Kurzfassung

Understanding how hunter-gatherer societies populated the landscapes of Europe during the Last Glacial is a crucial question of Palaeolithic Archaeology and Humane evolution. This general topic includes the investigation of different aspects of hunter-gatherer lifestyles, such as population dynamics, settlement and land-use patterns, mobility and techno-economic strategies, and human-environment interactions. MULTIPALEOIBERIA investigates these aspects during the Late Pleistocene (127,000 –...Understanding how hunter-gatherer societies populated the landscapes of Europe during the Last Glacial is a crucial question of Palaeolithic Archaeology and Humane evolution. This general topic includes the investigation of different aspects of hunter-gatherer lifestyles, such as population dynamics, settlement and land-use patterns, mobility and techno-economic strategies, and human-environment interactions. MULTIPALEOIBERIA investigates these aspects during the Late Pleistocene (127,000 – 11,700 years ago) in an under-investigated area of southwest Europe. In the Iberian Peninsula, a key area for these topics due to its geographic position and ecological variability, classic interpretations on key problems in the field, including the Neandertal demise and the first settlement of the area by anatomically modern humans, have been historically biased by the poor quality of available evidence for its interior lands. Consequently, the Iberian hinterland has traditionally been depicted as a marginal and few populated region due to its harsh ecological conditions compared to the coastal areas, especially during the coldest stages of the last glaciation. Based on preliminary data suggesting that this picture could be wrong, the main hypothesis of MULTIPALEOIBERIA was the following: both the late Neandertal and early modern human settlement of interior Iberia were more stable and complex than previously thought, despite potentially harsh environmental and climatic conditions.Thus, the project’s main aim was reconstructing population dynamics and human-environment-climate interactions of the last Neandertals and first modern humans in inland Iberia based on unprecedented evidence gathered by means of a macro-regional, interdisciplinary and collaborative investigation. The potential results were expected to significantly change our views on key biocultural and ecological processes of European prehistory, and the way human societies have dealt with challenging environments.» weiterlesen» einklappen