposes, the end of the Clovis interval in southwestern Pennsylvania. Beneath this spalling event, we expected to encounter no additional, older cultural material, but rather the parent bedrock of the rockshelter in the form of the Birmingham Shale. Instead of the Birmingham Shale, we found a series of apparent occupational surfaces replete with shallow fire pits and associated artifacts of indisputable anthropogenic origin. Radiocarbon dates derived from charcoal within these pits clearly preceded the established age of Clovis in eastern North America, thereby, and surprisingly to us, indicating an earlier than Clovis occupation. Additionally, none of the recovered artifacts, most notably the unfluted lanceolate so-called Miller projectile point [named after the site’s discoverer] and small blade flakes, were consistent with a Clovis ascription.
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Lithic shown under rockfall is the type specimen of the Miller Lanceolate projectile point form. Courtesy James M. Adovasio
Miller Lanceolate projectile point type specimen, obverse surface; the specimen is significantly re-sharpened and reduced in overall dimensions from the hypothesized prototype; it is unfluted, but basically ground. Courtesy James M. Adovasio
Assorted Miller Complex artifacts from Stratum IIa (containing the oldest cultural remains radiocarbon dated to at least 16,000 years B.P.) at Meadowcroft Rockshelter; from left to right: Miller Lanceolate type specimen made of local Cross Creek chert, prismatic blade flake made from Onandaga chert, prismatic blade flake made from Flint Ridge chert, biface fragments made from Flint Ridge or Kanawha chert (black specimens are Kanawha). Courtesy James M. Adovasio
Q5: What is the significance of these findings within the context of the Clovis First debate?
Meadowcroft was the first site in nearly 40 years to seriously challenge the long held Clovis-First paradigm. Between 1933 and 1973, more than 500 archaeological sites in North and South America were claimed to be older than the Clovis horizon of ca. 10,900 to 11,300 uncorrected radiocarbon years ago. Prior to Meadowcroft, all of these Pre-Clovis claimants exhibited a similar history. First, you would read about them in a local newspaper or popular scientific journal, then more extensive treatments would appear in the technical scientific literature. Inevitably, the sites would then be exposed for some real or imagined flaw – the artifacts were not definitively of human origin; the stratigraphy was non-existent or imperfectly defined; the context and association of even genuine recovered artifactual material was problematic, etc. As I pointed out in “The First Americans,” each of these sites enjoyed a Warholesque 15 minutes of fame, then disappeared into oblivion. Each time one of these claimant sites failed, it reinforced the Clovis-First model. Therefore, by the time the initial reports on Meadowcroft appeared, there was a long established record of failure which served to render the Meadowcroft discoveries suspect ab initio.
Q6: Do you think the Clovis First paradigm is now discredited, or on its way out, given the findings from other sites across the Americas that show evidence of human occupation before Clovis times? (In other words, do you think there is sufficient evidence now to support a pre-Clovis presence or culture in the Americas, and why?)
To answer this question, it is perhaps useful to cite an observation by Dr. Jonathan C. Lothrop in his review of a Pre-Clovis site in the Americas, a volume published by the Smithsonian Institution. He says,
“In 2015, if one polled New World archaeologists familiar with the literature, I suspect most would agree that there is a growing body of evidence of human occupation in the Americas that pre-dates ca. 13,200 Cal. B.P.” (Lothrop 2015: p. 256)
I certainly concur with Lothrop’s assessment, but it is also worth stressing that a handful of very vocal, Clovis-Firsters still remain and, like Hrdlicka in an earlier time, will probably go to their graves with their minds unchanged. The death of established paradigms often takes a very long time—as witnessed, for example, by the many decades which elapsed between the promulgation of continental drift and its widespread acceptance in the geological community. I completely underestimated how long it would take for Clovis-First to expire and I also misjudged the degree to which its “spear carriers” would hold on to their beliefs. This is all particularly interesting given the fact that, almost from its inception, most European scholars and virtually all South American scholars questioned the underpinnings of the Clovis-First model. The American response, of course, was that the Europeans were simply ignorant of the facts and that the South Americans didn’t even publish in English. The number and distribution of what might be called broadly acceptable Pre-Clovis archaeological sites now clearly points to an earlier than Clovis presence. I stress, however, that even if there were only one, then one would be sufficient. Monte Verde effectively terminated the argument even if its still vocal critics don’t accept the fact.
