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Mata-González M, Starkovich BM, Zeidi M, Conard NJ. Evidence of diverse animal exploitation during the Middle Paleolithic at Ghar-e Boof (southern Zagros). Sci Rep 2023; 13:19006. [PMID: 37923753 PMCID: PMC10624823 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-45974-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/31/2023] [Accepted: 10/26/2023] [Indexed: 11/06/2023] Open
Abstract
Although Middle Paleolithic (MP) hominin diets consisted mainly of ungulates, increasing evidence demonstrates that hominins at least occasionally consumed tortoises, birds, leporids, fish, and carnivores. Until now, the MP zooarchaeological record in the Zagros Mountains has been almost exclusively restricted to ungulates. The narrow range of hominin prey may reflect socioeconomic decisions and/or environmental constraints, but could also result from a research bias favoring the study of large prey, since archaeologists have undertaken no systematic taphonomic analyses of small game or carnivores in the region. Here, we report on the first comprehensive taphonomic analysis of an MP faunal assemblage from Ghar-e Boof (∼ 81-45 kyr), a Late Pleistocene site in the southern Zagros of Iran. Anthropogenic bone surface modifications point to hominins as the main agent of accumulation. Hominins preyed primarily on ungulates, particularly wild goat. However, we also found evidence for MP hominin exploitation of carnivores and tortoises at the site. Although small game represents only a minor portion of the diet, our results suggest that the hunting behavior of MP hominins in the Zagros was more diverse than previously thought, similar to what we find elsewhere in Eurasia.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mario Mata-González
- Institute for Archaeological Sciences, University of Tübingen, Hölderlinstr. 12, 72074, Tübingen, Germany.
- Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut, Unit 1176, 354 Mansfield Road, Storrs, CT, 06269, USA.
| | - Britt M Starkovich
- Institute for Archaeological Sciences, University of Tübingen, Hölderlinstr. 12, 72074, Tübingen, Germany
- Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Paleoenvironment (SHEP), Hölderlinstr. 12, 72074, Tübingen, Germany
| | - Mohsen Zeidi
- Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Paleoenvironment (SHEP), Hölderlinstr. 12, 72074, Tübingen, Germany
- Department of Early Prehistory and Quaternary Ecology, University of Tübingen, Schloss Hohentübingen, 72070, Tübingen, Germany
| | - Nicholas J Conard
- Institute for Archaeological Sciences, University of Tübingen, Hölderlinstr. 12, 72074, Tübingen, Germany
- Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Paleoenvironment (SHEP), Hölderlinstr. 12, 72074, Tübingen, Germany
- Department of Early Prehistory and Quaternary Ecology, University of Tübingen, Schloss Hohentübingen, 72070, Tübingen, Germany
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2
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de Vries R, Boesveldt S, de Vet E. Locating calories: Does the high-calorie bias in human spatial memory influence how we navigate the modern food environment? Food Qual Prefer 2021. [DOI: 10.1016/j.foodqual.2021.104338] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/19/2022]
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3
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Tejero JM, Bar-Oz G, Bar-Yosef O, Meshveliani T, Jakeli N, Matskevich Z, Pinhasi R, Belfer-Cohen A. New insights into the Upper Palaeolithic of the Caucasus through the study of personal ornaments. Teeth and bones pendants from Satsurblia and Dzudzuana caves (Imereti, Georgia). PLoS One 2021; 16:e0258974. [PMID: 34748581 PMCID: PMC8575301 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0258974] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/06/2021] [Accepted: 10/09/2021] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
The region of western Georgia (Imereti) in the Southern Caucasus has been a major geographic corridor for human migrations during the Middle and Upper Paleolithic. Data of recent research and excavations in this region display its importance as a possible route for the dispersal of anatomically modern humans (AMH) into northern Eurasia. Nevertheless, within the local research context, bone-working and personal ornaments have yet contributed but little to the Upper Palaeolithic (UP) regional sequence's characterization. Here we present an archaeozoological, technological and use-wear study of pendants from two local UP assemblages, originating in the Dzudzuana Cave and Satsurblia Cave. The ornaments were made mostly of perforated teeth, though some specimens were made on bone. Both the manufacturing marks made during preparation and use-wear traces indicate that they were personal ornaments, used as pendants or attached to garments. Detailed comparison between ornament assemblages from northern and southern Caucasus reveal that they are quite similar, supporting the observation of cultural bonds between the two regions, demonstrated previously through lithic techno-typological affinities. Furthermore, our study highlights the importance attributed to red deer (Cervus elaphus) by the UP societies of the Caucasus in sharing aesthetic values and/or a symbolic sphere.
