NEANDEROOTS

NEANDROOTS

Understanding a threshold in Human evolution at 450-350 ka through the roots of Neanderthal behavior

The project

As part of this interdisciplinary project, NEANDROOTS proposes:

(1) to build a large comprehensive database for the 450 to 350 ka period,

(2) to bridge the gap in chronological and environmental data,

(3) to develop methodological approaches to identify regional patterns and diffusion models of innovations,

(4) to question the role of population size and structure by modeling, and

(5) to test the impact of climate evolution on hominin adaptation by iLOVECLIM model and Eco-cultural-niche modeling.

Building a database on hominin behavior in their geographical and environmental contexts.

We will produce a comprehensive database with securely dated archeological data in Western Europe (UK, France, Italy, Spain; without Central Europe as the evolution of Eastern populations and the continental context are different), through new studies/reviews of archeological collections, and a large bibliography. We aim to work all together through the scientific network and discuss on some major sites in order to identify the main features of each series.

Bridging the gap in chronological and environmental data

Over the last 6 years our chronological group dated numerous archeological sites in France, UK, Italy, Spain, and in various Eurasian countries by combining different absolute dating methods. In the frame of this project, our goal is to combine all archeological records from the 350-450 ka period. This archaeological framework will be integrated to terrestrial and oceanic archives (see below) in order to have a coherent common chronological framework.

Identifying the earliest regional identities

The goals are (1) to compare the corpus of sites with older sites (global database on MIS 17-12 sites compiled during the ANR PremAcheuSept) to identify elements of behavioral stability and changes, (2) to validate the hypothesis of the regionalization of traditions from MIS 11 onwards, and (3) to identify scenarios of innovations/inventions between and into sequences.

Testing mechanisms of internal dynamics and the role of demography

Asking why innovations emerged in particular places in Western Europe after MIS 12 and how they persisted over time will contribute to the topical debate on relationships between mobility, population density, rates of cultural transmission, and the appearance, diffusion, and maintenance of innovations via different social learning strategies