New dating evidence of the early presence of hominins in Southern Europe

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Abstract

The first “Out of Africa” migrations represent a seminal event in the history of humankind. At the gates of Europe, the first appearance of Hominins is recorded in Georgia, 1.8 million years ago (Ma); however, the picture of migration across the continent remains incomplete. Vallonnet Cave (France) is a Lower Paleolithic prehistoric site with traces of hominin activities including lithic remains and cut-marks on mammal bones. Here, we apply the uranium-lead (U-Pb) methods to two flowstones to date the intervening archaeological levels. The U-Pb data, coupled with paleomagnetic constraints, provide an age range from 1.2 to 1.1 Ma. The results conclusively demonstrate that Vallonnet Cave is one of the oldest European prehistoric sites in France with early hominin occupations associated with an Epivillafranchian fauna. Combined with data from other archaeological sites, the new precise chronology suggests a widespread occupation the Northern Mediterranean to Southwestern Europe at ~1.2 Ma.

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Most cited references 47

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An earlier origin for the Acheulian.

Christopher J Lepre, Hélène Roche, Dennis Kent … (2011)

The Acheulian is one of the first defined prehistoric techno-complexes and is characterized by shaped bifacial stone tools. It probably originated in Africa, spreading to Europe and Asia perhaps as early as ∼1 million years (Myr) ago. The origin of the Acheulian is thought to have closely coincided with major changes in human brain evolution, allowing for further technological developments. Nonetheless, the emergence of the Acheulian remains unclear because well-dated sites older than 1.4 Myr ago are scarce. Here we report on the lithic assemblage and geological context for the Kokiselei 4 archaeological site from the Nachukui formation (West Turkana, Kenya) that bears characteristic early Acheulian tools and pushes the first appearance datum for this stone-age technology back to 1.76 Myr ago. Moreover, co-occurrence of Oldowan and Acheulian artefacts at the Kokiselei site complex indicates that the two technologies are not mutually exclusive time-successive components of an evolving cultural lineage, and suggests that the Acheulian was either imported from another location yet to be identified or originated from Oldowan hominins at this vicinity. In either case, the Acheulian did not accompany the first human dispersal from Africa despite being available at the time. This may indicate that multiple groups of hominins distinguished by separate stone-tool-making behaviours and dispersal strategies coexisted in Africa at 1.76 Myr ago.

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The characteristics and chronology of the earliest Acheulean at Konso, Ethiopia.

Yonas Beyene, Shigehiro Katoh, Giday Woldegabriel … (2013)

The Acheulean technological tradition, characterized by a large (>10 cm) flake-based component, represents a significant technological advance over the Oldowan. Although stone tool assemblages attributed to the Acheulean have been reported from as early as circa 1.6-1.75 Ma, the characteristics of these earliest occurrences and comparisons with later assemblages have not been reported in detail. Here, we provide a newly established chronometric calibration for the Acheulean assemblages of the Konso Formation, southern Ethiopia, which span the time period ∼1.75 to <1.0 Ma. The earliest Konso Acheulean is chronologically indistinguishable from the assemblage recently published as the world's earliest with an age of ∼1.75 Ma at Kokiselei, west of Lake Turkana, Kenya. This Konso assemblage is characterized by a combination of large picks and crude bifaces/unifaces made predominantly on large flake blanks. An increase in the number of flake scars was observed within the Konso Formation handaxe assemblages through time, but this was less so with picks. The Konso evidence suggests that both picks and handaxes were essential components of the Acheulean from its initial stages and that the two probably differed in function. The temporal refinement seen, especially in the handaxe forms at Konso, implies enhanced function through time, perhaps in processing carcasses with long and stable cutting edges. The documentation of the earliest Acheulean at ∼1.75 Ma in both northern Kenya and southern Ethiopia suggests that behavioral novelties were being established in a regional scale at that time, paralleling the emergence of Homo erectus-like hominid morphology.