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Affiliation(s)
- José-Miguel Tejero
- Department of Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
- Seminari d’Estudis I Recerques Prehistòriques, Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Guy Bar-Oz
- Zinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel
| | - Ofer Bar-Yosef
- Department of Anthropology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, United States of America
| | | | | | | | - Ron Pinhasi
- Department of Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
| | - Anna Belfer-Cohen
- Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
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4
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Prey Size Decline as a Unifying Ecological Selecting Agent in Pleistocene Human Evolution. QUATERNARY 2021. [DOI: 10.3390/quat4010007] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/23/2023]
Abstract
We hypothesize that megafauna extinctions throughout the Pleistocene, that led to a progressive decline in large prey availability, were a primary selecting agent in key evolutionary and cultural changes in human prehistory. The Pleistocene human past is characterized by a series of transformations that include the evolution of new physiological traits and the adoption, assimilation, and replacement of cultural and behavioral patterns. Some changes, such as brain expansion, use of fire, developments in stone-tool technologies, or the scale of resource intensification, were uncharacteristically progressive. We previously hypothesized that humans specialized in acquiring large prey because of their higher foraging efficiency, high biomass density, higher fat content, and the use of less complex tools for their acquisition. Here, we argue that the need to mitigate the additional energetic cost of acquiring progressively smaller prey may have been an ecological selecting agent in fundamental adaptive modes demonstrated in the Paleolithic archaeological record. We describe several potential associations between prey size decline and specific evolutionary and cultural changes that might have been driven by the need to adapt to increased energetic demands while hunting and processing smaller and smaller game.
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5
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Short-term occupations at high elevation during the Middle Paleolithic at Kalavan 2 (Republic of Armenia). PLoS One 2021; 16:e0245700. [PMID: 33539405 PMCID: PMC7861461 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0245700] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/01/2020] [Accepted: 01/05/2021] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
The Armenian highlands encompasses rugged and environmentally diverse landscapes and is characterized by a mosaic of distinct ecological niches and large temperature gradients. Strong seasonal fluctuations in resource availability along topographic gradients likely prompted Pleistocene hominin groups to adapt by adjusting their mobility strategies. However, the role that elevated landscapes played in hunter-gatherer settlement systems during the Late Pleistocene (Middle Palaeolithic [MP]) remains poorly understood. At 1640 m above sea level, the MP site of Kalavan 2 (Armenia) is ideally positioned for testing hypotheses involving elevation-dependent seasonal mobility and subsistence strategies. Renewed excavations at Kalavan 2 exposed three main occupation horizons and ten additional low densities lithic and faunal assemblages. The results provide a new chronological, stratigraphical, and paleoenvironmental framework for hominin behaviors between ca. 60 to 45 ka. The evidence presented suggests that the stratified occupations at Kalavan 2 locale were repeated ephemerally most likely related to hunting in a high-elevation within the mountainous steppe landscape.
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6
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Cullen VL, Smith VC, Tushabramishvili N, Mallol C, Dee M, Wilkinson KN, Adler DS. A revised AMS and tephra chronology for the Late Middle to Early Upper Paleolithic occupations of Ortvale Klde, Republic of Georgia. J Hum Evol 2020; 151:102908. [PMID: 33370643 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2020.102908] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/13/2020] [Revised: 10/26/2020] [Accepted: 10/26/2020] [Indexed: 12/11/2022]
Abstract
The nature and timing of the shift from the Late Middle Paleolithic (LMP) to the Early Upper Paleolithic (EUP) varied geographically, temporally, and substantively across the Near East and Eurasia; however, the result of this process was the archaeological disappearance of Middle Paleolithic technologies across the length and breadth of their geographic distribution. Ortvale Klde rockshelter (Republic of Georgia) contains the most detailed LMP-EUP archaeological sequence in the Caucasus, an environmentally and topographically diverse region situated between southwest Asia and Europe. Tephrochronological investigations at the site reveal volcanic ash (tephra) from various volcanic sources and provide a tephrostratigraphy for the site that will facilitate future correlations in the region. We correlate one of the cryptotephra layers to the large, caldera-forming Nemrut Formation eruption (30,000 years ago) from Nemrut volcano in Turkey. We integrate this tephrochronological constraint with new radiocarbon dates and published ages in an OxCal Bayesian age model to produce a revised chronology for the site. This model increases the ages for the end of the LMP (∼47.5-44.2 ka cal BP) and appearance of the EUP (∼46.7-43.6 ka cal BP) at Ortvale Klde, which are earlier than those currently reported for other sites in the Caucasus but similar to estimates for specific sites in southwest Asia and eastern Europe. These data, coupled with archaeological, stratigraphic, and taphonomic observations, suggest that at Ortvale Klde, (1) the appearance of EUP technologies of bone and stone has no technological roots in the preceding LMP, (2) a LMP population vacuum likely preceded the appearance of these EUP technologies, and (3) the systematic combination of tephra correlations and absolute dating chronologies promises to substantially improve our inter-regional understanding of this critical time interval of human evolution and the potential interconnectedness of hominins at different sites.
