Article, 2024
East-to-west human dispersal into Europe 1.4 million years ago
Nature,
ISSN
0028-0836,
1476-4687,
Volume 627,
8005,
Pages 805-810,
10.1038/s41586-024-07151-3
Contributors
Garba, Roman
0000-0001-8112-9428
(Corresponding author)
[1]
[2]
Usyk, Vitaly I
[1]
[3]
Ylä-Mella, Lotta
[1]
[4]
Kameník, Jan
0000-0001-7740-7683
[2]
Stübner, Konstanze
0000-0001-7473-9033
[5]
Lachner, Johannes Raimund
0000-0002-2655-5800
[5]
Rugel, Georg
0000-0002-0176-8842
[5]
Veselovský, František
[6]
Gerasimenko, Natalia P
0000-0001-9278-5770
[7]
Herries, Andy I R
0000-0002-2905-2002
[8]
[9]
Kučera, Jan
0000-0002-0251-3227
[2]
Knudsen, Mads Faurschou
0000-0001-5039-1773
(Corresponding author)
[10]
Jansen, John Duncan
0000-0002-0669-5101
(Corresponding author)
[1]
Affiliations
- [1]
Czech Academy of Sciences
[NORA names:
Czechia; Europe, EU; OECD];
- [2]
Nuclear Physics Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences
[NORA names:
Czechia; Europe, EU; OECD];
- [3]
Institute of Archeology
[NORA names:
Ukraine; Europe, Non-EU];
- [4]
Charles University
[NORA names:
Czechia; Europe, EU; OECD];
- [5]
Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf
[NORA names:
Germany; Europe, EU; OECD];
(... more)
- [6]
Czech Geological Survey
[NORA names:
Czechia; Europe, EU; OECD];
- [7]
Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv
[NORA names:
Ukraine; Europe, Non-EU];
- [8]
La Trobe University
[NORA names:
Australia; Oceania; OECD];
- [9]
University of Johannesburg
[NORA names:
South Africa; Africa];
- [10]
Aarhus University
[NORA names:
AU Aarhus University;
University; Denmark; Europe, EU; Nordic; OECD]
(less)
Abstract
Stone tools stratified in alluvium and loess at Korolevo, western Ukraine, have been studied by several research groups1–3 since the discovery of the site in the 1970s. Although Korolevo’s importance to the European Palaeolithic is widely acknowledged, age constraints on the lowermost lithic artefacts have yet to be determined conclusively. Here, using two methods of burial dating with cosmogenic nuclides4,5, we report ages of 1.42 ± 0.10 million years and 1.42 ± 0.28 million years for the sedimentary unit that contains Mode-1-type lithic artefacts. Korolevo represents, to our knowledge, the earliest securely dated hominin presence in Europe, and bridges the spatial and temporal gap between the Caucasus (around 1.85–1.78 million years ago)6 and southwestern Europe (around 1.2–1.1 million years ago)7,8. Our findings advance the hypothesis that Europe was colonized from the east, and our analysis of habitat suitability9 suggests that early hominins exploited warm interglacial periods to disperse into higher latitudes and relatively continental sites—such as Korolevo—well before the Middle Pleistocene Transition.
Keywords
Caucasus,
East,
Europe,
European,
European Palaeolithic,
Middle Pleistocene Transition,
Palaeolithic,
Pleistocene transition,
Ukraine,
Western Ukraine,
age,
age constraints,
alluvium,
analysis,
artifacts,
bridge,
burial,
constraints,
discovery,
dispersion,
early hominins,
findings,
gap,
higher latitudes,
hominin presence,
hominins,
human dispersal,
hypothesis,
importance,
interglacial periods,
knowledge,
latitudes,
lithic artifacts,
loess,
lowermost,
method,
method of burial,
middle,
period,
presence,
research,
sedimentary units,
sites,
southwestern Europe,
stone,
stone tools,
temporal gap,
tools,
transition,
units,
years
Funders
Data Provider: Digital Science