How Human
The earliest human face of Western Europe
Rosa Huguet et al.
Nature, forthcoming
Abstract:
Who the first inhabitants of Western Europe were, what their physical characteristics were, and when and where they lived are some of the pending questions in the study of the settlement of Eurasia during the Early Pleistocene epoch. The available palaeoanthropological information from Western Europe is limited and confined to the Iberian Peninsula. Here we present most of the midface of a hominin found at the TE7 level of the Sima del Elefante site (Sierra de Atapuerca, Spain), dated to between 1.4 million and 1.1 million years ago. This fossil (ATE7-1) represents the earliest human face of Western Europe identified thus far. Most of the morphological features of the midface of this hominin are primitive for the Homo clade and they do not display the modern-like aspect exhibited by Homo antecessor found at the neighbouring Gran Dolina site, also in the Sierra de Atapuerca, and dated to between 900,000 and 800,000 years ago. Furthermore, ATE7-1 is more derived in the nasoalveolar region than the Dmanisi and other roughly contemporaneous hominins. On the basis of the available evidence, it is reasonable to assign the new human remains from TE7 level to Homo aff. erectus. From the archaeological, palaeontological and palaeoanthropological information obtained in the lower levels of the Sima del Elefante and Gran Dolina sites, we suggest a turnover in the human population in Europe at the end of the Early Pleistocene.
The Economics of Ancient Mediterranean Slavery
Rafael Guthmann & Walter Scheidel
Stanford Working Paper, November 2024
Abstract:
This paper investigates the economic aspects of slavery in the Ancient Greco-Roman world. Existing evidence reveals significant variation in the relative cost of slaves compared to unskilled wages: it appears that at different times and places, a typical slave could be purchased for prices equivalent to wages paid from 150 to 1000 days of unskilled labor. To explain this great disparity, we develop a principal-agent model that predicts the return on slaves relative to wages, which varies as a function of the prevalence of slavery in the labor force. This model implies that slavery may have increased aggregate labor productivity by reallocating workers from less productive to more productive regions within the Greco-Roman world.
Genetic architecture in Greenland is shaped by demography, structure and selection
Frederik Filip Stæger et al.
Nature, 13 March 2025, Pages 404-410
Abstract:
Greenlandic Inuit and other indigenous populations are underrepresented in genetic research, leading to inequity in healthcare opportunities. To address this, we performed analyses of sequenced or imputed genomes of 5,996 Greenlanders with extensive phenotypes. We quantified their historical population bottleneck and how it has shaped their genetic architecture to have fewer, but more common, variable sites. Consequently, we find twice as many high-impact genome-wide associations to metabolic traits in Greenland compared with Europe. We infer that the high-impact variants arose after the population split from Native Americans and thus are Arctic-specific, and show that some of them are common due to not only genetic drift but also selection. We also find that European-derived polygenic scores for metabolic traits are only half as accurate in Greenlanders as in Europeans, and that adding Arctic-specific variants improves the overall accuracy to the same level as in Europeans. Similarly, lack of representation in public genetic databases makes genetic clinical screening harder in Greenlandic Inuit, but inclusion of Greenlandic data remedies this by reducing the number of non-causal candidate variants by sixfold. Finally, we identify pronounced genetic fine structure that explains differences in prevalence of monogenic diseases in Greenland and, together with recent changes in mobility, leads to a predicted future reduction in risk for certain recessive diseases. These results illustrate how including data from Greenlanders can greatly reduce inequity in genomic-based healthcare.
Neanderthals’ recolonizations of marginal areas: An overview from Eastern Germany
Andrea Picin
Quaternary Science Advances, January 2025
Abstract:
The Middle Paleolithic in Eastern Germany presents a unique context for understanding Neanderthal populations' dynamics within environmental shifts. The cyclical ice-sheet growth and advancements during the late Middle and Late Pleistocene caused occupational gaps in North-western and Central Europe and recurring episodes of recolonization from the southern regions. From cold tundra and steppe landscapes to forested habitats during climatic amelioration, these environmental changes significantly influenced Neanderthal settlement patterns and adaptive strategies. In this study, the lithic assemblages from some Middle Paleolithic sites stretched between Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt are analyzed. Despite migrations occurring over millennia, our study reveals that the unidirectional reduction scheme was continuously applied to different knapping methods remaining a common technological substrate during the whole Middle Paleolithic. The introduction of asymmetric bifacial tools during MIS 5c/MIS 5a did not alter predominant flake production methods. Contrariwise to support a techno-cultural stasis lasted several millennia, this study reveals that this technical continuity could be related to the changes in raw material size occurred during the Middle Pleistocene. Large erratic flint nodules during the Elsterian glaciation promoted loss-making behaviors, while the transport of smaller nodules during the Drenthe glaciation encouraged more intensive exploitation of pebbles during the Late Middle Paleolithic. By shedding light on Neanderthal lifeways, technological adaptations, and settlement patterns in Eastern Germany, this research contributes to a nuanced understanding of their behavior amidst evolving environmental conditions.
Human Response to Cold Climate: First Evidence from the Tibetan Plateau during the Last Glacial Maximum
Wenli Li et al.
Quaternary Science Advances, January 2025
Abstract:
The Tibetan Plateau (TP) is a hotspot for early human history research, however, there is no evidence of prehistoric human activity on the southern TP during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Thus, it remains unclear how the cold climate affected human activities and whether humans could survive such extremes on the Tibetan Plateau. Here, we present eight AMS 14C dates obtained from charcoal at a newly discovered blade site-Pengbuwuqing (PBWQ) in the Yarlung Zangbo River Valley basin, southern TP. We have also identified ochre at Paleolithic sites on the TP for the first time. Our chronological data indicate the human occupation of the Yarlung Tsangpo River basin during MIS2 (cal 29.2–27.0 kyr B.P), (cal 25.03–24.37 kyr B.P), and (cal 23.7–23.1 kyr B.P). This site represents the first evidence of human activity during the LGM in the southern TP valley and indicates that the southern TP river valley could have served as a refugium enabling prehistoric humans to survive the cold LGM on the TP.
The ichnology of White Sands (New Mexico): Linear traces and human footprints, evidence of transport technology?
Matthew Bennett et al.
Quaternary Science Advances, January 2025
Abstract:
A travois is crafted from one or more wooden poles and is one of the simplest prehistoric vehicles. Although these devices likely played vital roles in the lives of ancient peoples, they have low preservation potential in the archaeological record. Here we report linear features associated with human footprints, some of which are dated to ∼22,000 years old, preserved in fine-grained sediments at White Sands National Park (New Mexico, USA). Using a range of examples, we identify three morphological types of trace in late Pleistocene sediments. Type I features occur as single, or bifurcating, narrow (depth > width) grooves which extend in planform from 2 to 50 m in length and trace either straight, gently curved or more irregular lines. They are associated with human footprints, which are truncated longitudinally by the groove and are not associated with other animal tracks. Type II examples are broader (width > depth) and form shallow runnels that typically have straight planforms and may truncate human footprints to one side. Type III examples consist of two parallel, equidistant grooves between 250 and 350 mm apart. They trace gently curving lines that can extend for 30+ m. Human footprints are associated with these features and may occur between, and to the side of, the parallel grooves. We review a range of possible interpretations including both human and non-human explanations and conclude that the most parsimonious explanation is that they represent drag marks formed by travois consisting of a single pole or crossed poles pulled by humans, presumably during the transport of resources. As such this unique footprint record may represent one of the earliest pieces of evidence for the use of transport technology.