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Affiliation(s)
- Victoria L Cullen
- Department of Chemistry, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom; Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
| | - Victoria C Smith
- Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
| | | | - Carolina Mallol
- Archaeological Micromorphology and Biomarker Research Lab, Instituto Universitario de Bio-Orgánica Antonio González, Tenerife, Spain; Departamento de Geografía e Historia, Universidad de La Laguna Campus de Guajara, Tenerife, Spain
| | - Michael Dee
- Centre for Isotope Research, ESRIG, University of Groningen, Groningen, the Netherlands
| | - Keith N Wilkinson
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Winchester, United Kingdom
| | - Daniel S Adler
- Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut, CT, USA.
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7
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Dinnis R, Bessudnov A, Reynolds N, Devièse T, Pate A, Sablin M, Sinitsyn A, Higham T. New data for the Early Upper Paleolithic of Kostenki (Russia). J Hum Evol 2019; 127:21-40. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2018.11.012] [Citation(s) in RCA: 30] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/06/2018] [Revised: 11/27/2018] [Accepted: 11/28/2018] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
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8
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Starkovich BM. Paleolithic subsistence strategies and changes in site use at Klissoura Cave 1 (Peloponnese, Greece). J Hum Evol 2017; 111:63-84. [PMID: 28874275 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2017.04.005] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/14/2015] [Revised: 03/24/2017] [Accepted: 04/18/2017] [Indexed: 11/17/2022]
Abstract
Klissoura Cave 1 in southern Greece preserves a long archaeological sequence that spans roughly 90,000 years and includes Middle Paleolithic, Uluzzian, Upper Paleolithic, and Mesolithic deposits. The site provides a unique opportunity to examine diachronic change and shifts in the intensity of site use across the Late Pleistocene. There is an overall picture of the intensified use of faunal resources at the site, evidenced by a shift from large to small game, and to small fast-moving taxa in particular. This trend is independent of climatic change and fluctuations in site use, and most likely reflects a broader, regional growth of hominin populations. At the same time, multiple lines of evidence (e.g., input of artifacts and features, sedimentation mechanisms, and intensification of faunal resources) indicate that the intensity of site use changed, with a sharp increase from the Middle Paleolithic to Aurignacian. This allows us to address a fundamental issue in the study of human evolution: differences in population size and site use between Neandertals and modern humans. At Klissoura Cave 1, the increase in occupation intensity might be related to population growth or larger group size, but it might also be due to changes in season of site use, more favorable environmental conditions at the beginning of the Upper Paleolithic, and/or changes in the composition of people occupying the site. These explanations are not necessarily mutually exclusive, and indeed the data support a combination of factors. Ascribing the increase in occupation intensity to larger Upper Paleolithic populations more broadly is difficult, particularly because there is little consensus on this topic elsewhere in Eurasia. The data are complicated and vary greatly between sites and regions. This makes Klissoura Cave 1, as the only currently available case study in southeastern Europe, a critical example in understanding the range of variation in demography and site use across the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition.
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Affiliation(s)
- Britt M Starkovich
- Institute for Archaeological Sciences, University of Tübingen, Germany; Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Paleoenvironment at Tübingen, Germany; School of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson, USA.
