title: Early modern human settlement of Europe north of the Alps occurred 43,500 years ago in a cold steppe-type environment.
abstract: The first settlement of Europe by modern humans is thought to have occurred between 50,000 and 40,000 calendar years ago (cal B.P.). In Europe, modern human remains of this time period are scarce and often are not associated with archaeology or originate from old excavations with no contextual information. Hence, the behavior of the first modern humans in Europe is still unknown. Aurignacian assemblages--demonstrably made by modern humans--are commonly used as proxies for the presence of fully behaviorally and anatomically modern humans. The site of Willendorf II (Austria) is well known for its Early Upper Paleolithic horizons, which are among the oldest in Europe. However, their age and attribution to the Aurignacian remain an issue of debate. Here, we show that archaeological horizon 3 (AH 3) consists of faunal remains and Early Aurignacian lithic artifacts. By using stratigraphic, paleoenvironmental, and chronological data, AH 3 is ascribed to the onset of Greenland Interstadial 11, around 43,500 cal B.P., and thus is older than any other Aurignacian assemblage. Furthermore, the AH 3 assemblage overlaps with the latest directly radiocarbon-dated Neanderthal remains, suggesting that Neanderthal and modern human presence overlapped in Europe for some millennia, possibly at rather close geographical range. Most importantly, for the first time to our knowledge, we have a high-resolution environmental context for an Early Aurignacian site in Central Europe, demonstrating an early appearance of behaviorally modern humans in a medium-cold steppe-type environment with some boreal trees along valleys around 43,500 cal B.P.
authors.affiliation: Departments of Human Evolution and Division of Archaeology, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3DZ, United Kingdom; prn25@cam.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Philip R
authors.initials: PR
authors.lastname: Nigst
authors.affiliation: Department of Paleontology, Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, 1000 Brussels, Belgium;
authors.forename: Paul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Haesaerts
authors.affiliation: Department of Paleontology, Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, 1000 Brussels, Belgium;
authors.forename: Freddy
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Damblon
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology and.
authors.forename: Christa
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Frank-Fellner
authors.affiliation: Departmento de Geografia e Historia, Universidad de La Laguna, Campus de Guajara, La Laguna, 38071 Tenerife, Spain; Instituto Universitario de Bio-Orgánica Antonio Gonzáles, Universidad de La Laguna, La Laguna, 38206 Tenerife, Spain; and.
authors.forename: Carolina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Mallol
authors.affiliation: Departments of Human Evolution and Department of Anthropology and Evolutionary Genetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, 04103 Leipzig, Germany;
authors.forename: Bence
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Viola
authors.affiliation: Institute of Mineralogy and Crystallography, University of Vienna, A-1090 Vienna, Austria;
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Götzinger
authors.affiliation: Departments of Human Evolution and.
authors.forename: Laura
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Niven
authors.affiliation: Institute for Prehistoric and Historic Archaeology, University of Vienna, A-1190 Vienna, Austria.
authors.forename: Gerhard
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Trnka
authors.affiliation: Departments of Human Evolution and.
authors.forename: Jean-Jacques
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Hublin
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001106:Archaeology / Q000379:methods*; D001317:Austria; D003080:Cold Temperature; D017753:Ecosystem; D005060:Europe; D005580:Fossils; D005843:Geography; D015186:Hominidae; D006801:Humans; D013997:Time Factors