Archaeology and the Origins of Modern Humans: European and African Perspectives

2004 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Mellars
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Before Present ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Archaeological Evidence ◽  
Cognitive Capacities ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Behavioural Patterns ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans ◽  
Rapid Appearance

This chapter outlines the archaeological evidence for the relative recency and abruptness of appearance of artefacts associated with the creativity of modern humans. It compares the archaeological evidence associated with the appearance of anatomically modern humans in Europe and Africa. In Europe, there is a rapid appearance of new behavioural elements that are often seen to represent a ‘revolution’ in behavioural and perhaps cognitive terms, centred on c.43–35,000 years before present (BP). In Africa, new behavioural elements seem to appear in a more gradual, mosaic fashion but show many of the distinctive features of European Upper Palaeolithic culture by at least 70–80,000 (BP), including seemingly explicit evidence for fully symbolic expression. The central problem remains that of assessing how far these well-documented changes in the archaeological record reflect not only major shifts in behavioural patterns, but also underlying shifts in the cognitive capacities for behaviour, including increasing complexity in the structure of language.

The Evolution of Modern Behaviour and its Implications for Maritime Dispersal During the Palaeolithic

2015 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 829-846 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas P. Leppard
Keyword(s):  
Late Pleistocene ◽  
Cognitive Architecture ◽  
Central Question ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Cognitive Capacities ◽  
Dispersal Model ◽  
The Social ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans ◽  
Bodies Of Water

Oceans and seas are more frequently thought to have been barriers to than enablers of movement for archaic hominins. This interpretation has been challenged by a revisionist model which suggests that bodies of water facilitated the dispersal of pre-moderns. This paper addresses the revisionist model by defining maritime dispersal as a series of cognitive and organizational problems, the capacity to solve which must have arisen during the evolution of Homo. The central question posed is: knowing the type of social and cognitive configuration necessary for strategic maritime dispersal, and knowing the social and cognitive capacities of hominin species implied in the revisionist dispersal model, how likely is it that such species possessed the capacity to undertake purposive maritime colonization? Available data suggest that the evolution of modern cognitive architecture during the Late Pleistocene correlates positively with increasing evidence for maritime dispersal in the Upper Palaeolithic, and that behavioural modernity is implicated in the appearance of strategic maritime dispersal in Homo. Consequently, it is likely that deliberate trans-oceanic seagoing is restricted to Anatomically Modern Humans, and possibly Neanderthals.

Art, sign, and representation

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elisabeth V. Culley ◽  
Iain Davidson
Keyword(s):  
Human Evolution ◽  
Homo Erectus ◽  
Upper Paleolithic ◽  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Cognitive Capacities ◽  
Space And Time ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans

This chapter addresses questions about the emergence of art, sign, and representation, showing what these categories mean as applied to the archaeological record and how evidence of them may relate to the evolution of human cognitive capacities. It goes beyond the Eurasian Upper Paleolithic to consider marked or decorated objects from significantly older sites associated with Anatomically Modern Humans in Africa and Indonesia, Neanderthals in Europe, and Homo erectus in Trinil, Java. The materials evidence a range of graphic production across significant space and time. They indicate the emergence of graphic expression and its role in human evolution is much more complex than traditional Eurocentric model, as well as more recent models, allow. The review points to problems with the current epistemology of symbolic evolution and emphasizes how the use of “art” and other traditional artifact classes bias interpretations of prehistoric behaviors and models of when and why symbolling emerged.

The Archaeology of Archaic and Early ModernHomo Sapiens: An African Perspective

1993 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-39 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Allsworth-Jones
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
Middle Stone Age ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans ◽  
African Perspective ◽  
Out Of Africa

Whereas in Europe the transition from Middle to Upper Palaeolithic and the replacement of Neanderthal by anatomically modern humans appear to be synchronous events, in Africa this is not the case. Neanderthals as such were not present in Africa, and if the ‘Out of Africa’ model is correct, the ancestors of anatomically modern humans must have made their appearance in a Middle Stone Age context before 100,000 years ago. Subsequently, it seems that they coexisted with Neanderthals for up to 70,000 years in the Near East. If a direct biological correlation can be ruled out, the question arises: what was the impetus for an Upper Palaeolithic ‘revolution’ and why should it have taken place at all?