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Evaluating the potential for tactical hunting in the Middle Stone Age: Insights from a bonebed of the extinct bovid, Rusingoryx atopocranion. J Hum Evol 2017. [PMID: 28622933 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2016.11.004] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
Abstract
The foraging behaviors of Middle Stone Age (MSA) early modern humans have largely been based on evidence from well-stratified cave sites in South Africa. Whereas these sites have provided an abundance of data for behavioral reconstruction that are unmatched elsewhere in Africa, they are unlikely to preserve evidence of the diversity of foraging strategies employed by MSA hunters who lived in a variety of ecological and landscape settings across the African continent. Here we describe the results of recent excavations at the open-air site of Bovid Hill at Wakondo, Rusinga Island, Kenya, which yielded 24 in situ MSA artifacts within an assemblage of bones comprised exclusively of the extinct alcelaphin bovid Rusingoryx atopocranion. The excavated faunal assemblage is characterized by a prime-age-dominated mortality profile and includes cut-marked specimens and an associated MSA Levallois blade-based artifact industry recovered from a channel deposit dated to 68 ± 5 ka by optically stimulated luminescence. Taphonomic, geologic, and faunal evidence points to mass exploitation of Rusingoryx by humans at Bovid Hill, which likely represents an initial processing site that was altered post-depositionally by fluvial processes. This site highlights the importance of rivers and streams for mass procurement in an open and seasonal landscape, and provides important new insights into MSA behavioral variability with respect to environmental conditions, site function, and tactical foraging strategies in eastern Africa. Bovid Hill thus joins a growing number of MSA and Middle Paleolithic localities that are suggestive of tactical hunting behaviors and mass capture of gregarious ungulate prey.
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10
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Shipley GP, Kindscher K. Evidence for the Paleoethnobotany of the Neanderthal: A Review of the Literature. SCIENTIFICA 2016; 2016:8927654. [PMID: 27843675 PMCID: PMC5098096 DOI: 10.1155/2016/8927654] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/09/2016] [Accepted: 09/29/2016] [Indexed: 05/31/2023]
Abstract
Our perception of our closest human relatives, the Neanderthals, has evolved in the last few decades from brutish ape-men to intelligent archaic human peoples. Our understanding and appreciation of their cultural sophistication has only recently extended to their diet. Only within the last few years, with new techniques and a shift in focus, have we begun to truly investigate and understand the role of plants in their diet and culture. The more we learn about Neanderthals, the more we realize that biological and cultural distinctions between them and us were relatively small. Given that we coexisted and likely interacted with them for thousands of years, the more we learn about them, the better we may understand our own past. In that light, we review the current evidence, derived from such sources as plant remains (e.g., starch, pollen, phytoliths, and seeds) in soil and dental calculus, dental and tool wear, coprolites, and genetics, for Neanderthal's nutritional, medicinal, and ritual use of plants, which includes 61 different taxa from 26 different plant families found at 17 different archaeological sites. Further, we updated and standardized botanical nomenclature from many sources published over many decades to provide a more stable foundation for future work.
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Affiliation(s)
- Gerhard P. Shipley
- Indigenous Studies Department, University of Kansas, Lippincott Hall, 1410 Jayhawk Boulevard, Lawrence, KS 66045, USA
| | - Kelly Kindscher
- Kansas Biological Survey, University of Kansas, 2101 Constant Ave., Lawrence, KS 66047, USA
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11
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Bob P, Laker M. Traumatic stress, neural self and the spiritual mind. Conscious Cogn 2016; 46:7-14. [PMID: 27677049 DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2016.09.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/14/2016] [Revised: 09/02/2016] [Accepted: 09/13/2016] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
According to recent findings stressful experiences may influence various physiological disturbances and also neuroanatomical changes and some studies also show that psychotherapy and meditation may influence brain functions. Traumatic stress is frequently related to a dissociative response that disintegrates conscious experience. In this context, self-reflection is an essential principle in the process of posttraumatic growth related to spiritual experiences and meditation states that enable mental integration and create the novel integrated self. According to recent findings there is no widely accepted evidence about specific neural mechanisms of processes related to mental integration linked to the spiritual experiences and meditation. Nevertheless there is growing evidence that these integrative experiences are related to various alterations in the brain's physiology and morphology. These findings provide a new paradigm for understanding of mental disorders and emphasize the fundamental role of mental integration and integrated self in the therapy of psychiatric disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Petr Bob
- Center for Neuropsychiatric Research of Traumatic Stress, Department of Psychiatry, 1st Faculty of Medicine, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic; Central European Institute of Technology, Faculty of Medicine, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic.
