In a multidisciplinary study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, an international team of researchers combined archaeological, genetic and stable isotope data to encapsulate 4000 years of Iberian biomolecular prehistory.

El Portalón cave in the Sierra de Atapuerca (northern Spain) contains four millennia of biomolecular prehistory [Credit: Eneko Iriarte (Universidad de Burgos)]

The team analyzed human remains of 13 individuals from the north and south of Spain, including the rich archaeological site of El Portalón, which forms part of the well-known site of Atapuerca in Burgos and in itself harbors four millennia of Iberian prehistory. The study also involved important sites like Cueva de los Murciélagos in Andalusia, from which the genome of a 7,245 year-old Neolithic farmer was sequenced, making it the oldest sequenced genome in southern Iberia representing the Neolithic Almagra Pottery Culture—the early agriculturalists of southern Spain.

Background

Prehistoric migrations have played an important role in shaping the genetic makeup of European populations. After the last glacial maximum about 20,000 years ago, Europe was inhabited by hunter-gatherer groups and two major migrations during the last 10,000 years had massive impacts on lifestyle and gene pool of European populations. First, groups originally coming from the Middle East and Anatolia introduced farming practices to Europe during the Neolithic. Less than 5,000 years ago, herder groups from the Pontic-Caspian steppe spread over the European continent. As both of these movements originated in the east, the most western parts of the continent were last to be reached by these migrations. While archaeogenetic studies have shown that both of these migrations have replaced more than half of the gene pool in Central and Northern Europe, much less is known about the influence of these events in Iberian populations, particularly in the most southern areas such as Andalusia.

Two independent migrations spread farming practices across Europe

The first farmers mainly reached Iberia following a coastal route through the northern Mediterranean Sea. The new study demonstrates that Neolithic Iberians show genetic differences to the migrant farmers that settled in Central and Northern Europe. "This suggests that all early farmers in Iberia trace most of their ancestry to the first Neolithic people that migrated into the peninsula and that later contributions from their central European counterparts were only minor," says archaeogeneticist Cristina Valdiosera from La Trobe University in Australia, one of the lead authors of the study.

Skeletal remains of a 7245-year-old Early Neolithic Farmer from Andalusia, Spain (Cueva de los Murciélagos)  sequenced in this study. 1) Diagram of funerary position, 2) Skull of the individual, 3) Funerary remains as discovered in the cave [Credit: Rafael Martínez-Sánchez (Universidad de Granada) and Antonio Moreno Rosa (Universidad de Córdoba)]

These Mediterranean route migrants show a strong genetic connection with the modern-day inhabitants of the Mediterranean island of Sardinia. "We can probably consider modern Sardinians relatively direct descendants of the people who spread farming practices across the Mediterranean region around 8,000 years ago," adds Mattias Jakobsson, population geneticist at Uppsala University, Sweden and one of the senior authors of the study.

First wave of eastern migration involved small number of individuals

Despite other potential entrances into Iberia, such as North Africa or mainland Europe, the researchers did not find substantial regional differences within Iberia. Uppsala University's Torsten Günther, population geneticist and one of the lead authors of this study, says, "While geographic differences seem minor, we do see some differences over time due to interaction and genetic exchange between groups." The first Iberian farmers show remarkably low levels of genetic diversity, indicating that the first wave of eastern migration to establish itself on the peninsula was relatively small. Following this initial period of low diversity, the newly arrived populations grew in size and mixed with the local hunter-gatherers, rapidly increasing genetic diversity during later periods.

Low genetic impact of later/Bronze Age migrations in Iberia While recent studies have demonstrated that a massive migration of Pontic-Caspian steppe herders during the Late Neolithic/Bronze Age transition is responsible for a major population turnover in central and northern Europe, the authors report in this study that the genetic influence of this migration on contemporary southwestern Europeans, namely the prehistoric Iberians, was only minor. This confirms that the genetic history of Iberia was unique as it has mostly been influenced by the main prehistoric migration associated with the introduction of farming practices—the Neolithic Revolution.

Representation of an Iberian Neolithic farmer [Credit: Maria de la Fuente (Maria de la Fuente Archaeological Illustrations)]

Homogenous diet in Iberian farmers

The authors also investigated the diet of these Neolithic farmers throughout almost 4000 years corroborating that despite the significant biological interaction between culturally different groups the farming culture predominated from the very beginning and continued over time. Molecular archaeologist Colin Smith from La Trobe University, one of the senior authors, explains: "Interestingly, while we do see a substantial genetic influx of hunter-gatherer ancestry into farmers over time, the diet of these early farmers does not change. Their terrestrial diet is characteristic of farming cultures and persist temporally and geographically across the millennia."

The study illustrates the power of interdisciplinary research to understand the full complexity of European prehistory. "Overall, these results emphasize the differences between the westernmost populations and their central European counterparts and highlight the need for detailed regional studies to reveal the full complexity of prehistoric migrations," Dr. Valdiosera concludes.

Source: Uppsala University [March 12, 2018]

There is a famous song by Antonio Rodríguez Martínez, aka El Tío de la Tiza, that was sung at the Cádiz carnival of 1905 chronicling a fisherman’s discovery of 18th-century coins at La Victoria beach. In the song, locals rush in with shovels to extract the valuable coins from the sand.

Architectural remains uncovered by the recent storm in Cádiz [Credit: ADIP]

Now, 114 years later, a similar scene has unfurled at Cortadura beach: when local residents walked out on the sand following the recent storm, they were amazed to find remains of a Roman aqueduct and parts of a stone road dating back to the 16th or 17th centuries.

“We were alerted to the presence of these remains, and to the fact that people were digging in the area, so we went there, warned people to stop what they were doing, and called city officials,” explains Moisés Camacho, president of the Association for the Investigation and Dissemination of Cádiz’s Heritage (Adip).

Soon after that, the municipal archeologist and a local police patrol car showed up to watch over the remains on a stretch of beach that runs parallel to the road connecting Cádiz and San Fernando.