scholarly journals The First Anatomically Modern Humans from South-Eastern Europe. Contributions from the Buran-Kaya III Site (Crimea)

2018 ◽  
Vol 30 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 169-179
Author(s):  
S. Prat ◽  
S. Péan ◽  
L. Crépin ◽  
S. Puaud ◽  
D.G. Drucker ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Human Remains ◽  
Post Mortem ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
South Eastern ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans ◽  
South Eastern Europe ◽  
Potential Interactions

The arrival of modern humans into Europe, their dispersal and their potential interactions with Neanderthals are still in debate. Whereas the first appearance of anatomically modern humans in Western Europe seems to be well understood, the situation is quite different for Eastern Europe, where data are more scarce. The Buran-Kaya III site in Crimea is of key importance to understand the colonization of Europe by anatomically modern humans and their potential contemporaneity with the last Neanderthal occupations. The new radiocarbon dated sequence shows that no Neanderthal settlement existed after 39 ka cal BP and casts doubt on the survival, as previously proposed, of Neanderthal refuge zones in Crimea 28 ka BP ago (34-32 ka cal BP). The human remains from Buran-Kaya III, directly dated to 32450 +250/-230 BP (layer 6-2) and 31900+/-220 BP (layer 6-1) (37.1-35.7 ka cal BP and 36.3-35.2 cal BP respectively), represent some of the oldest evidence of anatomically modern humans in Europe in a unique welldocumented archaeological context (Gravettian). Furthermore, the specimens from layer 6-1 represent the oldest Upper Palaeolithic modern humans from Eastern Europe with evidence of post-mortem treatment of the dead.

scholarly journals A chrono-cultural reassessment of levels III-V from El Cuco rock-shelter: a new sequence for the late Middle Palaeolithic – early Upper Palaeolithic boundary in the Cantabrian region (northern Iberia)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pedro RASINES DEL RÍO ◽  
Julià MAROTO ◽  
Emilio MUÑOZ-FERNÁNDEZ ◽  
José Manuel MORLOTE-EXPÓSITO ◽  
undefined Pedro María CASTAÑOS-UGARTE ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Iberian Peninsula ◽  
Middle Palaeolithic ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Large Mammals ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Rock Shelter ◽  
Cantabrian Region ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans ◽  
Early Upper

The Iberian Peninsula is one of the key areas for studying the last populations of Neanderthals and the arrival in Europe of the first anatomically modern humans. In the Cantabrian region, this process can be traced in just a few sites with levels dating to the final stages of the Middle Palaeolithic and the earliest phases of the Upper Palaeolithic. One of these singular enclaves is El Cuco rock-shelter, where the sequence was initially dated by 14C only to the early Upper Palaeolithic sensu lato. However, new studies and datings now place this archaeological sequence in the late Mousterian and the Aurignacian. In this article we present a chrono-cultural reassessment of the upper levels of El Cuco (III-V), including a study of the large mammals. Levels Vc and Vb (>43.5-40.5 ky uncal BP) date from the late Mousterian, whereas levels Va, IV and III (c. 36.5-30 ky uncal BP) cover an interval extending at least from the Early Aurignacian to the Evolved Aurignacian. Particularly noteworthy is the discovery in level Va of a set of decorative beads made from marine shells in a context of possible symbolic behaviour.

scholarly journals Timing of the Middle-to-Upper Palaeolithic transition in the Iberian inland (Cardina-Salto do Boi, Côa Valley, Portugal)

2020 ◽  
Vol 98 ◽  
pp. 81-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thierry Aubry ◽  
Luca Antonio Dimuccio ◽  
António Fernando Barbosa ◽  
Luís Luís ◽  
André Tomás Santos ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Iberian Peninsula ◽  
Optically Stimulated Luminescence ◽  
Osl Dating ◽  
Stone Tool ◽  
Middle Palaeolithic ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Alluvial Deposits ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans

