Volcanic ash layers illuminate the resilience of Neanderthals and early modern humans to natural hazards
- Resource Type
- Authors
- Lowe, John; Barton, N.; Blockley, Simon; Ramsey, C. Bronk; Cullen, Victoria L.; Davies, S. W. G.; Gamble, Clive; Grant, Katharine; Hardiman, Mark; Housley, Rupert; Lane, Christine S.; Lee, Sharen; Lewis, Mark; MacLeod, Alison; Menzies, Martin; Muller, Wolfgang; Pollard, Mark; Price, Catherine; Roberts, Andrew P.; Rohling, Eelco J.; Satow, Christopher; Smith, V.C.; Stringer, C. B.; Tomlinson, Emma; White, Dustin; Albert, Paul; Arienzo, Ilenia; Barker, G.; Carandente, Antonio; Civetta, Lucia; Farrand, William; Ferrier, Catherine; Gaudelli, Jean-Luc; Karkanas, Panagiotis; Koumouzelis, Margarita; Muller, Ulrich C.; Orsi, Giovanni; Pross, Jorg; Rosi, Mauro; Shalamanov-Korobar, Ljiljiana; Sirakov, Nikolay; Tzedakis, Polychronis C.; Boric, Dusan
- Source
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 109 (34)
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, National Academy of Sciences, 2012, 109 (34), pp.13532-13537. ⟨10.1073/pnas.1204579109⟩
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- Subject
- Neanderthal
Human dispersal
Climate
010502 geochemistry & geophysics
01 natural sciences
Mass Spectrometry
Research Groups and Centres\Earth Sciences\Geochemistry
Campanian Ignimbrite
Earliest anatomically modern human
VOLCANIC ASH
Tephra
Neanderthals
MODERN HUMANS
education.field_of_study
Multidisciplinary
biology
Fossils
Hominidae
Biological Sciences
ABRUPT CLIMATE-CHANGE
Archaeology
campi Flegrei
Geology
010506 paleontology
Cryptotephra deposits
[SHS.ARCHEO]Humanities and Social Sciences/Archaeology and Prehistory
Faculty of Science\Geography
[SDE.MCG]Environmental Sciences/Global Changes
Population
Research Groups and Centres\Earth Sciences\Ancient and Modern Earth Systems
Volcanic Eruptions
Paleontology
volcanology
Natural hazard
biology.animal
Commentaries
Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition
[SDU.STU.VO]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Volcanology
Faculty of Science\Earth Sciences
Animals
Humans
education
0105 earth and related environmental sciences
Vulcanian eruption
Volcanic eruption
15. Life on land
biology.organism_classification
Research Groups and Centres\Geography\Centre for Quaternary Research
archeology
13. Climate action
Anatomically modern human
Upper Paleolithic
Microscopy, Electron, Scanning
Paleolithic Transitions
Volcanic ash
- Language
- ISSN
- 0027-8424
1091-6490
Marked changes in human dispersal and development during the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition have been attributed to massive volcanic eruption and/or severe climatic deterioration. We test this concept using records of volcanic ash layers of the Campanian Ignimbrite eruption dated to ca. 40,000 y ago (40 ka B.P.). The distribution of the Campanian Ignimbrite has been enhanced by the discovery of cryptotephra deposits (volcanic ash layers that are not visible to the naked eye) in archaeological cave sequences. They enable us to synchronize archaeological and paleoclimatic records through the period of transition from Neanderthal to the earliest anatomically modern human populations in Europe. Our results confirm that the combined effects of a major volcanic eruption and severe climatic cooling failed to have lasting impacts on Neanderthals or early modern humans in Europe. We infer that modern humans proved a greater competitive threat to indigenous populations than natural disasters.