| | - Matthew Laker
- Center for Neuropsychiatric Research of Traumatic Stress, Department of Psychiatry, 1st Faculty of Medicine, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic
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12
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Frahm E, Feinberg JM, Schmidt-Magee BA, Wilkinson KN, Gasparyan B, Yeritsyan B, Adler DS. Middle Palaeolithic toolstone procurement behaviors at Lusakert Cave 1, Hrazdan valley, Armenia. J Hum Evol 2016; 91:73-92. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2015.10.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/31/2015] [Revised: 10/15/2015] [Accepted: 10/16/2015] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
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13
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Moreau L, Odar B, Higham T, Horvat A, Pirkmajer D, Turk P. Reassessing the Aurignacian of Slovenia: techno-economic behaviour and direct dating of osseous projectile points. J Hum Evol 2014; 78:158-80. [PMID: 25498105 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2014.09.007] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/27/2014] [Revised: 09/29/2014] [Accepted: 09/29/2014] [Indexed: 10/24/2022]
Abstract
The Palaeolithic of southern Central Europe has a long history of archaeological research. Particularly, the presence of numerous osseous projectile points in many early Upper Palaeolithic (EUP) assemblages in this region has attracted the attention of the international research community. However, the scarcity of properly identified and well-dated Aurignacian contexts represents an obstacle for investigation of the nature and timing of the Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition. In this context, the question of whether Neandertals made Aurignacian osseous projectile points, either on their own or as a consequence of cultural interaction with anatomically modern humans (AMH), still remains an open issue. Here we reassess the EUP record of Slovenia by evaluating the Aurignacian character of the assemblages from Potočka zijalka, Mokriška jama and Divje babe I in the light of their suggested roots in the local Mousterian. We provide a comprehensive description of the lithic industry from Potočka zijalka, which represents one of the rare EUP assemblages of southern Central Europe with a representative number of lithic artefacts to be analysed from the perspective of lithic technology and raw material economy. Our re-analysis of the Slovenian assemblages is backed by a series of 11 new ultrafiltered collagen 14C dates obtained directly on associated osseous projectile points from the studied assemblages. The Aurignacian of Potočka zijalka underlines the remarkable consistency of the Early Aurignacian with low typo-technological variability across Europe, resulting from a marked dependence on transported toolkits and raw material conservation. The new radiocarbon determinations for the Aurignacian of Slovenia appear to post-date the 34-32 ka BP (thousands of years before present) threshold for the last Neandertals in the region. Although not falsified, the hypothesis of Aurignacian bone tools in southern Central Europe as a product of late Neandertals is not supported by our re-examination of the EUP record of Slovenia.
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Affiliation(s)
- Luc Moreau
- MONREPOS Archaeological Research Centre and Museum for Human Behavioural Evolution, Schloss Monrepos, 56567 Neuwied, Germany.
| | | | - Tom Higham
- Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit, Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3QY, United Kingdom
| | - Aleksander Horvat
- Ivan Rakovec Institute of Palaeontology, Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia
| | - Darja Pirkmajer
- Pokrajinskij muzej Celje, Trg Celjskih knezov 8, 3000 Celje, Slovenia
| | - Peter Turk
- Narodni muzej Slovenije, Prešernova cesta 20, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia
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14
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Wilson L, Browne CL. Change in raw material selection and subsistence behaviour through time at a Middle Palaeolithic site in southern France. J Hum Evol 2014; 75:28-39. [PMID: 25150897 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2013.12.018] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/28/2012] [Revised: 10/17/2013] [Accepted: 12/10/2013] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
We apply a resource selection model to the lithic assemblages from 11 archaeological layers at a Middle Palaeolithic site in southern France, the Bau de l'Aubesier. The model calculates how to weight each of 10 variables in order to best match the proportions of raw materials from various potential sources in the lithic assemblages. We then combine the variables into two sets of five each, those related to the characteristics of the raw materials themselves, and those related to the sources and the terrain around them. Running the model with each subset shows that the terrain variables always provide a better match to raw material use than do the raw material variables taken by themselves, but the best model is always the overall (10-variable) model. This means that terrain is most important in every case, but raw material properties also matter. Comparing the percentage contributions of each subset within the overall model, however, shows a clear change in emphasis in the upper layers versus the lower layers of the site. In the lower six layers, the percent contribution of the terrain variables is always greater than that of the raw material variables, but in the upper five layers the reverse is true: terrain still matters, but raw material becomes more important. We also look at faunal and basic tool typological data, which show a progressive change through time, as smaller prey become more important (and large prey less so), and tools and cores proportionally less abundant in the assemblages in the upper layers. We suggest that these results reflect a change in subsistence strategies at the time of a particularly harsh climate near the end of the Middle Pleistocene, and that hominin groups using this site continued to use this new approach throughout the rest of the Pleistocene.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lucy Wilson
- Department of Biology, University of New Brunswick in Saint John, P.O. Box 5050, 100 Tucker Park Road, Saint John, N.B. E2L 4L5, Canada.
| | - Constance L Browne
- Department of Biology, University of New Brunswick in Saint John, P.O. Box 5050, 100 Tucker Park Road, Saint John, N.B. E2L 4L5, Canada.