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Blade flakes from Stratum IIa at Meadowcroft Rockshelter; cross sections range from prismatic on the first three specimens to triangular on the forth; the edge is intentionally dulled for hafting. Courtesy Jame M. Adovasio
Close up of blade flakes from Meadowcroft Rockshelter; one edge of each blade flake is intentionally dulled for hafting, while the opposite edge is the working edge. Courtesy James M. Adovasio
Polyhedral blade cores of the type from which Meadowcroft blade flakes were struck; these are very different from Clovis blade cores. Courtesy James M. Adovasio
Q7: What were the specific challenges of excavating and investigating the site?
All cave and rockshelter sites around the world are part of what some archaeologists call the “marked landscape”. Places so designated were well known to aboriginal populations both in time and through time and as such, were frequently visited and utilized. While some of these sites probably witnessed yearly visits, many were only episodically visited. Because of repetitive visits, often over very long periods of time, such sites provide the opportunity for studying environmental change and concomitant human adjustments to those changes in very unique ways. Unfortunately, depending on the nature, intensity, and duration of these visits, these types of sites may evidence considerable anthropogenic disturbance with attendant difficulties in establishing the stratigraphic/occupational sequence. Additionally, because of the nature of the depositional process in many of these sites, even without human disturbance, the stratification may be remarkably complex. The combination of naturally complicated stratigraphy and repetitive human visits with attendant disturbance render the proper excavation of these kinds of sites very difficult.
Q8: What specific techniques, processes, methodologies and applications made the investigation of this site stand out from other excavations or investigations?
A necessary preamble to this answer is to state that a field archaeologist in virtually any setting – prehistoric, historic, or forensic – has three basic responsibilities. The first, and most fundamental of these, is the reconstruction of stratigraphy from visible stratification. While in English, we tend to use the terms “stratigraphy’ and “stratification” interchangeably, they do not, in fact, mean the same thing. Stratification is an objective phenomenon. It has both subjective and objective physical properties which can be detected, assessed, and measured. Stratification is a product. Stratigraphy is both the process by which stratification is created and the study of that process. The establishment of stratigraphy from observable stratification is fundamental and critical to the other two responsibilities of a field archaeologist. Without it, the other two cannot be done. The second responsibility is the delineation of context. Context literally means place in time and space and unless the context of all recovered material is explicitly defined in a stratigraphic perspective, there is no context. Finally, perhaps the most difficult field responsibility is the demonstration of association. Association means that two or more items have entered the archaeological record penecontemporaneously as a consequence of the same process. Association refers, in forensic terms, to primary or probative evidence as opposed to secondary or circumstantial evidence.
Suffice to note, for reasons already articulated, it is particularly and peculiarly difficult to execute the three responsibilities of a field archaeologist in a cave or rockshelter situation. To execute these responsibilities in any excavation situation requires knowledge of and the ability to operationalize all of the so-called laws of stratigraphy. While most people are familiar with the first of these laws – superposition – many are, to varying degrees, unfamiliar with the remainder. These include original horizontality, lateral continuity, and intersecting relationships. The key to operationalizing all of these principles – frequently referred to as Steno’s Laws – requires the ability to recognize and delineate the contacts or interfaces between discrete strata. Without digressing into an arcane lecture on methodology, it should be noted that during the Meadowcroft excavations much of our attention was directed precisely at facilitating and defining interfaces and contacts. Students were exhaustively trained to recognize strata differences on the basis of perceived textural differences. In practice, this meant that they could use their trowels to detect differences in compactness versus friability, density versus porosity, and related properties by feel and even sound. Once sufficiently skilled, our students could recognize stratigraphic differences quite literally with their eyes shut in much the same way that anyone could detect by feel and sound alone the difference between layers of cake and icing between those layers. Despite the reliance on texture in the excavation training process, a wide array of other things were done to maximize the ability to “see” stratigraphic transformations in profile. Meadowcroft, virtually from the outset, was fully electrified and thanks to University of Pittsburgh engineers in conjunction with assistance from Westinghouse, we were able to install an experimental lighting system that allowed the excavators to combine different light sources to illuminate stratigraphic profiles in a variety of ways. The difference between different light source combinations was and is striking and, at that time, had not been employed extensively as a supplement to excavation.
In order to systematically plot the three-dimensional Cartesian coordinates of artifacts and ecofacts, a series of vertical and horizontal datum points were combined, initially manually, and later, via total stations, to ensure the establishment of the appropriate provenience or context of excavated materials. Since the rockshelter had an active phone line, we could then communicate directly via telephone modem to the mainframe at the University of Pittsburgh to encode excavation data. To my knowledge, this is also the first time that was ever done – at least in a cave or rockshelter setting.
In order to provide objective verification of what were subjectively defined strata, samples of sediment from each stratum or microstratum were processed with a Coulter blood cell counter converted to measure sediment size differences. Once again, this was the first time such technology had been employed in the field.
