RT info:eu-repo/semantics/article
T1 Discontinuity of Human Presence at Atapuerca during the Early Middle Pleistocene: A Matter of Ecological Competition?
A1 Rodríguez Gómez, Guillermo
A1 Mateos, Ana
A1 Martín González, Jesús Ángel
A1 Blasco, Ruth
A1 Rosell, Jordi
A1 Rodríguez, Jesús
K1 Arqueología-Burgos
K1 Archaeology-Burgos
K1 Prehistoria-Burgos
K1 Prehistoric peoples
K1 Paleontología
K1 Paleontology
AB Increasing evidence suggests that the European human settlement is older than 1.2 Ma. However, there is a fierce debate about the continuity or discontinuity of the early human settlement of Europe. In particular, evidence of human presence in the interval 0.7−0.5 Ma is scarce in comparison with evidence for the previous and later periods. Here, we present a case study in which the environmental conditions at Sierra de Atapuerca in the early Middle Pleistocene, a period without evidence of human presence, are compared with the conditions in the previous period, for which a relatively intense human occupation is documented. With this objective in mind, the available resources for a human population and the intensity of competition between secondary consumers during the two periods are compared using a mathematical model. The Gran Dolina site TD8 level, dated to 0.7−0.6 Ma, is taken as representative of the period during which Atapuerca was apparently not occupied by humans. Conditions at TD8 are compared with those of the previous period, represented by the TD6-2 level, which has yielded abundant evidence of intense human occupation. The results show that survival opportunities for a hypothetical human population were lower at TD8 than they were at TD6-2. Increased resource competition between secondary consumers arises as a possible explanation for the absence of human occupation at Atapuerca in the early Middle Pleistocene.
PB Public Library of Science
YR 2014
FD 2014-07
LK http://hdl.handle.net/10259/10447
UL http://hdl.handle.net/10259/10447
LA eng
NO This research was funded by the MINECO project, CGL2012-38434-C03-02, CGL2012-38434-C03-03, CGL2012-38358 and CGL-BOS-2012-34717. G. Rodrı´guez-Go´mez is the beneficiary of a predoctoral FPI Grant from the Spanish MICINN. The fieldwork at the Atapuerca sites was funded by the Junta de Castilla y Leo´n. R. Blasco is a Beatriu de Pino´s postdoctoral scholarship recipient from Generalitat de Catalunya and was co-financed by the European Union through Marie Curie Actions, FP7.
DS Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Burgos
RD 10-may-2025