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15
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16
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Clark JL, Kandel AW. The Evolutionary Implications of Variation in Human Hunting Strategies and Diet Breadth during the Middle Stone Age of Southern Africa. CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY 2013. [DOI: 10.1086/673386] [Citation(s) in RCA: 46] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/03/2022]
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17
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Montoya C, Balasescu A, Joannin S, Ollivier V, Liagre J, Nahapetyan S, Ghukasyan R, Colonge D, Gasparyan B, Chataigner C. The Upper Palaeolithic site of Kalavan 1 (Armenia): An Epigravettian settlement in the Lesser Caucasus. J Hum Evol 2013; 65:621-40. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2013.07.011] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/21/2012] [Revised: 07/10/2013] [Accepted: 07/15/2013] [Indexed: 10/26/2022]
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18
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The beginning of the Upper Paleolithic in the Iranian Zagros. A taphonomic approach and techno-economic comparison of Early Baradostian assemblages from Warwasi and Yafteh (Iran). J Hum Evol 2013; 65:39-64. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2013.04.005] [Citation(s) in RCA: 41] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/18/2012] [Revised: 04/05/2013] [Accepted: 04/16/2013] [Indexed: 11/18/2022]
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19
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Variation in lithic technological strategies among the Neanderthals of Gibraltar. PLoS One 2013; 8:e65185. [PMID: 23762312 PMCID: PMC3675147 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0065185] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/17/2012] [Accepted: 04/23/2013] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
The evidence for Neanderthal lithic technology is reviewed and summarized for four caves on The Rock of Gibraltar: Vanguard, Beefsteak, Ibex and Gorham’s. Some of the observed patterns in technology are statistically tested including raw material selection, platform preparation, and the use of formal and expedient technological schemas. The main parameters of technological variation are examined through detailed analysis of the Gibraltar cores and comparison with samples from the classic Mousterian sites of Le Moustier and Tabun C. The Gibraltar Mousterian, including the youngest assemblage from Layer IV of Gorham’s Cave, spans the typical Middle Palaeolithic range of variation from radial Levallois to unidirectional and multi-platform flaking schemas, with characteristic emphasis on the former. A diachronic pattern of change in the Gorham’s Cave sequence is documented, with the younger assemblages utilising more localized raw material and less formal flaking procedures. We attribute this change to a reduction in residential mobility as the climate deteriorated during Marine Isotope Stage 3 and the Neanderthal population contracted into a refugium.
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Pinhasi R, Nioradze M, Tushabramishvili N, Lordkipanidze D, Pleurdeau D, Moncel MH, Adler D, Stringer C, Higham T. New chronology for the Middle Palaeolithic of the southern Caucasus suggests early demise of Neanderthals in this region. J Hum Evol 2012; 63:770-80. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2012.08.004] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/24/2012] [Revised: 08/16/2012] [Accepted: 08/17/2012] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
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Tushabramishvili N, Pleurdeau D, Moncel MH, Agapishvili T, Vekua A, Bukhsianidze M, Maureille B, Muskhelishvili A, Mshvildadze M, Kapanadze N, Lordkipanidze D. Human remains from a new Upper Pleistocene sequence in Bondi Cave (Western Georgia). J Hum Evol 2012; 62:179-85. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2011.11.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/04/2011] [Revised: 06/06/2011] [Accepted: 11/03/2011] [Indexed: 10/15/2022]
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Bocherens H. Diet and Ecology of Neanderthals: Implications from C and N Isotopes. NEANDERTHAL LIFEWAYS, SUBSISTENCE AND TECHNOLOGY 2011. [DOI: 10.1007/978-94-007-0415-2_8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/24/2022]
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Microfossils in calculus demonstrate consumption of plants and cooked foods in Neanderthal diets (Shanidar III, Iraq; Spy I and II, Belgium). Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2010; 108:486-91. [PMID: 21187393 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1016868108] [Citation(s) in RCA: 157] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
The nature and causes of the disappearance of Neanderthals and their apparent replacement by modern humans are subjects of considerable debate. Many researchers have proposed biologically or technologically mediated dietary differences between the two groups as one of the fundamental causes of Neanderthal disappearance. Some scenarios have focused on the apparent lack of plant foods in Neanderthal diets. Here we report direct evidence for Neanderthal consumption of a variety of plant foods, in the form of phytoliths and starch grains recovered from dental calculus of Neanderthal skeletons from Shanidar Cave, Iraq, and Spy Cave, Belgium. Some of the plants are typical of recent modern human diets, including date palms (Phoenix spp.), legumes, and grass seeds (Triticeae), whereas others are known to be edible but are not heavily used today. Many of the grass seed starches showed damage that is a distinctive marker of cooking. Our results indicate that in both warm eastern Mediterranean and cold northwestern European climates, and across their latitudinal range, Neanderthals made use of the diverse plant foods available in their local environment and transformed them into more easily digestible foodstuffs in part through cooking them, suggesting an overall sophistication in Neanderthal dietary regimes.