I could continue in this vein, but the point here is simply this – given the experience and imagination of the investigators, coupled with sufficient funding, we were able to implement a variety of data recovery and documentation as well as analytical protocols which had never been extensively employed before. While some of these did not work as expected, many did. The collective effect was a level of precision in the excavations which virtually no critic of the site has ever questioned.
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Precision and care: Excavation of a thin anthropogenic surface at the site via single-edged razorblade. Courtesy James M. Adovasio
Above and below: On-site documentation procedures at Meadowcroft Rockshelter; colored pencils which represented different combinations of silt, sand, and clay-sized materials were employed to produce microstratigraphic profile maps of all parts of the excavation. Courtesy James M. Adovasio
Q9: What arguments or issues did you have to address regarding the validity of the finds and their dating?
Virtually from the publication of the first radiocarbon chronology from Meadowcroft in 1974, the possible age of the earliest occupation of the site engendered great controversy. Significantly, especially as compared to other putative Pre-Clovis claimant localities, none of this controversy surrounded either the excavation methodology employed at the site nor the possible anthropogenic origin of any of the earliest artifacts. As already noted, the excavations at Meadowcroft were, and still are, widely hailed as “meticulous” and the “early” artifacts bear the unmistakable stigmata of humanly modified materials. Instead, the criticisms of the possible antiquity of the site pivoted around three basic issues: 1) the possible particulate or non-particulate contamination of only the eleven oldest radiocarbon samples from the site; 2) the absence of Pleistocene faunal remains; and 3) the apparently anomalous character of the recovered floral materials.
Dozens of pages of published material have been devoted to refuting the objections to the apparent age of the lower and middle Stratum IIa materials from Meadowcroft and these arguments will not be repeated here. It should be sufficient to note that there is absolutely no probative evidence for the particulate contamination of any of the eleven oldest C-14 samples from Meadowcroft. As to non-particulate contamination, the introduction of dissolved older carbon into just the eleven deepest radiocarbon samples from Meadowcroft requires a vehicle for contamination in the form of groundwater movement. An intensive micromorphological study conclusively demonstrated that such movement did not occur and, therefore, the non-particulate contamination issue is moot.
As to the faunal and floral critiques, modern research indicates that the paleoenvironment south of the glacial ice front in North America was remarkably variable and diverse. Further, the floral species represented at Meadowcroft were not inconsistent with such diversity. Finally, the faunal remains from Meadowcroft’s oldest deposits are diminutive both in numbers and weight, though all of the species represented have been reported in Late Pleistocene contexts elsewhere in eastern North America.
Put most simply, all of the currently available data suggests that Meadowcroft was sequentially and sporadically visited before the advent and spread of Clovis technology by populations who may or may not have been the ancestors to the makers of fluted points.
Of course, a larger issue, at least for some scholars, was the absence for a period of time of “other Meadowcrofts.” Now, of course, there are other sites of demonstrable Pre-Clovis age. Despite the best efforts of diehard Clovis-Firsters to discredit these other localities, often with incredibly convoluted and far-fetched scenarios, the existence of Pre-Clovis populations in the new world is now widely accepted.
Meadowcroft set the evidentiary bar! Monte Verde broke it! Other sites are appearing to join them. For Clovis-First it is the end of the game.
Q10: If you were to create a scenario or story describing the nature and lifestyle of the early, Pre-Clovis inhabitants of the site, what would it be?
As described in various publications, the earliest visitors to Meadowcroft appear to have been broad spectrum foragers rather than megafauna-focused big game hunters. These populations visited the site, as would their successors, principally in the fall of the year, utilizing a durable technology that included the production of unfluted lanceolate projectile points and the manufacture of diminutive blade flakes from polyhedral cores. They also employed a perishable technology that included basketry and presumably a variety of other less well documented related technologies. Their visits to Meadowcroft were apparently brief and perhaps separated by a number of years. They exploited a wide array of lithic raw material sources which I personally do not believe reflect their range. I would suspect these materials were acquired by trade and exchange. These sources include Kanawha chert from West Virginia, Onandaga chert from New York, and Flint Ridge chert from Ohio to name but a few. Evidence of these earliest visitors to Meadowcroft, named by us the Miller Complex after Albert Miller who discovered the site, are also evidenced at several other localities in the Cross Creek Drainage and a very similar durable technology is also evident at more remote locations like Cactus Hill in Virginia. While there are no obvious technological connections between Miller durable technology and Clovis, there is the possibility that some sort of relationship may be discovered in the future.
