Brachial and crural indices of European Late Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic humans

Holliday, Trenton W.

doi:10.1006/jhev.1998.0289

Cited by 126 publications

(139 citation statements)

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“…By contrast, relative limb dimensions are positively congruent with environmental factors such as latitude and annual temperature. This finding is in line with other studies that also found a relationship between limb morphology and various environmental factors [35,38,44,60,61]. Upper limb dimensions were found to be significantly and strongly correlated with maximum temperature, with OTUs from warmer climates having relatively longer and more slender upper limb bones.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Skull and limb morphology differentially track population history and environmental factors in the transition to agriculture in Europe

2013

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The Neolithic transition in Europe was a complex mosaic spatio-temporal process, involving both demic diffusion from the Near East and the cultural adoption of farming practices by indigenous hunter-gatherers. Previous analyses of Mesolithic hunter-gatherers and Early Neolithic farmers suggest that cranial shape variation preserves the population history signature of the Neolithic transition. However, the extent to which these same demographic processes are discernible in the postcranium is poorly understood. Here, for the first time, crania and postcranial elements from the same 11 prehistoric populations are analysed together in an internally consistent theoretical and methodological framework. Results show that while cranial shape reflects the population history differences between Mesolithic and Neolithic lineages, relative limb dimensions exhibit significant congruence with environmental variables such as latitude and temperature, even after controlling for geography and time. Also, overall limb size is found to be consistently larger in hunter-gatherers than farmers, suggesting a reduction in size related to factors other than thermoregulatory adaptation. Therefore, our results suggest that relative limb dimensions are not tracking the same demographic population history as the cranium, and point to the strong influence of climatic, dietary and behavioural factors in determining limb morphology, irrespective of underlying neutral demographic processes.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Skull and limb morphology differentially track population history and environmental factors in the transition to agriculture in Europe

2013

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“…The bra chial index in Dederiyeh 1 (right � 78.7, left � 76.3) is also relatively high, above the mean in three samples of modem human children (Kondo and Dodo, 2002). Kondo and Dodo (2002) noted that the differences between Roe de Marsal and Dederiyeh 1 would represent a wide range of variation in the brachial index among immature Nean dertals, a situation also seen among adult Neandertals and in terpreted as a product of ecogeographic variation (Trinkaus, 1981(Trinkaus, , 1983Heim, 1982b;Holliday, 1997Holliday, , 1999Holliday and Ruff, 2001). The European context of the Cova Negra (n�5) (n � 13) 97.6 9S.0 100.8 ± S.8 l1S.6 ± 13.3 10.9 9.7 10.2 ± 1.4 11.2± 1.5 10.1 10.2 10.6 ± 1.4 11.8±1.7…”

Section: Postcraniai Remainsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Proportions of limb-bone lengths to stature and body mass are different between Neandertals and modern humans, and relative limb length and body breadth vary ecogeographically in modern and earlier humans (Trinkaus, 1981;Holliday, 1999;Holliday and Ruff, 2001). Wide variation is also known to exist in the correlation of long-bone length to stature between sexes and populations (Feldesman, 1992;Feldesman and Fountain, 1996), and esti mates from upper-limb bones provide different results than those based on lower-limb bones (Kondo et aI., 2000).…”

Section: Femur I (Cn 42168 and Cn 42169) (Figs 18 19)mentioning

confidence: 99%

New Neandertal remains from Cova Negra (Valencia, Spain)

Arsuaga

Bonilla

Quam

et al. 2007

Journal of Human Evolution

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New Neandertal fossils from the Mousterian site of Cova Negra in the Valencia region of Spain are described, and a comprehensive study of the entire human fossil sample is provided. The new specimens significantly augment the sample of human remains from this site and make Cova Negra one of the richest human paleontological sites on the Iberian Peninsula. The new specimens include cranial and postcranial elements from immature individuals and provide an opportunity to study the ontogenetic appearance of adult Neandertal characteristics in this Pleistocene pop ulation. Children younger than 10 years of age constitute four of the seven minimum number of individuals in the sample, and this relative abundance of children at Cova Negra is similar that in to other Neandertal sites in Europe and southwest Asia. The recognition of diagnostic Neandertal features in several of the specimens, as well as their western European context and late Pleistocene age, suggests that all the human remains from Cova Negra represent Neandertals. The archaeological evidence from Cova Negra indicates sporadic, short-term occupations of the site, suggesting a high degree of mobility among Neandertals.

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“…The possible causal relationships between millennial-scale climate change and long-term hominid evolution has long been debated (e.g. Ruff, 1994;Holliday and Falsetti, 1995;Holliday, 1997Holliday, , 1999Sherratt, 1997;Housley et al,1997;Blockley et al, 2000a,b), but the idea that extremely abrupt climate shifts, decadal in scale, could be implicated as initiators of human dispersal and development has only recently emerged. It was not until the publication of the Greenland ice-core records in the early 1990s that the sheer rapidity with which the global climate system was capable of change became better appreciated (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The chronology of abrupt climate change and Late Upper Palaeolithic human adaptation in Europe

Blockley

Donahue

et al. 2006

J Quaternary Science

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This paper addresses the possible connections between the onset of human expansion in Europe following the Last Glacial Maximum, and the timing of abrupt climate warming at the onset of the Lateglacial (Bö lling/Allerød) Interstadial. There are opposing views as to whether or not human populations and activities were directly 'forced' by climate change, based on different comparisons between archaeological and environmental data. We review the geochronological assumptions and approaches on which data comparisons have been attempted in the past, and argue that the uncertainties presently associated with age models based on calibrated radiocarbon dates preclude robust testing of the competing models, particularly when comparing the data to non-radiocarbonbased timescales such as the Greenland ice core records. The paper concludes with some suggestions as to the steps that will be necessary if more robust tests of the models are to be developed in the future.

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Brachial and crural indices of European Late Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic humans

Cited by 126 publications

References 0 publications

Skull and limb morphology differentially track population history and environmental factors in the transition to agriculture in Europe

Skull and limb morphology differentially track population history and environmental factors in the transition to agriculture in Europe

New Neandertal remains from Cova Negra (Valencia, Spain)

The chronology of abrupt climate change and Late Upper Palaeolithic human adaptation in Europe

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