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Ghukasyan R, Colonge D, Nahapetyan S, Ollivier V, Gasparyan B, Monchot H, Chataigner C. KALAVAN-2 (NORTH OF LAKE SEVAN, ARMENIA): A NEW LATE MIDDLE PALEOLITHIC SITE IN THE LESSER CAUCASUS. ARCHAEOLOGY ETHNOLOGY AND ANTHROPOLOGY OF EURASIA 2010. [DOI: 10.1016/j.aeae.2011.02.003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
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Golovanova LV, Doronichev VB, Cleghorn NE, Koulkova MA, Sapelko TV, Shackley MS. Significance of Ecological Factors in the Middle to Upper Paleolithic Transition. CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY 2010. [DOI: 10.1086/656185] [Citation(s) in RCA: 82] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/03/2022]
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Mortality profiles of the large herbivores from the Lingjing Xuchang Man Site, Henan Province and the early emergence of the modern human behaviors in East Asia. ACTA ACUST UNITED AC 2009. [DOI: 10.1007/s11434-009-0648-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/20/2022]
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Bar-Oz G, Belfer-Cohen A, Meshveliani T, Jakeli N, Matskevich Z, Bar-Yosef O. BEAR IN MIND: BEAR HUNTING IN THE MESOLITHIC OF THE SOUTHERN CAUCASUS. ARCHAEOLOGY, ETHNOLOGY AND ANTHROPOLOGY OF EURASIA 2009. [DOI: 10.1016/j.aeae.2009.05.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
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Stiner MC, Kuhn SL. Paleolithic Diet and the Division of Labor in Mediterranean Eurasia. THE EVOLUTION OF HOMININ DIETS 2009. [DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4020-9699-0_11] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/24/2023]
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Eren MI, Greenspan A, Sampson CG. Are Upper Paleolithic blade cores more productive than Middle Paleolithic discoidal cores? A replication experiment. J Hum Evol 2008; 55:952-61. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2008.07.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 71] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/09/2007] [Revised: 05/25/2008] [Accepted: 07/28/2008] [Indexed: 10/21/2022]
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Adler DS, Bar-Yosef O, Belfer-Cohen A, Tushabramishvili N, Boaretto E, Mercier N, Valladas H, Rink W. Dating the demise: Neandertal extinction and the establishment of modern humans in the southern Caucasus. J Hum Evol 2008; 55:817-33. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2008.08.010] [Citation(s) in RCA: 68] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/09/2007] [Revised: 06/19/2008] [Accepted: 11/25/2007] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
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Hovk 1 and the Middle and Upper Paleolithic of Armenia: a preliminary framework. J Hum Evol 2008; 55:803-16. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2008.04.005] [Citation(s) in RCA: 31] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/03/2007] [Revised: 01/10/2008] [Accepted: 04/25/2008] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
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Eland, buffalo, and wild pigs: were Middle Stone Age humans ineffective hunters? J Hum Evol 2008; 55:24-36. [PMID: 18372003 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2007.11.005] [Citation(s) in RCA: 69] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/01/2007] [Revised: 10/28/2007] [Accepted: 11/29/2007] [Indexed: 11/23/2022]
Abstract
Patterns of faunal exploitation play a central role in debates concerning the behavioral modernity of Middle Stone Age (MSA) peoples. MSA foragers have been portrayed as less effective hunters than their Later Stone Age (LSA) successors on the basis of relative species abundances from ungulate assemblages in southern Africa. Specifically, MSA hunters are said to focus on docile eland while avoiding more aggressive prey, particularly buffalo and wild pigs. To evaluate these arguments and compare subsistence behavior, I present a quantitative examination of 51 MSA and 98 LSA ungulate assemblages from southern Africa to show that: (1) with respect to ungulate exploitation, MSA diet breadth may have exceeded LSA diet breadth, (2) ungulate assemblage evenness is equivalent in the MSA and LSA, (3) eland, buffalo, and wild pig are equally abundant in the MSA and LSA, and (4) large ungulate prey are more common in the MSA than in the LSA. With few exceptions, the broad patterns, which sample a range of geographic and environmental contexts, are supported by an environmentally controlled comparison of Middle and Later Stone Age faunas that accumulated under interglacial conditions along the southern African coastline. When interpreted within a foraging theory framework, these differences suggest that MSA hunters enjoyed increased meat yields due to elevated encounter rates with large prey. These results need not imply cognitive differences, but are consistent with an increase in human populations from the Middle to Later Stone Age, which resulted in diminished abundances of large ungulates.