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Reenactment of Paleoindian family unit showing both genders, different ages, durable and non-durable technology. Courtesy James M. Adovasio
Q11: What is in store for the future investigation and research of this site?
About one third of Meadowcroft remains unexcavated. This area is available for future study when there are even more resolute excavation, documentation, and analysis protocols available. The main task at present is to complete the long overdue final report as well as a series of smaller contributions about one or another aspect of the long Meadowcroft sequence.
Q12: Are there any other comments you would like to make?
The Meadowcroft/Cross Creek operation was originally designed as an undergraduate and graduate training project aimed at both anthropology/archaeology students and those in related fields. Obviously, there was also a research component but this was, at least on paper, secondary to the student training goal. Because of the experience of the multidisciplinary research staff as well as access to extraordinary funding, it was possible to not only offer students state-of-the-art protocols in site excavation, documentation, and analysis, but also to constantly refine those protocols from both a methodological and substantive perspective. Because of the foregoing, the excavations at Meadowcroft were considered by others to be at the very cutting edge of the field. That they are still considered by many to be so is a testimony to the success of the methodological aspect of the project. We have always been more proud and pleased with the methodological “end” of the Meadowcroft project than any, or even all, of the results it produced. Expanding the envelope of the field in any perspective is rewarding, but in terms of actual enhancement of field data collecting procedures, it is and has been particularly gratifying. From a more substantive perspective, while the earliest materials from Meadocroft have garnered the most attention, the incredible length of the occupational sequence is to us far more striking. Because of the lengthy and hyper-detailed Paleo-environmental record from Meadowcroft, we can examine macro and micro climatic changes and their attendant consequences very precisely. We can also articulate in unique ways human responses and adjustments to those changes. That was in essence the “cake” we were trying to bake. That the site proved to be quite old was the unintended “icing.”
If you liked this article, you may like The Update: Trackways of Otero 2, a previously published in-depth premium feature article about 22,000-year-old human footprints discovered in White Sands, New Mexico. (Image courtesy Dan Flores as illustrated in said article)
I must admit that I lived a full three years less than a two-hour drive away from the Meadowcroft Rockshelter site before actually seeing this site in person. Likely many thousands more are not even aware that this, clearly one of the most important archaeological sites related to Early Americans, sits so closely to their doorsteps. Accessing the impressively well maintained site and its associated visitation area is, however, not a simple and straightforward endeavor. It isn’t located conveniently off the well-traveled freeway circuits. But the driving directions provided at the website can be extremely helpful to any first-time visitor. Any visitor should be aware in advance that, to physically access the rockshelter itself, one must ascend a relatively lengthy flight of stairs. But this effort, though comparatively modest as hiking and climbing goes, is richly awarded with an up-close-and-personal view of the site and its scenic surrounding context.
—Ed.
General view of Meadowcroft, facing northeast after sunset. Courtesy James M. Adovasio
MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR EVOLUTIONARY ANTHROPOLOGY—Decidious and evergreen forests dominate the limestone karst formations of the northwestern highlands of Thailand. A vast number of caves and rock shelters intersperses the mountains. In over 40 such caves in Mae Hong Son province, large wooden coffins mounted on stilts, dating between 2,300 and 1,000 years ago, can be found. During the Iron Age period, each of these up to several-meter-long coffins was crafted from a single teak tree and features refined carvings of geometric, animal- or human-like shapes at the handles of both ends.
This archaeological assemblage has been studied for over two decades by members of the Prehistoric Population and Cultural Dynamics in Highland Pang Mapha Project, led by Professor Rasmi Shoocongdej, from the Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Archaeology, Silpakorn University. “Our research examines the relationship between humans and their environments in the seasonal tropics. One crucial aspect is the exploration of the social structure of these prehistoric communities, as well as explaining their connections with other pre-Neolithic, Neolithic and post-Neolithic groups in this region,” says Rasmi Shoocongdej, an archaeologist and senior author of the study*.