The Roman road and aqueduct were discovered near the beach of Cortadura [Credit: CEN/ADIP]

Experts have identified remains of two walls around 80 centimeters thick and two meters high that once delimited the road, said Eugenio Belgrano, a member of Adip and president of the Association of Underground Investigators.

This road was used until 1755, when it was destroyed by a tidal wave triggered by the great earthquake in Lisbon. The tsunami swept through Cádiz and Huelva, killing 1,240 people.

Not two meters from this road, archaeologists have identified up to seven fragments of what might have been the aqueduct of Gades (the Latin name for modern-day Cádiz), a Roman construction built in the first century. “Two of these fragments are still joined together with the original mortar, which is a rare occurrence,” said Camacho.

The modern epoch road that the temporary 'Emma' has left visible in Cádiz [Credit: Silvia Manito Velázquez]

Historians had already been aware of of the existence of both the aqueduct and the road, although no finds had emerged in recent decades.

The Roman aqueduct of Cádiz once stretched over 75 kilometers, bringing residents water from the springs of Tempul, in San José del Valle. It is considered one of the greatest feats of engineering in Roman-era Hispania. Other similar aqueduct fragments found years ago are now on display in Cádiz’s Asdrúbal square.

Scholars believe that there could also be an older Roman road right underneath its 17th-century counterpart, or else running parallel to it under the sea.

Author: Susana Urra | Source: El Pais [March 06, 2018]

The acoustic qualities of a rock shelter may have been a key factor in its selection as a site for rock art and indicate a spiritual significance to the practice, according to a recent study, while scientists are also looking into whether some caves were chosen as artistic sites because of the view.

Scientists believe that rock art sites were chosen for their visual and acoustic properties [Credit: Curt Harrell]

Professor Margarita Díaz-Andreu and Dr. Tommaso Mattioli, both from the University of Barcelona, Spain, spent two years visiting rock art sites in France, Italy and Spain to compare acoustics and assess their relevance to the choice of location.

'In a cliff such as Baume Brune (in Vaucluse, France), with 43 shelters, why were only eight selected to be painted?' said Prof. Díaz-Andreu. 'There are other apparently similar ones nearby that were left empty. Why?'

Armed with a specialised portable tool for measuring acoustics, the researchers showed the rock art sites studied have distinct acoustic features.

These take the form of either many echoes in the shelters where the art was found, or strong reverberations. At some sites, it was possible to hear sounds from great distances. Other undecorated shelters in the area lacked these special effects.

'We found that in all of the areas that we tested, the people who had chosen places to decorate had selected places with good acoustics,' said Prof. Díaz-Andreu. In two particular sites, the team demonstrated that the places that were decorated were those with more echoes.

Music

This suggests that the rock art sites were used for rituals, or religious ceremonies, and may or may not have involved music.

'As archaeologists we are obsessed with material culture,' said Prof. Diaz-Andreu, 'But in fact, sound and music are very important to the way in which we feel and the way we react. Sound has special properties that facilitate us to reach a type of mental state that is prone to enhance religious feelings.'

Dr. Jamie Hampson, a researcher at the University of York, UK, who works on a project exploring the modern-day use of rock art (see below), agreed that the rock art has spiritual significance. 'We've got a lot of ethnography from groups in South Africa in particular about the rock face being a veil between this world and the spirit world,' he said.

Prof. Díaz-Andreu and Dr. Mattioli believe that prehistoric humans may have used echolocation techniques such as tongue clicks, cane tapping and handclapping to select the shelters. However, this is impossible to prove.

'Clicking and handclapping do not leave a trace in the archaeological record,' Prof. Díaz-Andreu said.

Rock art is found at hundreds of thousands of sites throughout the world. Throughout history, people from all walks of life have used rock carvings, engravings and paintings to express themselves, and the oldest sites found are more than 65,000 years old.


Manual rubbings

Up until now, researchers have had to take manual rubbings of rock art to analyse in the lab. But this low-tech, 2-D and labour-intensive option meant that important data, such as colour and the 3-D nature of indentations in the rock, were missing.

Now, new zoomable 3-D digital models of rock art sites are providing archaeologists with better tools for analysing data – and they could shed light on why certain sites were chosen. They could also help archaeologists work out whether traces at certain sites are man-made or natural, and potentially identify the styles of individual artists.

Dr. Sue Cobb of the University of Nottingham, UK, led the 3-D-PITOTI project, which developed fully interactive virtual replicas of several rock art sites at Valcamonica, Northern Italy, in high detail.

She said: 'The archaeologists were looking for a way to analyse the content that they were studying in more detail and in different ways. They wanted a better way to view and compare small details of different rock art figures, identify families of figures, and make the 3-D rock art available to their fellow colleagues and the public.'

To build the models, the project team developed an entirely new scanning device to collect images of the rock surface. Specially designed to capture the colour of the rock art and intricate details, at the same time it is lightweight and portable enough to be easily transported across inaccessible areas, hence the nickname 'walking-stick scanner'.

The scanner is so powerful it can reconstruct surface points at 0.1 millimetre spatial resolution, and uses a high=powered flash.

A feature of the finished 3-D models is that you can zoom in and out from the images easily, and virtually fly over the sites. To achieve this effect, the team took photographs from near-range, mid-range and far-range locations to capture the rock art from a range of distances and angles.

The 3-D models can be viewed via a 3-D multi-user touch table, a multi-user 3-D wall display, or individual tablets. Tourists can use the models in museums and visitor centres, to view rock art that is inaccessible or highly vulnerable to damage.

As well as providing a faithful record of art that is one day likely to vanish from exposure to wind, rain and snow, the highly detailed 3-D models are helping scientists answer questions such as whether the view from a particular place was important in selecting the site for decoration.

'Archaeologists can compare rock art images located in different sites,' said Dr. Cobb. 'They ask—is there anything meaningful about those locations and the images of rock art that are placed at that site that can help us understand why that site was meaningful to people at that time?'