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Yeshurun R, Bar-Oz G, Weinstein-Evron M. Modern hunting behavior in the early Middle Paleolithic: Faunal remains from Misliya Cave, Mount Carmel, Israel. J Hum Evol 2007; 53:656-77. [PMID: 17669471 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2007.05.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 78] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/12/2006] [Revised: 05/07/2007] [Accepted: 05/10/2007] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
Understanding the behavioral adaptations and subsistence strategies of Middle Paleolithic humans is critical in the debate over the evolution and manifestations of modern human behavior. The study of faunal remains plays a central role in this context. Until now, the majority of Levantine archaeofaunal evidence was derived from late Middle Paleolithic sites. The discovery of faunal remains from Misliya Cave, Mount Carmel, Israel (>200 ka), allowed for detailed taphonomic and zooarchaeological analyses of these early Middle Paleolithic remains. The Misliya Cave faunal assemblage is overwhelmingly dominated by ungulate taxa. The most common prey species is the Mesopotamian fallow deer (Dama mesopotamica), followed closely by the mountain gazelle (Gazella gazella). Some aurochs (Bos primigenius) remains are also present. Small-game species are rare. The fallow deer mortality pattern is dominated by prime-aged individuals. A multivariate taphonomic analysis demonstrates (1) that the assemblage was created solely by humans occupying the cave and was primarily modified by their food-processing activities; and (2) that gazelle carcasses were transported complete to the site, while fallow deer carcasses underwent some field butchery. The new zooarchaeological data from Misliya Cave, particularly the abundance of meat-bearing limb bones displaying filleting cut marks and the acquisition of prime-age prey, demonstrate that early Middle Paleolithic people possessed developed hunting capabilities. Thus, modern large-game hunting, carcass transport, and meat-processing behaviors were already established in the Levant in the early Middle Paleolithic, more than 200 ka ago.
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Affiliation(s)
- Reuven Yeshurun
- Zinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa, Mount Carmel, 31905 Haifa, Israel.
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Roostalu U, Kutuev I, Loogväli EL, Metspalu E, Tambets K, Reidla M, Khusnutdinova EK, Usanga E, Kivisild T, Villems R. Origin and expansion of haplogroup H, the dominant human mitochondrial DNA lineage in West Eurasia: the Near Eastern and Caucasian perspective. Mol Biol Evol 2006; 24:436-48. [PMID: 17099056 DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msl173] [Citation(s) in RCA: 121] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/27/2022] Open
Abstract
More than a third of the European pool of human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is fragmented into a number of subclades of haplogroup (hg) H, the most frequent hg throughout western Eurasia. Although there has been considerable recent progress in studying mitochondrial genome variation in Europe at the complete sequence resolution, little data of comparable resolution is so far available for regions like the Caucasus and the Near and Middle East-areas where most of European genetic lineages, including hg H, have likely emerged. This gap in our knowledge causes a serious hindrance for progress in understanding the demographic prehistory of Europe and western Eurasia in general. Here we describe the phylogeography of hg H in the populations of the Near East and the Caucasus. We have analyzed 545 samples of hg H at high resolution, including 15 novel complete mtDNA sequences. As in Europe, most of the present-day Near Eastern-Caucasus area variants of hg H started to expand after the last glacial maximum (LGM) and presumably before the Holocene. Yet importantly, several hg H subclades in Near East and Southern Caucasus region coalesce to the pre-LGM period. Furthermore, irrespective of their common origin, significant differences between the distribution of hg H sub-hgs in Europe and in the Near East and South Caucasus imply limited post-LGM maternal gene flow between these regions. In a contrast, the North Caucasus mitochondrial gene pool has received an influx of hg H variants, arriving from the Ponto-Caspian/East European area.
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Affiliation(s)
- U Roostalu
- Department of Evolutionary Biology, Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of Tartu and Estonian Biocentre, Tartu, Estonia
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