On the devil's tracks: unexpected news from the Foresta ichnosite (Roccamonfina volcano, central Italy)

Abstract

The Foresta ichnosite is well known for preserving some of the oldest human fossil footprints recorded in Europe so far. This research aims to: i) describe new footprints that are larger than those already reported, some of which form a new trackway that moves in the opposite direction to all the others; ii) announce the discovery of some stone tools also in the surroundings of the Foresta ichnosite. The new results increase the total number of human fossil footprints to at least 81, specify the direction and the number of footprints of Trackway C, and identify three new directions of walking at the site. More compelling and complete estimates of the dimensional range of all ichnological evidence enables us, furthermore, to estimate the number of trackmakers walking on the trampled surface as a minimum of five, one of them likely being an adult male. The general shape of all the recorded footprints suggests that the Foresta trackmakers share some similarities with those at Sima de los Huesos, and belong to the same taxonomical group as the Ceprano skull. All the new evidence enables us to better understand the presence of hominin populations in the Roccamonfina volcano area during the Middle Pleistocene. © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

New dating of the Matalascañas footprints provides new evidence of the Middle Pleistocene (MIS 9-8) hominin paleoecology in southern Europe

“…to Homo neanderthalensis or Homo heidelbergensis s.l.). Footprints are even more scarce than skeletal remains in the entire European Middle Pleistocene since only four sites have delivered footprints from this period: Terra Amata 37 and Roccamonfina 4 , dated to 380,000 and 345,000 years ago, whose footprints were attributed to Homo heidelbergensis , and the sites of Biache-Vaast 12 and Theopetra 7 , dated to 236,000 and 130,000 years ago, whose footprints were attributed to Homo neanderthalensis . The dimensions of these Middle Pleistocene footprints are known except for the one from Biache-Saint-Vaast.…”

“…The recently published discoveries and re-studies of Pleistocene hominin footprints in UK 1 , France 2 , 3 , Italy 4 , Spain 5 , 6 , and Greece 7 have highlighted the crucial importance of the ichnological record in discussing Europe’s palaeoanthropological scenario.…”

Hypoxia in Paleolithic decorated caves: the use of artificial light in deep caves reduces oxygen concentration and induces altered states of consciousness

“…In recent years, it has become evident that Neanderthals, in the framework of the Middle Paleolithic period (ca. 200-45 kyr), entered deep, dark caves in order to construct mysterious circular structures and used fire while in the cave (Jaubert et al 2016), climbed up a volcano soon after it erupted (Panarello et al 2020), dived into deep water in order to retrieve fresh shells for making tools (Villa et al 2020), and routinely extracted and used bird feathers and talons (Finlayson et al 2019;Morin and Laroulandie 2012;Peresani et al 2011;Rodríguez-Hidalgo et al 2019;Romandini et al 2014). In our view, all these behaviors might be viewed as liminal, suggesting that even the Neanderthals were already heavily engaged in their relationships with the upper and lower worlds and used using transformative and landscape features as mediators between the worlds.…”

Function, life histories, and biographies of Lower Paleolithic patinated flint tools from Late Acheulian Revadim, Israel

“…The extraction and use of bird feathers and talons 160 – 165 exemplifies this idea as well. Neanderthals, during European Middle Paleolithic times, are known to have entered deep, dark caves to build circular structures and used fire while in the cave 166 , climbed up a volcano soon after it erupted 167 , and dived into deep water in order to retrieve fresh shells for making tools 168 . In our view, all these behaviors might be viewed as practices rooted in ontological beliefs.…”