Modern-day use of rock art imagery

Rock art sites can be a big tourist draw and scientists have been looking at how the experience can best be managed. Dr. Jamie Hampson from the University of York found that visitor perceptions of artwork and the management of rock art sites in South Africa, Australia and the US were enhanced when there were indigenous tour guides and staff at the sites.

'A lot of visitors point out how much more meaningful their experience is if they're accompanied by a guide who is part of an indigenous group in the area,' explained Dr. Hampson.

It's clear that for many indigenous people, rock art holds a symbolic and spiritual meaning. However, it is often used to create tourist memorabilia, without seeking permission from the relevant indigenous people. Certain images are considered sacred and are not suitable for this kind of use.

'So much of this is about respect and courtesy and taking all possible measures to ensure permission is granted before images are borrowed,' said Dr. Hampson.

The work done by Dr. Hampson's ROCKART project encouraged the employment of more indigenous staff at heritage sites, and raised awareness about image appropriation. The project also aided several Aboriginal corporations in Australia to set up and run their own rock art visitor centres, fueling entrepreneurship in remote areas.

Author: Catherine Collins | Source: Horizon: The EU Research & Innovation Magazine [March 01, 2018]

Geochronologists from the Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH) have led a study published in the journal Quaternary Geochronology about the chronology of the archaeological site of Gran Dolina, situated in the Sierra de Atapuerca (Burgos), whose results confirm a pulse of human dispersion in southern Europe around one million years ago..

TD4 Level at Gran Dolina site [Credit: CENIEH]

This is a paleomagnetic study of the lower stratigraphic levels of this archaeological site in Burgos, whose objective was to determine the possible presence of the Jaramillo subchron, a geological event of normal magnetic polarity about one million years ago, to improve the chronological framework for the lithic industry found at level TD4, and therefore for human presence in Atapuerca.

"Gran Dolina is one of the sites with the best-preserved sedimentary records of the Middle and Early Pleistocene in Europe, and therefore, knowing the chronology of the stratigraphic levels comprising it is an extremely important element in understanding the presence and development of human activity in the zone," explains Claudia Álvarez Posada, lead author of this paper.

Samples from the levels TD4 to TD6 were analyzed using paleomagnetism, a methodology which is increasingly used for establishing absolute datings given its great versatility and the fact that it has an extremely wide chronological register, because the magnetic field remains captured in sediments when they are formed. These days there is a known register covering a timeline of over 180 million years up to the present, so that as Álvarez affirms, "it's a very powerful tool for chronology."

This method, together with the data furnished by biostratigraphy and the recent dating studies using Electron Spin Resonance (ESR) made at the site, has allowed an age later than the Jaramillo Subchron to be definitively established for the level TD4, that is, less than one million years, consistent with with a pulse of human dispersal across southern Europe during the time interval known as the Lower Pleistocene transition.

Dual study 

This paper forms part of a dual paleomagnetic study of Gran Dolina, encompassing levels TD1 to TD6, undertaken for better understanding of the ages of the different stratigraphic levels which comprise the fillings of the site.

The second paper, which has just been published in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews, focuses on the chronology of the lower sedimentary fillings, and corroborates the datings found for TD4.

Source: CENIEH [February 28, 2018]

Over 41 000 cultural goods such as coins, paintings and drawings, furniture and musical instruments, porcelain, archaeological and paleontological objects, books and manuscripts and sculptures were seized all over the world as a result of coordinated law enforcement actions. These seizures were made during the first Global Global Customs-Police Operation, codenamed ATHENA and organised by the World Customs Organisation (WCO) in cooperation with INTERPOL, and during the regional Europe-focused Operation PANDORA II, coordinated by the Spanish Guardia Civil and Europol.

Credit: Europol

Both operations took place from October to early December 2017, with a common action phase from 20 to 30 November 2017, and saw the involvement of customs and police forces from 81 countries. Both, ATHENA and PANDORA II, focused on the illicit trafficking of cultural objects, theft, looting as well as internet sales. Most of the actions were developed and coordinated jointly between Customs and Police on the national level with the support and participation of the experts from the Ministries of Culture and other relevant institutions and law enforcement agencies.

Apart from seizures, there have been tens of thousands of checks and controls in various airports, ports, other border crossing points, as well as in the auction houses, museums and private houses. As a result, more than 200 investigations were opened and 53 persons arrested.

Credit: Europol

Given the global nature of this crime, operation coordination units working 24/7 were established by Europol on one side, and the WCO and INTERPOL on the other, to support the exchange of information as well as disseminate alerts, warnings and perform cross- checks in different international and national databases.

Internet as a facilitator for the illicit trafficking of cultural goods

Internet has changed, as in many other fields of our society, the traditional chains of the illicit trade of cultural goods. It is a new challenge for law enforcement authorities especially for the specialized cultural goods crime units. Now the criminals can reach the collector’s (anywhere in the world) without any intermediate, and out of the traditional channels.

Credit: Europol

Facing this threat, the involved law enforcement agencies monitored thousands of market places, internet announcement has in order to detect and seize looted or stolen cultural goods. Only in this area, 63 new criminal investigations have been opened and more than 6 000 cultural objects have been seized.

In a single successful investigation in Spain, Guardia Civil seized more than 2 000 cultural objects. Most of them were coins from Roman and other Empires and archaeological objects made of ceramic, metal and stone. In addition, 88 pieces of ivory were seized during the searches, including a carving of Christ valued at EUR 6 000 , and 39 firearms of different classification, from historical weapons, such as rifles and shotguns, swords, swords, katanas and a crossbow, revolvers and pistols. The investigation started with the checks of various internet pages dedicated to the sale and purchase of objects of historical value, and is still ongoing.

The Hellenic Police conducted a fruitful investigation in the framework of PANDORA II: during the searches in two residences and in two businesses of a national entrepreneur, they found 41 archaeological objects, for which the collector did not have a corresponding license. Additionally, from a legal collection of 1 133 coins of silver, bronze and gold of the 2nd century B.C. until 200 A.C., 15 coins were missing, and from a legal collection of 105 ancient objects, 26 objects were missing. All the possessed objects of archaeological and cultural value were confiscated, namely 1 252 cultural goods.

