Climatic Changes, Paleogeography, and the Evolution of the Neandertals

Bibliographic Data

ID20041445
AuthorsJean-Jacques Hublin (0000-0001-6283-8114, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, corresponding author)
Year2005
Pages295-310
Publication date2005-12-16
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeCHAPTER
VenueNeandertals and modern humans in Western Asia (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherKluwer Academic Publishers (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1007/0-306-47153-1_18
OpenAlexW1908939616
ISBN9780306459245
LanguageEN
Citations received106
References cited42

Mainly because of historical reasons, Europe has provided the largest series of Middle and Upper Pleistocene hominids. Many of the sites which yielded these specimens can be placed in a reliable environmental and chronological framework, and they allow us to produce detailed evolutionary scenarios covering the entire last half a million years. However, although this area was once used as a model for the entire Old World, it is actually marginal when considering the development of hominids using broader chronological and geographical scales. The evolutionary processes of the European population are indeed peculiar. At the center of this peculiarity are the Neandertals, a group of archaic humans that remains unknown outside of Western Eurasia (i.e., Europe and its oriental fringes). The rise, development, and extinction of Neanderthals can be traced in relation to the environmental and cultural changes in Europe. It is easy to recognize the unique nature of the area that produced this original group. Europe is a long and rather narrow peninsula in the middle latitudes that became isolated by the development of seas and mountain chains. Located at the western extremity of Eurasia, it is far from the intertropical zone where most of the evolutionary processes of the early hominids took place. Another aspect of this European particularism is the dramatic climate changes that it experienced for most of the last million years. These changes caused tremendous contraction of the non-arctic bio-climatic zones and led to the periodic development of periarctic conditions in moderately high latitudes. It is tempting to imagine a relationship between the peculiar paleobiogeographic history of Europe and the development of an odd lineage of hominids. In this perspective, the following questions arise: What series of phenomena could determine this link? When did the divergence of the European hominids from their Asian and African relatives begin? How fast was it? How far did it go biologically? What is the geographical extension of the process

Geography · Palaeogeography · Physical geography · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Geology · Geology and Paleoclimatology Research · Paleontology · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology

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