New evidence of broader diets for archaic Homo populations in the northwestern Mediterranean
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
1-1-2019
Abstract
Investigating diet breadth is critical for understanding how archaic Homo populations, including Neanderthals, competed for seasonally scarce resources. The current consensus in Western Europe is that ungulates formed the bulk of the human diet during the Lower and Middle Paleolithic, while small fast prey taxa were virtually ignored. Here, we present a multisite taphonomic study of leporid assemblages from Southern France that supports frequent exploitation of small fast game during marine isotope stages 11 to 3. Along with recent evidence from Iberia, our results indicate that the consumption of small fast game was more common prior to the Upper Paleolithic than previously thought and that archaic hominins from the northwestern Mediterranean had broader diets than those from adjacent regions. Although likely of secondary importance relative to ungulates, the frequent exploitation of leporids documented here implies that human diet breadths were substantially more variable within Europe than assumed by current evolutionary models.
Publication Title
Science Advances
Volume
5
Issue
3
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
10.1126/sciadv.aav9106
PubMed ID
30854435
E-ISSN
23752548
Citation Information
Morin, E.; Meier, J.; El Guennouni, K.; Moigne, A. M.; Lebreton, L.; Rusch, L.; Valensi, P.; Conolly, J.; and Cochard, D., "New evidence of broader diets for archaic Homo populations in the northwestern Mediterranean" (2019). UNF Faculty Research and Scholarship. 1006.
https://digitalcommons.unf.edu/unf_faculty_publications/1006