Early Pleistocene Hominin Expansion and Landscape Evolution in the Armenian Highlands

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Pleistocene Landscapes and Hominin Behavior in the Armenian Highlands" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Understanding the chronology and environmental context of the earliest hominin expansions into Eurasia is of considerable interest in paleoanthropology. Several Early Pleistocene archaeological sites in the Armenian Highlands and wider Caucasus region have demonstrated the importance of the region for understanding the morphology of early Eurasian Homo and their technological capabilities. However, little is known about the broader landscapes and climatic framework in which these sites lie. Here we present findings from geoarchaeological investigations in the Debed River valley, located in the Armenian Highlands. We will first present a model of landscape evolution during the Early Pleistocene based on combined geological and chronometric study (40Ar/39Ar and paleomagnetism) of deposits exposed in the valley. This model will be discussed in the context of newly discovered Paleolithic sites in the valley. We will also describe preliminary results from Dzoragyugh paleolake, a 30 m thick fluvial-lacustrine sequence that is sandwiched between two basaltic lava flows. These results will be summarized in the context of the Early Pleistocene archaeological record of the Armenian Highlands and wider Caucasus region, highlighting the importance for understanding the nature and environments of early hominin expansions into Eurasia.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)   •
• Pleistocene Landscapes and Hominin Behavior in the Armenian Highlands

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37084.0