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Landscape modification by Last Interglacial Neanderthals
Wil Roebroeks1, Katharine MacDonald1, Fulco Scherjon1
1Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University, P.O. Box 9514, 2300 RA Leiden, Netherlands.
Science Advances
|December 15, 2021
Summary
Pleistocene hunter-gatherers, including early humans (hominins), significantly impacted ancient ecosystems. Evidence from Neumark-Nord, Germany, shows hominin activities like fire use altered vegetation around 125,000 years ago.
Area of Science:
- Paleoecology
- Archaeology
- Human Evolution
Background:
- Understanding Pleistocene hunter-gatherer ecological impact is crucial for conservation and human evolution studies.
- Such impacts are often limited and difficult to detect due to low hominin population densities.
- Interpreting cause-effect dynamics in paleoecological data presents significant challenges.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the antiquity, nature, and scale of hominin ecological footprint during the Pleistocene.
- To reconstruct paleoenvironmental changes and identify hominin influence on vegetation at Neumark-Nord, Germany.
- To compare findings with regional archaeological and baseline data to confirm hominin impact.
Main Methods:
- High-resolution paleoenvironmental data collection.
- Archaeological evidence analysis from the Last Interglacial locality of Neumark-Nord.
- Comparative analysis with regional archaeological and baseline sites.
Main Results:
- Distinct ecological footprint of hominin activities identified, including evidence of fire use.
- Open vegetation at Neumark-Nord correlated with a continuous ~2000-year hominin presence.
- Comparative data strongly suggest hominins were a contributing factor to vegetation transformation.
Conclusions:
- Neumark-Nord provides an early example of hominin-driven vegetation transformation dating back approximately 125,000 years.
- Hominin activities played a role in shaping Pleistocene lake landscape vegetation structure and succession.
- This study highlights the long-term ecological significance of early human behavior.
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