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The time between Palaeolithic hearths.

Ángela Herrejón-Lagunilla1,2, Juan José Villalaín3, Francisco Javier Pavón-Carrasco4,5

  • 1Departamento de Física, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad de Burgos, Burgos, Spain. aherrejon@ubu.es.

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Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Researchers precisely dated Middle Palaeolithic hearths, revealing human occupation events occurred over 200-240 years. This high-resolution timescale offers new insights into early human behavior and social dynamics.

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Area of Science:

  • Archaeology
  • Geochronology
  • Paleoanthropology

Background:

  • Reconstructing Palaeolithic timescales is challenging due to dating limitations, sedimentary disturbances, and palimpsest effects.
  • Understanding hunter-gatherer camp duration and frequency is crucial for social and environmental interaction studies.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To provide a high-resolution timescale for Middle Palaeolithic human activity.
  • To quantitatively estimate the temporal framework of human occupation events.

Main Methods:

  • Utilized archaeomagnetic and archaeostratigraphic analyses to determine time differences between hearths.
  • Applied statistical methods to establish a probability range for the occupation period.

Main Results:

  • Six Middle Palaeolithic hearths from El Salt Unit X (Spain) were analyzed.
  • The hearths indicate a minimum occupation span of 200-240 years with 99% probability.
  • Decade- and century-long intervals were identified between hearth occupations.

Conclusions:

  • Achieved a quantitative temporal estimate for Palaeolithic human occupation events, approaching a human lifespan scale.
  • This high-resolution dating advances Palaeolithic archaeology, enabling the study of human behavior across generational timescales.
  • The findings bridge the gap between geological timescales and the generational changes relevant to human societies.