Sedimentary DNA Displays the Upper Paleolithic Human-Carnivore Interface in El Mirón Cave (Spain)

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Interdisciplinary Research into the Late Pleistocene of Europe" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Humans and carnivores competed for the same ecological niche during the Paleolithic, including caves used as shelters that they even alternately occupied in many cases. Through the presence of archeological material, including animal bones, we can assess the human occupation periods and their intensity. Iberia represents one of the main European human refugia during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), and therefore, has a key interest in the understanding of the human population dynamics before, after, and during such climatic events. Here, we present genetic data from the complete stratigraphic archaeological sequence of the site of El Mirón Cave, from which we have recovered three human mtDNA sequences from Solutrean layers and multiple mammalian mitochondrial data from all the screened layers. In addition, we have also produced a new radiocarbon date and mitochondrial genome from a human Gravettian tooth from the vicinity cave of Chufín, extending the available data on such a period in the Cantabrian region. The animal data shows a differential presence of carnivore species through the archeological sequence of El Mirón.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Interdisciplinary Research into the Late Pleistocene of Europe   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37991.0