Source: Europol [February 23, 2018]

Even our earliest human ancestors made and used technology - something we can look back on thanks to the lasting nature of stone tools.

Researchers work on the archaeological site in Spain, known as Porto Maior, where the tool deposits were found [Credit: Eduardo Méndez Quintas, Author provided]

An exceptionally high density of giant handaxes dated to 200,000-300,000 years ago has been uncovered at an archaeological site in Galicia, northwest Spain. The findings are documented in a new article published by our international research team of archaeologists and dating specialists.

The discovery of these handaxes suggests that alternative types of stone tool technologies were simultaneously being used by different populations in this area – supporting the idea that a prehistoric “Game of Thrones” scenario existed as Neanderthals emerged in Europe.

Additional evidence for this idea comes from fossil records showing that multiple human lineages lived in southwest Europe around the same time period.

Stone tool technology

Porto Maior is near the town of As Neves (Pontevedra, Galcia) on a terrace 34m above the current level of the Miño River, which borders northern Portugal and Spain.

The large tools are consistent with a culture known as Acheulean [Credit: Eduardo Mendez Quintas, Author provided]

The archaeological site at Porto Maior preserves an ancient stone tool culture known as the Acheulean. Characterised by symmetrically knapped stones or large flakes (known as bifaces), the Acheulean is the first sophisticated handaxe technology known in the early human settlement record of Europe.

While Acheulean sites are widespread across the continent, Porto Maior represents Europe’s first extensive accumulation of large cutting tools (LCTs) in the Acheulean tradition. Until now, such high densities of LCTs had only been found in Africa. This new finding reinforces an African origin for the Acheulean in Europe, and confirms an overlap in time-frames of distinctly different stone tool cultures on the continent.


At around the same time that handaxes were being used at Porto Maior, a different stone tool tradition (the Early Middle Palaeolithic) was present in Iberia, for example at Ambrona and Cuesta de la Bajada. In central and eastern Europe – where tools were made exclusively on small flakes – the Acheulean tradition has never been found.

Porto Maior introduces further complexity to this overlapping technological pattern, and suggests that distinct early human populations of different geographical origins coexisted during the Middle Pleistocene (between 773,000 and 125,000 years ago).

Abundant large cutting tools

In total, 3,698 discarded artefacts were recovered from river-lain sediments at the site, with 290 of these making up the studied assemblage reported in our new paper.

The stone tool assemblage is composed of 101 LCTs in original position, and that are on average 18cm long, with a maximum length of 27cm. These handaxe dimensions are exceptionally large by European Acheulean standards (typically only 8-15cm long). The assemblage also contains large cleavers, a type of tool typically found in African sites.


At 9.5 pieces per m² in an excavated area of more than 11.8m², the density of the Acheulean stone tool accumulation is one of the highest recorded globally, surpassing previous European findings of smaller Acheulean tools (usually less than 3 artefacts per m²).

Laboratory analyses indicate that the tools were used to process hard materials such wood and bone, in activities that could have included the breaking up of carcasses.

The Spanish site of Porto Maior clearly resembles extensive accumulations of very large tools previously only seen in Africa and the Near East. These similarities reinforce the idea of an African origin for the Acheulean tradition of southwest Europe.

They also raise new questions regarding the origin and mobility of prehistoric human populations – the ancestors of Neanderthals – that occupied the European continent during the Middle Pleistocene period before the arrival of our own species, Homo sapiens.

Dating the tools

The age of these unusually large Acheulean tools at Porto Maior was determined using two different dating methods – post-infrared infrared stimulated luminescence (pIR-IRSL) dating of potassium feldspar grains and electron spin resonance (ESR) dating of quartz grains.

Luminescence dating samples being measured under controlled lighting conditions at the University of Adelaide’s Prescott Environmental Luminescence Laboratory [Credit: Lee Arnold]

These techniques provide an estimate of the last time sand grains within sediments were exposed to sunlight, by looking at their luminescence or paramagnetic properties – that is, they can tell us the timing of sediment burial. This, in turn, can be used to determine when the site was last occupied and when the artefacts discarded by prehistoric populations were subsequently buried by sediment accumulation.

In the study of Porto Maior, pIR-IRSL and ESR dating were applied to grains that had been carefully collected from the sediment layers hosting the stone tools, without exposing the sample material to daylight.

The two methods, which were applied independently at two different Australian institutions (University of Adelaide and Griffith University), produced remarkably similar ages.

This confirms the reliability of the dating results, and indicates that the archaeological record spanned the time period from 200,000 to 300,000 years ago.

Migration from Africa

The Acheulean tool-making tradition originated in Africa about 1.7 million years ago, and disappeared on that continent by 500,000 years ago. The specific type of Acheulean tools described at Porto Maior is exclusive to southwest Europe, suggesting that the technology was brought into the region by an “intrusive” population.

Acheulean tools in their primary position at Porto Maior, Spain [Credit: Eduardo Mendez-Quintas, CC BY]

The age of Porto Maior is consistent with previous findings from Iberia that suggest that the Acheulean culture experienced an expansion in the region between 400,000 to 200,000 years ago.

This latest discovery supports the increasingly complex narrative developing from ongoing studies of human fossils from Europe; namely that human groups of potentially different origins and evolutionary stages coexisted across the continent during a time when the emergence of Neanderthals was taking place.

While it is clear that more human fossil and stone tool sites need to be reliably dated across the region, a picture appears to be emerging of a turbulent “Game of Thrones” style scenario of hominin evolution in Eurasia during the Middle Pleistocene period.

Authors: Martina Demuro, Lee Arnold And Mathieu Duval | Source: The Conversation [February 23, 2018]

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

In the Late Neolithic, a new style of pottery appears among the grave goods buried with the dead in many parts of Europe. A new genetic study shows that, with one exception, its dissemination was not accompanied by large-scale migration.