To understand the genetic profile of the Log Coffin-associated communities, and the connection of individuals buried in different caves, an interdisciplinary team of researchers from Germany and Thailand has analyzed the DNA of 33 ancient individuals from five Log Coffin sites. The genomes recovered from the ancient individuals allow the first detailed study of the structure of a prehistoric community from Southeast Asia. “This project illustrates how ancient DNA can contribute to our understanding of past communities, their every-day life, and their cross-regional connections”, says first author Selina Carlhoff, a researcher in the Department of Archaeogenetics at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
Complex genetic landscape in post-Neolithic mainland South East Asia
DNA preservation conditions in tropical regions are challenging and limit ancient population genetic studies from Southeast Asia. Most studies were limited to single individuals or small groups representing a country and period, and identifying only broad patterns, such as genetic admixture of farmers from the Yangtze River valley in southern China with the local Hòabìnhian hunter-gather-associated gene pool during the pre-Neolithic. The current study identifies two separate farmer-associated ancestries in the Log Coffin-associated individuals. One connected to the Yangtze River Valley, and another to the Yellow River valley in China. While previously published individuals from Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam also carry the Yellow River-related ancestry, it was absent in Bronze and Iron Age individuals from Ban Chiang in northeastern Thailand. These genetic differences mirror cultural differences between the two regions, such as mortuary practices and diet, and point towards separate influence spheres and connections to separate initial migration routes during the Neolithic period.
“Our results contribute to the emerging picture of a complex genetic landscape in post-Neolithic mainland Southeast Asia; however, this study provides successful genetic results from samples in limestone caves from the northwestern highlands of Thailand. Future studies of samples retrieved from open-air archaeological sites in the lowlands seem promising. If possible, they can provide additional insight into the genetic history of Mainland Southeast Asia,” says Wibhu Kutanan, a scientist from Naresuan University, Thailand, involved in the conception of the study. Detailed analyses of uniparental markers, which can reveal sex-specific demographic histories of Log Coffin-associated groups, will be provided in a forthcoming study. Further archaeogenetic studies in collaboration with local scholars, as well as novel admixture modelling and dating techniques, will illuminate the developing patterns better and enable direct connections to archaeological findings and hypotheses.
First community-level analysis in Southeast Asian archaeology
On the local scale, the study provided the first community-level analysis in Southeast Asian archaeology. To investigate the relations between individuals, the authors used genetic regions that are identical in two individuals, because they were inherited from a common ancestor. The analysis of so-called IBD blocks (identical-by-descent) helps tracing complex biological relatedness patterns within a site and across regions – and had so far not been applied in archaeogenetic studies of Southeast Asia. The study identified close genetic relatives buried in the same cave system, such as parents and children or grandparents and grandchildren. This cluster of closely related individuals was more distantly connected to all other individuals buried at the site.
While this suggests a selection of burial place under consideration of genetic relatedness, the more distant genetic relationships between Log Coffin sites, a low level of consanguinity, as well as high mitochondrial and low genome-wide diversity suggest that the Log Coffin-associated groups were rather large and constantly connected to each other across different river valleys. “This result is highly significant, since wooden coffins were also used in other archaeological cultures all over Southeast Asia. Comparing relatedness patterns and cross-regional genetic connections would be a fascinating future collaborative project which could potentially explain the cultural dynamics and population interactions within Southeast Asian and other regions”, says Rasmi Shoocongdej.
*Genomic portrait and relatedness patterns of the Iron Age Log Coffin culture in northwestern Thailand, Nature Communications, 22-Dec-2023. 10.1038/s41467-023-44328-2
A team composed of scientists and scholars from Italy, Germany and Switzerland are suggesting that a form of writing was independently invented on Rap Nui (Easter Island) and used before European contact occurred in the early 18th century. To come to this consensus, they examined four inscribed wood tablets stored at the Congregazione dei Sacri Cuori di Gesù e di Maria, in Rome. The tablets featured a glyphic writing system known as Rongorongo, a local island script observed by outsiders in 1864. They employed radiocarbon dating techniques to date the wood upon which the script was inscribed.
“Until now, only two tablets [out of at least 27 known to exist] were directly dated, placing them in the nineteenth c. AD, which does not solve the question of independent invention,” states the study authors in the recently released paper published in Scientific Reports. “Here we radiocarbon-dated four Rongorongo tablets preserved in Rome, Italy. One specimen yielded a unique and secure mid-fifteenth c. date, while the others fall within the nineteenth c. AD. Our results suggest that the use of the script could be placed to a horizon that predates the arrival of external influence.”*
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The study report* was published in Nature on February 2, 2024.
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*Ferrara, S., Tassoni, L., Kromer, B. et al. The invention of writing on Rapa Nui (Easter Island). New radiocarbon dates on the Rongorongo script. Sci Rep14, 2794 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-53063-7
Image, Above: Rapa Nui tablet. (A) 3D model of the Rapa Nui tablet D Échancrée. (B) Enlargement on the script. ( Ferrara, S., Tassoni, L., Kromer, B. et al., CC-BY-4.0 Deed.
Compelling stories dramatize and humanize major events and characters in the history of Ephesus, the ruins of which are a popular destination for tourists in present-day Turkey.Historium Press, 2023.Available from Amazon and other online booksellers.
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