From Atapuerca to Europe: Tracing the earliest peopling of Europe

Abstract

The Sierra de Atapuerca sites (Spain) have yielded excellent data and they represent the longest chronological sequence discovered in Europe to date, covering the late Early Pleistocene to the late Middle Pleistocene. In view of these exceptional characteristics, this work aims to meet three objectives: to characterise the technological features of various key European sites in relation to the significant factors observed through the Atapuerca sequence; to evaluate whether technological evolution in Europe during the Early and the Middle Pleistocene is consistent with that of Atapuerca; and finally, to consider the possibility of extrapolating population inferences from Atapuerca to the rest of the continent.The conclusions suggest that the earliest peopling of western Europe occurred not long before 1 Ma and was accompanied by a relatively homogeneous Mode 1 technology. Between 800 and 600 ka, the European framework is limited to a few assemblages, most of them derived from European Mode 1, and even probably belonging to the earliest European Acheulean. Interestingly, at Atapuerca there is a gap between c. 900 ka and c. 500 ka with no hominin presence; in other words, approximately 400,000 years passed between the late Mode 1 of Homo antecessor and the first Mode 2 represented there with Homo heidelbergensis. Significantly, this hominin gap has been observed in three consecutive levels of the Gran Dolina site (about 4 m thickness), all of them extremely rich in faunal remains.This paper poses the hypothesis that this gap at Atapuerca represents a non-local, continental phenomenon, leading to consideration of several different points. Firstly, H. antecessor and its possible ascendants, who had formerly peopled Europe, might have been in the process of extinction around 800 ka. Secondly, before 650 ka new but light waves of hominins may have arrived in Europe carrying the new Acheulean technology. These waves did not reach most of the continent, and surely they were not successful in demographic terms until (thirdly) the arrival of the full Acheulean groups at 500 ka. Between 500 ka and 300 ka this full Acheulean appeared at several European sites, and H. heidelbergensis, whatever its origin, is strongly associated with this technology on this subcontinent. Fourthly, if the Mode 1 populations eventually disappeared before 650 ka then the later Clactonian/Tayacian sites of northern Europe cannot be derived from this legacy, but must come from the Acheulean line, and are therefore a variant. Finally, the data suggest that the Acheulean may have technically developed into the European Middle Palaeolithic, as H. heidelbergensis evolved into Neanderthals.