"Das Bode-Becher" of Quedlinburg, Germany [Credit: K. Ulrich /Landesamt für Denkmalpflege und Archäologie Sachsen-Anhalt]

At the end of the Neolithic, on the threshold to the Early Bronze Age, around 2600 BCE, a new set of religious beliefs began to spread across Europe. This is indicated in the archaeological record above else by the appearance of a novel form of pottery among the grave goods buried with the dead. These highly characteristic, decorated vessels are known as bell beakers, and their dissemination from Spain as far as Hungary, and across Northwestern Europe into Britain is known as the Bell Beaker phenomenon.

A team made up of geneticists and archaeologists has now explored whether the diffusion of these pots was driven by the influx of new migrants. Their findings appear in the latest issue of the journal Nature. The new study, for the first time, combines archaeological data relating to the distribution and ages of the Bell Beaker phenomenon in Europe with genetic analysis of human DNA sequences obtained from skeletal remains dated to the same period. This approach has enabled the team to compare the spread of the bell beakers (pots) with that of the migrants (people) who brought the new ideology. The results indicate that the diffusion of the pottery in continental Europe was not accompanied by large-scale migration.

"The study demonstrates that the spread of cultural elements need not involve migrational movements. In this case, it was the ideas that were propagated," says Professor Philipp Stockhammer of the Institute for Prehistoric and Protohistoric Archaeology at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich, one of the leading archaeologists among the authors. The results refute the long accepted theory that the spread of the new religion through Western and Central Europe was associated with significant incursions of migrants. Britain, however, represents a striking exception to this. Here, the appearance of the Bell Beaker phenomenon coincides with genetic evidence for the arrival of large numbers of migrants from continental Europe.

In the course of their investigation, the authors obtained DNA sequence data from 400 human skeletons, making it the largest study of ancient DNA carried out so far. This material had been excavated from 136 different sites, most of them in Britain, Spain and Germany. The new DNA samples from Germany originated from excavations carried out in the Valley of the River Lech. In a recent paper based on material from this area, Philipp Stockhammer reported evidence that reveals the surprising mobility of women in the Bronze Age.

"We will now have to compare these three regions in order to determine the degree of spatial variability in mobility across the transition from the Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age," he says. The ability to recover and analyze ancient DNA from human burials on such a large scale was made possible by the advent of new techniques. These advances will usher in "a new era in palaeogenetics," he adds.

Indeed, Stockhammer himself is among the authors of a second article in the same issue of Nature. This paper looks at the pattern of migration of farmers and herders from Anatolia into Southeastern Europe 8500 years ago. That study also uses ancient DNA to reveal how the resident hunter-gatherer population reacted to the arrival of the newcomers. In some areas the two groups lived together and in other regions, they avoided contact and lived apart for hundreds of years. In the Danube Valley, the evidence suggests that some of the new farming communities subsequently abandoned agriculture and adopted the hunter-gatherer lifestyle favored by the locals.

Source: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen [February 22, 2018]

Scientists have found the first major evidence that Neanderthals, rather than modern humans, created the world's oldest known cave paintings -- suggesting they may have had an artistic sense similar to our own.

Panel 3 in Maltravieso Cave showing 3 hand stencils (centre right, centre top and top left). One has been dated to at least 66,000 years ago and must have been made by a Neanderthal (colour enhanced) [Credit: H. Collado]

A new study led by the University of Southampton and the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology shows that paintings in three caves in Spain were created more than 64,000 years ago -- 20,000 years before modern humans arrived in Europe.

This means that the Palaeolithic (Ice Age) cave art -- including pictures of animals, dots and geometric signs -- must have been made by Neanderthals, a 'sister' species to Homo sapiens, and Europe's sole human inhabitants at the time.

It also indicates that they thought symbolically, like modern humans.

Published in the journal Science, the study reveals how an international team of scientists used a state-of-the-art technique called uranium-thorium dating to fix the age of the paintings as more than 64,000 years.

Until now, cave art has been attributed entirely to modern humans, as claims to a possible Neanderthal origin have been hampered by imprecise dating techniques. However, uranium-thorium dating provides much more reliable results than methods such as radiocarbon dating, which can give false age estimates.

Panel 78 in La Pasiega. The scalariform (ladder shape) composed of red horizontal and vertical lines dates to older than 64,000 years and was made by Neanderthals [Credit: C.D Standish, A.W.G. Pike and D.L. Hoffmann]

The uranium-thorium method involves dating tiny carbonate deposits that have built up on top of the cave paintings. These contain traces of the radioactive elements uranium and thorium, which indicate when the deposits formed -- and therefore give a minimum age for whatever lies beneath.

Joint lead author Dr Chris Standish, an archaeologist at the University of Southampton, said: "This is an incredibly exciting discovery which suggests Neanderthals were much more sophisticated than is popularly believed.

"Our results show that the paintings we dated are, by far, the oldest known cave art in the world, and were created at least 20,000 years before modern humans arrived in Europe from Africa -- therefore they must have been painted by Neanderthals."

A team of researchers from the UK, Germany, Spain and France analysed more than 60 carbonate samples from three cave sites in Spain -- La Pasiega (north-eastern Spain), Maltravieso (western Spain) and Ardales (south-western Spain).

The ladder shape composed of red horizontal and vertical lines (centre left) dates to older than 64,000 years and was made by Neanderthals [Credit: © P. Saura]

All three caves contain red (ochre) or black paintings of groups of animals, dots and geometric signs, as well as hand stencils, hand prints and engravings.

According to the researchers, creating the art must have involved such sophisticated behaviour as the choosing of a location, planning of light source and mixing of pigments.

Alistair Pike, Professor of Archaeological Sciences at the University of Southampton and co-director of the study, said: "Soon after the discovery of the first of their fossils in the 19th century, Neanderthals were portrayed as brutish and uncultured, incapable of art and symbolic behaviour, and some of these views persist today.