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Early Pleistocene human occupation at the edge of the boreal zone in northwest Europe.

Simon A Parfitt, Nick M Ashton, Simon G Lewis … (2010)

The dispersal of early humans from Africa by 1.75 Myr ago led to a marked expansion of their range, from the island of Flores in the east to the Iberian peninsula in the west. This range encompassed tropical forest, savannah and Mediterranean habitats, but has hitherto not been demonstrated beyond 45 degrees N. Until recently, early colonization in Europe was thought to be confined to the area south of the Pyrenees and Alps. However, evidence from Pakefield (Suffolk, UK) at approximately 0.7 Myr indicated that humans occupied northern European latitudes when a Mediterranean-type climate prevailed. This provided the basis for an 'ebb and flow' model, where human populations were thought to survive in southern refugia during cold stages, only expanding northwards during fully temperate climates. Here we present new evidence from Happisburgh (Norfolk, UK) demonstrating that Early Pleistocene hominins were present in northern Europe >0.78 Myr ago when they were able to survive at the southern edge of the boreal zone. This has significant implications for our understanding of early human behaviour, adaptation and survival, as well as the tempo and mode of colonization after their first dispersal out of Africa.

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Author and article information

Contributors

Véronique Michel: veronique.michel@cepam.cnrs.fr

Chuan-Chou Shen: river@ntu.edu.tw

Marie-Hélène Moncel: moncel@mnhn.fr

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Sci Rep

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Sci Rep

Title: Scientific Reports

Publisher: Nature Publishing Group UK (London )

ISSN (Electronic): 2045-2322

Publication date (Electronic): 30 August 2017

Publication date PMC-release: 30 August 2017

Publication date Collection: 2017

Volume: 7

Electronic Location Identifier: 10074

Affiliations

[1 ]ISNI 0000 0001 2112 9282, GRID grid.4444.0, Université Côte d’Azur, CNRS, CEPAM, ; 06357 Nice, France

[2 ]ISNI 0000 0000 9888 6911, GRID grid.464167.6, Université Côte d’Azur, CNRS, OCA, IRD, Géoazur, ; 06560 Valbonne, France

[3 ]ISNI 0000 0004 0546 0241, GRID grid.19188.39, High-Precision Mass Spectrometry and Environment Change Laboratory (HISPEC), Department of Geosciences, National Taiwan University, ; 10617 Taipei, Taiwan R.O.C.

[4 ]ISNI 0000 0001 2179 088X, GRID grid.1008.9, School of Earth Sciences, University of Melbourne, ; VIC, 3010 Australia

[5 ]Musée de Préhistoire Régionale de Menton, 06500 Menton, France

[6 ]ISNI 0000 0001 2183 2410, GRID grid.464572.6, Institut de Paléontologie Humaine, ; 75013 Paris, France

[7 ]Laboratoire Nice Côte d’Azur, 06300 Nice, France

[8 ]ISNI 0000 0001 2112 9282, GRID grid.4444.0, Département de Préhistoire, MNHN Paris, CNRS, ; 75013 Paris, France

[9 ]Musée de Préhistoire, 06690 Tourrette-Levens, France

[10 ]Réserve de biosphère de Fontainebleau et du Gâtinais, 77300 Fontainebleau, France

[11 ]Université Côte d’Azur, Centre Commun de Microscopie Appliquée (CCMA), 06108 Nice, France

Article

Publisher ID: 10178

DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-10178-4

PMC ID: 5577296

PubMed ID: 28855634

SO-VID: f6182828-8f05-446c-b162-ef2d9e741906

License:

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

History

Date received : 22 February 2017

Date accepted : 7 August 2017

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New dating evidence of the early presence of hominins in Southern Europe

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Abstract

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Special feature: Europe and Education

Most cited references 47

An earlier origin for the Acheulian.

The characteristics and chronology of the earliest Acheulean at Konso, Ethiopia.

Early Pleistocene human occupation at the edge of the boreal zone in northwest Europe.

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