AbstractThe timing of the Neanderthal-associated Middle Palaeolithic demise and a possible overlap with anatomically modern humans (AMH) in some regions of Eurasia continues to be debated. The Iberian Peninsula is considered a possible refuge zone for the last Neanderthals, but the chronology of the later Middle Palaeolithic record has undergone revision and has increased the debate on the timing of Neanderthal extinction. Here we report on a study of the 5-m-thick archaeological stratigraphy of the Cardina-Salto do Boi, an open-air site located in inland Iberia, from which optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) ages were obtained for Middle and Upper Palaeolithic occupations preserved in overbank alluvial deposits. Geomorphology, archaeostratigraphy, stone-tool evolution, and OSL dating support the persistence of Neanderthals after 41 ka in central Iberia; the transition between the Middle Palaeolithic material culture and the AMH-associated Aurignacian blade and bladelet production is estimated to lie between 34.0 ± 2.0 ka and 38.4 ± 1.9 ka. Our results demonstrate that investigations focusing on different geomorphological situations are necessary to overcome the current limitations of the evidence and to establish more consistent models for Neanderthal disappearance and AMH expansion in the Iberian Peninsula.

African and Asian perspectives on the origins of modern humans

1992 ◽  
Vol 337 (1280) ◽  
pp. 201-215 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Differences ◽  
Far East ◽  
Human Populations ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Fossil Hominids ◽  
The Far East ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans ◽  
The One ◽  
Noah's Ark

The ways in which the cultural evidence - in its chronological context - can be used to imply behavioural patterning and to identify possible causes of change are discussed. Improved reliability in dating methods, suites of dates from different regional localities, and new, firmly dated fossil hominids from crucial regions such as northeast Africa, the Levant, India and China, are essential for clarification of the origin and spread of the modern genepool. Hominid ancestry in Africa is reviewed, as well as the claims for an independent origin in Asia. The cultural differences and changes within Africa, West and South Asia and the Far East in the later Middle and early Upper Pleistocene are examined and compared, and some behavioural implications are suggested, taking account of the evolutionary frameworks suggested by the ‘multiregional evolution’ and ‘Noah’s Ark’ hypotheses of human evolution. A possible explanation is proposed for the cultural differences between Africa, West Asia and India on the one hand, and southeast Asia and the Far East on the other. The apparent hiatus between the appearance of the first anatomically modern humans, ca . 100 ka ago, and the appearance of the Upper Palaeolithic and other contemporaneous technological and behavioural changes around 40 ka ago, is discussed. It is suggested that the anatomical changes occurred first, and that neurological changes permitted the development of fully syntactic language some 50 ka later. The intellectual and behavioural revolution, best demonstrated by the ‘Upper Palaeolithic’ of Eurasia, seems to have been dependent on this linguistic development - within the modern genepool - and triggered the rapid migration of human populations throughout the Old World.

Initial Upper Palaeolithic in south-central Turkey and its regional context: a preliminary report

Antiquity ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 73 (281) ◽  
pp. 505-517 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven L. Kuhn ◽  
Mary C. Stiner ◽  
Erksin Güleç
Keyword(s):  
Preliminary Report ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
Faunal Remains ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Regional Context ◽  
South Central ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans ◽  
Central Turkey ◽  
Radiometric Dates

The earliest Upper Palaeolithic industries of the Levant, which figure prominently in discussions of the spread of anatomically modern humans and the origins of the Upper Palaeolithic, are known from a small number of localities. Two sites in the Hatay region of Turkey have yielded initial Upper Palaeolithic assemblages similar to those found in the Levant. One of the sites, Üçaǧizlı’ cave, has also provided radiometric dates and faunal remains, both relatively rare for sites of this period.

scholarly journals Neandertalczyk i człowiek anatomicznie współczesny w ujęciu najnowszych źródeł archeologicznych i paleoantropologicznych

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
pp. 49-60
Author(s):  
Olga Dec
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Dna ◽  
Cognitive Neuroscience ◽  
Modern Humans ◽  
Cognitive Capacities ◽  
Anatomically Modern Humans

The article summarises recent discoveries regarding Neandertals and anatomically modern humans (AMH), and tries to examine currently leading trends in the fields of archaeology and palaeoanthropology. Collected evidence suggests that modern research focuses mostly on discussions on the origin of symbolism, cultural and cognitive capacities, and analyses of ancient DNA. Although archaeology and palaeoanthropology undoubtedly provide the highest number of sources, other sciences such as cognitive neuroscience also deliver new, equally valuable perspectives and information.

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