"The issue of just how human-like Neanderthals behaved is a hotly debated issue. Our findings will make a significant contribution to that debate."

Joint lead author Dirk Hoffmann, of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, added that symbolic material culture -- a collection of cultural and intellectual achievements handed down from generation to generation -- has, until now, only been attributed to our species.

Drawing of Panel 78 in La Pasiega by Breuil et al (1913). The red scalariform (ladder) symbol has a minimum age of 64,000 years but it is unclear if the animals and other symbols were painted later [Credit: Breuil et al.]

"The emergence of symbolic material culture represents a fundamental threshold in the evolution of humankind. It is one of the main pillars of what makes us human," he said.

"Artefacts whose functional value lies not so much in their practical but rather in their symbolic use are proxies for fundamental aspects of human cognition as we know it."

Early symbolic artefacts, dating back 70,000 years, have been found in Africa but are associated with modern humans.

Other artefacts including cave art, sculpted figures, decorated bone tools and jewellery have been found in Europe, dating back 40,000 years. But researchers have concluded that these artefacts must have been created by modern humans who were spreading across Europe after their arrival from Africa.


There is evidence that Neanderthals in Europe used body ornamentation around 40,000 to 45,000 years ago, but many researchers have suggested this was inspired by modern humans who at the time had just arrived in Europe.

Study co-author Paul Pettitt, of Durham University, commented: "Neanderthals created meaningful symbols in meaningful places. The art is not a one-off accident.

"We have examples in three caves 700km apart, and evidence that it was a long-lived tradition. It is quite possible that similar cave art in other caves in Western Europe is of Neanderthal origin as well."

Source: University of Southampton [February 22, 2018]

Prehistoric Iberians 'exported' their culture throughout Europe, reaching Great Britain, Sicily, Poland and all over central Europe in general. However, they did not export their genes. The Beaker culture, which probably originated in Iberia, left remains in those parts of the continent.

Iberian beakers [Credit: Museo de Almeria]

However, that diffusion was not due to large migrations of populations that took this culture with them. These are the conclusions of an international study in which the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) was involved. Its findings, published in the journal Nature, indicate no evidence of any genetic outflow from Iberia to those areas has been discovered.

"Therefore, the diffusion of the Beaker culture from Iberia is the first example of a culture being transmitted as an idea, basically due to a question of social prestige (since it was associated with the virtues of being virile and of being warriors), which is why it is adopted by other populations," indicates researcher Carles Lalueza-Fox, from the Institute of Evolutionary Biology, a mixed research centre run by CSIC and the Pompeu Fabra University, in Barcelona, Spain.

Between 4,700 and 4,400 years ago, a new type of bell-shaped beaker pottery was introduced throughout western and central Europe. For more than a century, archaeologists have been trying to determine whether the spread of this beaker pottery -- and the (Beaker) culture associated with it -- represented a large-scale migration or whether it was due simply to the exchange of new ideas.

Now, this new study, which includes DNA data from 400 prehistoric skeletons collected from sites across Europe, resolves the debate of whether the spread was due to migrations or ideas, indicating that both arguments are correct. The findings show that the culture which produced these bell-shaped beakers extended from Iberia to central Europe without a significant movement of populations, although the Beaker culture would spread to other places through migrations at a later date.

The study, whose first author is the Spanish researcher Inigo Olalde, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School, shows that once the (Bell) Beaker culture reaches the centre of Europe (around Germany and its surrounding area), it expands backwards to other places, notably to the British Isles. Yet, in this case, it does represent a migration, replacing around 90% of the population with it.

"That is to say, the Neolithic people who built Stonehenge (and who had a greater genetic similarity with Neolithic Iberians than with those from Central Europe) almost disappear and are replaced by the populations from the Beaker culture from the Netherlands and Germany. This replacement is almost absolute in terms of the Y chromosome, which is transmitted by the paternal line, indicating an extreme reproductive bias, and therefore a previously unheard of social dominance. The backward flow also reaches other places such as Italy (at least in the north) and Iberia. I believe it is possible that this is also associated with the expansion of the Celtic or Proto-Celtic languages," Mr. Lalueza-Fox points out.

Coordinated by researcher David Reich from Harvard University, the study was developed by an international team of 144 archaeologists and geneticists from institutions in Europe and the United States.

Source: Spanish National Research Council [February 21, 2018]

The archaeologists working in the excavations of the defensive moat of Puig de Sant Andreu in the Iberian city of Ullastret (a small historic village on the Bay of Empordà in Catalonia) have discovered a small lead object with an Iberian inscription. This "exceptional" find is currently being restored in the laboratory of the Archaeological Museum of Catalonia in Girona, where an initial evaluation and a more detailed study will be carried out.

Credit: Museu d' Arqueologia de Catalunya

The object found in the levels that covered the moat, weighs 65 grams and measures 40 centimetres long and is approximately 25 centimetres wide. According to a preliminary study by the researcher Joan Ferrer, the inscription of 16 signs is structured in two lines and belongs to the northeastern 'dual' script.

Credit: Museu d' Arqueologia de Catalunya

The excavations of the Ullastret site's defensive moat began last November 2017 with a planned duration of four months. They are part of the restoration project of the walls of the Iberian city carried out by the Direccio General de Patrimoni Cultural del Departament de Cultura, which will recover 130 linear metres of the moat that protected the southwestern band of the fortification.

The restoration of the wall and the excavated part of the moat will present one of the most important defensive systems in the Iberian world and is expected to enhance the appearance of the site, which is managed by the Archaeological Museum of Catalonia.

Source: La Vanguardia [February 20, 2018]

The Dental Anthropology Group of the Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH) forms part of the team which has just published a paper in American Journal of Physical Anthropology on the morphological analysis of the dentin in the lower molars of the population of the archaeological site of Sima de los Huesos (Atapuerca, Burgos), using three-dimensional geometric morphometry, in order to study the origin of the Neanderthals.

Dentine surface illustrating the landmarks used to capture their shape [Credit: Hanegraef et al.]

In this innovative study, in which scientists from University College London have also participated, 85 molars have been analyzed using computerized axial microtomography in the laboratories of the CENIEH, which has allowed high-resolution virtual sections to be obtained.

Geometric morphometric analyses performed hitherto have been based on using two-dimensional images such as photographs, although the application of new technologies such as micro-CT and the 3D reconstruction software Amira have made possible the first work of geometric morphometry using three-dimensional images.

“With the results obtained, we have been able to ratify once again the similarities found between the population of Sima de los Huesos and the Neanderthals, and the differences between these and Homo sapiens”, explains the director of the CENIEH María Martinón-Torres, co-author of this work.

Nevertheless, despite the notable affinities with Homo neanderthalensis, the population of Sima de los Huesos displays lower intra-population variability and has certain features even more derived than the Neanderthals themselves.

Neanderthal accretion

The principal objective of the authors, in addition to reviewing the current hypotheses which explain the origin of the Neanderthals, has been to verify the reliability of the Neanderthal accretion model, which suggests that Neanderthal characteristics did not develop in a linear and continuous manner, but  rather accreted abruptly at different periods.

“The results of this investigation favor the theory of a more complex evolutionary scenario for the European continent during the Middle Pleistocene, with the coexistence of different populations and without rejecting possible hybridization between them”, concludes Martinón-Torres.

Source: CENIEH [February 19, 2018]

The oldest studied rodent fauna in this work, which inhabited the Iberian Peninsula from twelve million years ago, progressively shifted north looking for humid environments to survive climate change that caused prominent dry and cold environments in central Iberia. According to an investigation leading by Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM).

Life restoration of a flying squirrel (at the forefront) in the forest environments from the northern region (Catalonia and south of France) around 10 million years ago [Credit: Oscar Sanisidro (Vertebrate Paleontology. Biodiversitiy Institute, University of Kansas)]

The results of this study, published this week in the Nature Publishing Group Scientific Reports, allow us to know the effects of climate change on past biodiversity. Based on the analysis of changes in faunas with different ecological features (dietary habits, habitat preferences, etc).

The study focuses on the rodent faunas that inhabited the Iberian Peninsula between 12 and 5 million years ago. This timeframe is particularly relevant for the evolution of past climate as it is a period of intense cooling coupled with increased aridity at a global scale. This global trend radically transformed landscapes in Southwestern Europe, which became increasingly more arid.

'We compiled information from all the rodent species present at more than hundred fossil sites of Iberian Peninsula and the South of France, which allow us to statistically evaluate how this rodent communities were grouped based on their ecological affinities. Then, we tested how these associations were affected by the critical environmental changes happening in the region between 12 and 5 million years ago' explains Fernando Blanco researcher at the Department of Geodynamics, Stratigraphy and Palaeontology (UCM).

This work has confirmed the strong influence two important environmental events had in mammal communities: the Vallesian crisis, ten million years ago and, more remarkably the Messinian crisis, six million years ago, where nearly the whole Mediterraean basin was completely drained.

A group with valuable information

During the studied time interval the climatic changes provoked diversity and distribution changes on rodent communities. 'One of the main outcomes of this study is that older faunas, linked to environments that were disappearing due to increased aridity at the time, were displaced to the north surviving temporally in local refugia with more humid conditions, particularly in the region of Catalonia and the South of France' adds Manuel Hernández Fernández, professor at Universidad Complutense de Madrid and senior author of the study.

Rodents are an ideal group to conduct palaeoecological research: 1) they are among the most diverse groups of mammals, 2) they are widely distributed geographically across a huge range of ecosystems and 3) they are particularly sensitive to environmental changes. Furthermore, their fossil record is extraordinarily rich.

'Only in the Iberian Peninsula, the number of fossil localities with rich assemblages of rodents are counted by the hundreds' explains Fernando Blanco. 'This study sets a primer to move the field toward more comprehensive studies spanning larger geographical regions and longer timeframes to ultimately understand in higher detail the effects of past climate change in extinct faunas' adds Ana Rosa Gómez Cano from Institut Català de Paleontologia and coauthor of the article.

In addition to UCM, there are several institutions collaborating, including Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Institut Català de Paleontologia, Museum für Naturkunde of Berlin and Harvard University, under the coordination of Universidad Complutense de Madrid. This study, are the result of more than 50 years of digging and research experience in Iberian Peninsula and southern France fossil sites.

As a final remark, it is important to underline that this kind of studies are essential to create explanatory, or even predictive, models to anticipate the effects that the climate change that we are experiencing might have upon current biodiversity. 'By understanding in depth the effects of past climatic conditions on extinct biodiversity we might be able to anticipate these trends in the future. In this sense, I believe Palaeontology has a crucial role in the study of modern global change" explains Fernando Blanco.

Source: Universidad Complutense de Madrid [February 06, 2018]

Homo sapiens are considered to be the only species with a predominance of a preferred use of the right hand, with a ratio of 9 right-handed to 1 left-handed people. However, when did the human handedness appeared in human evolution remains unknown. An international research recently published and led by Marina Lozano, researcher at IPHES (Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social), shows that this behaviour is more ancient than it was thought. At population level, Neanderthal as far as 130,000 years ago, showed a well-stablished hand preference as our species. Nevertheless, this practice goes back to Homo habilis showing that handedness is an ancestral characteristic of our genus.

A. An incisor of Homo antecessor (Gran Dolina, Atapuerca, Spain) and B. an incisor of pre-Neanderthal (Sima de los Huesos, Atapuerca, Spain) [Credit: Marina Lozano/IPHES]

The scientific community has developed a huge amount of studies focused on handedness and brain laterality in hominins. However, in this work, a large sample has been analyzed, for the first time, following the same methodology. That is 120 individuals of five different human species (Homo habilis, Homo antecessor, preneanderthals, European Neanderthals and Homo sapiens), spanning almost 2 million years.

The main research teams focused on the study of handedness in fossil hominins are involved in this work. So, this is the result of an international collaboration between researchers of Spain, USA and Italy. Thanks to this work “we can affirm that the trend to have a preferred hand is an intrinsic characteristic of our genus. The handedness was established slowly in each of the species who precede us. From this research, we can do some inferences because handedness implies brain laterality that is closely related to language”, mentions the researcher Marina Lozano.

This international team studied the cultural dental wear, specifically the striations (cut marks) that result from the use of the mouth as a third hand, when some material is held between the anterior teeth and cut with a lithic tool. These marks are analyzed with environmental scanning electron microscopy.

The study is published in Evolutionary Anthropology.

Source: IPHES [January 28, 2018]

A new study shows the chemical register of climate change and global episodes such as volcanic eruptions in high-mountain centennial forests in the Iberian Peninsula (Spain).

The chemical traces from the released gases into the atmosphere by eruptions such the Timanfaya’s can be now  identified in the oldest coniferous Pyrenean forests [Credit: Emilia Gutierrez/J.Julio Camarero]

In September 1730, a large eruption in the Timanfaya volcano (Canary Islands, Spain) completely changed the morphology of Lanzarote. Atmospheric changes that caused volcanic eruptions centuries ago, such as the one in Timanfaya or the Tambora volcano (Indonesia) - which hid the sunlight for months -, had an impact on high-mountain centennial forests in the Iberian Peninsula, as stated in an article published in the journal Science of the Total Environment in which the lecturer Emilia Gutiérrez, from the Faculty of Biology of the University of Barcelona, has taken part.

The chemical traces from the released gases into the atmosphere by these volcanic eruptions can be now identified in the oldest coniferous Pyrenean forests, according to the study. In particular, eruptions such the Timanfaya's in Lanzarote ─ one of the strongest in the country due its duration until 1736 and the amount of thrown material ─ and Tambora's ─ one of the biggest volcanic episodes, which led to a "year without summer" in 1816 ─ released big amounts of iron that altered the chemical composition of the annual Pyrenean tree rings. According to this article, the study of the records of tree growth rings (dendrochronology) could help to see the frequency and intensity of the volcanic phenomena in modern times.

Studying the registers of atmospheric changes in tree rings

The new study, led by the expert Andrea Hevia, researcher at CETEMAS-Asturias, analysed temporary changes in the chemical composition of annual growth tree rings in the Pyrenees, in particular those in subalpine black pine (Pinus uncinata) forests in the national parks in Ordesa and Monte Perdido, and Aigüestortes and Estany de Sant Maurici. The study has the participation of Julio Camarero (Pyrenean Institute of Ecology -Zaragoza, IPE-CSIC), Raúl Sánchez Salguero (University Pablo de Olavide, Seville), and Allan Buras (Technical University of Munich, Germany), among other experts.

The study analyses temporary changes in the chemical composition of annual growth tree rings in subalpine black pine  forests in the national parks in Ordesa and Monte Perdido, and Aigüestortes and Estany de Sant Maurici  [Credit: Emilia Gutierrez/J.Julio Camarero]

For the first time, this study allowed researchers to analyse the effects of the climate change on the forest nutrient cycles, and states that Pyrenean forests can register these episodes chemical mark at a global scale (for instance, volcanic eruptions in remote areas) and the effects of gas emissions into the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution.

According to the lecturer Emilia Gutiérrez, from the Department of Evolutionary Biology, Ecology and Environmental Sciences of the UB, "the data from these trees that grow in heights over 2,000 metres represents the global changes, since their growth is not influenced by the effects of the local human activity (wood cutting, industry)."

Extraction of a wood sample for the analysis of Black pine annual growth ring  in the national park of Aiguestortes and Estany de Sant Maurici  [Credit: Emilia Gutierrez/J.Julio Camarero]

The experts applied a new non-destructive methodology that analyses atmospheric changes from the last seven hundred years ─ with a yearly resolution and seasonal resolution ─ out of the analysis of the tree growth rings. Among other results, the study shows an increase of content in elements such as phosphorus, sulphur, and chlorine since 1850, when the Industrial Revolution began taking place in Europe. Also, other essential chemical elements in the development of wood were analysed, such as calcium. "The fixation of these elements in growth rings in wood was favoured by the global rise of temperatures," says the researcher Andrea Hevia.

Trees, guarding global change in this planet

According to the studio, trees that grow in areas with alkaline floors (such as part of the National Park of Ordesa and Monte Perdido) could have a bigger ability to reduce global acidification phenomena, contrary to what was seen in areas with acid floors (such as the National Park in Aigüestortes and Estany de Sant Maurici).

In 1816 Tambora’s eruption released big amounts of iron that altered the chemical composition  of the annual Pyrenean tree rings [Credit: Andrea Hevia]

"The increase of sulphates and nitrate emissions into the atmosphere can limit the fixation into the floor and the tree absorption of essential elements such as calcium, magnesium or manganese, among others, which are essential for forest growth and development," says the lecturer Emilia Gutiérrez.

The study of the effects of climate change in this area and historical variation of chemical elements in trees can highly contribute to discover the potential effects that could stand many of the coniferous forests in the 21st century, according to the authors.

Source: Universidad de Barcelona [January 20, 2018]

Work carried out on the main road of Mernorca has led to the discovery of an Islamic (Moorish) necropolis that was used between the 10th and 13th centuries. The discovery took place near the Naveta des Tudons in Ciutadella.

Credit: Jordi Ribera/Radio Menorca

So far a total of 21 single graves have been found. An emergency exacavation is currently under way and will last about six weeks.

Ismael Moll, co-director of the project, explains that it was already suspected that there could be a medieval cemetery at this point because more medieval remains were found in nearby works in 1988.

This finding, together with other new discoveries in recent years in POIMA IV Fase and So Na Caçana, should provide a better understanding of one of the most obscure periods in the island's history.

The human remains found will now be transferred to the Museum of Ciutadella, where they will be studied in order to gain a broader view of rural life in the Middle Ages.

Source: Radio Menorca [January 12, 2018]