William E. Banks

Neanderthal extinction by competitive exclusion.

Background Despite a long history of investigation, considerable debate revolves around whether Neanderthals became extinct because of climate change or competition with anatomically modern humans (AMH). Methodology/Principal Findings We apply a new methodology integrating archaeological and chronological data with high-resolution paleoclimatic simulations to define eco-cultural niches associated with Neanderthal and AMH adaptive systems during alternating cold and mild phases of Marine Isotope Stage 3. Our results indicate that Neanderthals and AMH exploited similar niches, and may have continued to do so in the absence of contact. Conclusions/Significance The southerly contraction of Neanderthal range in southwestern Europe during Greenland Interstadial 8 was not due to climate change or a change in adaptation, but rather concurrent AMH geographic expansion appears to have produced competition that led to Neanderthal extinction.

Human-climate interaction during the Early Upper Paleolithic: testing the hypothesis of an adaptive shift between the Proto-Aurignacian and the Early Aurignacian.

The Aurignacian technocomplex comprises a succession of culturally distinct phases. Between its first two subdivisions, the Proto-Aurignacian and the Early Aurignacian, we see a shift from single to separate reduction sequences for blade and bladelet production, the appearance of split-based antler points, and a number of other changes in stone tool typology and technology as well as in symbolic material culture. Bayesian modeling of available (14)C determinations, conducted within the framework of this study, indicates that these material culture changes are coincident with abrupt and marked climatic changes. The Proto-Aurignacian occurs during an interval (ca. 41.5-39.9 k cal BP) of relative climatic amelioration, Greenland Interstadials (GI) 10 and 9, punctuated by a short cold stadial. The Early Aurignacian (ca. 39.8-37.9 k cal BP) predominantly falls within the climatic phase known as Heinrich Stadial (HS) 4, and its end overlaps with the beginning of GI 8, the former being predominantly characterized by cold and dry conditions across the European continent. We use eco-cultural niche modeling to quantitatively evaluate whether these shifts in material culture are correlated with environmental variability and, if so, whether the ecological niches exploited by human populations shifted accordingly. We employ genetic algorithm (GARP) and maximum entropy (Maxent) techniques to estimate the ecological niches exploited by humans (i.e., eco-cultural niches) during these two phases of the Aurignacian. Partial receiver operating characteristic analyses are used to evaluate niche variability between the two phases. Results indicate that the changes in material culture between the Proto-Aurignacian and the Early Aurignacian are associated with an expansion of the ecological niche. These shifts in both the eco-cultural niche and material culture are interpreted to represent an adaptive response to the relative deterioration of environmental conditions at the onset of HS4.

Identifying Mechanisms behind Middle Paleolithic and Middle Stone Age Cultural Trajectories

A critical analysis of the debate that has surrounded the emergence of “modern behavior” during the last two decades and new ways to study material culture and human-environment relationships allow us to design a novel approach with which we can understand the mechanisms that have led human populations to develop the variety of cultures that we recognize today. We propose a methodological framework that moves away from narrative explanations for the origin of “behavioral modernity” and instead focuses on the interplay between cultural adaptation and environmental change. We argue that by applying this approach to the many different instances of cultural change as well as stasis that characterized the last 300 kyr of human societies we may identify the mechanisms that have led us to become what we are and, if any, the underlying trends that guided this process.

Revisiting the chronology of the Proto-Aurignacian and the Early Aurignacian in Europe: A reply to Higham et al.'s comments on Banks et al. (2013)

IntroductionThe timing of the entry of anatomically modern humans (AMH)onto the European landscape and subsequent cultural changesduring the early Upper Paleolithic are topics that continue toreceive a great deal of attention in the archaeological community.Among the reasons for this focus is that the chronology of thesepopulationeventshasimplicationswithrespecttoinvestigationsofthe Neanderthals’ cultural evolution and eventual disappearance. ItisalsocentraltointerpretationsofhowAMHpopulationsmayhaveculturally responded to millennial-scale climatic variability.Recently, we argued that the transition between the Proto-Aurignacian and Early Aurignacian archaeological cultures wascoincident with the onset of the climatic phase known as HeinrichStadial 4 (Banks et al., 2013). While we focused on the ecologicalimplications of the transition between the two archaeologicaltechnocomplexes, our study hinged on the chronology of thistransition since each technocomplex had to be placed within itsappropriate climatic setting in order to produce accurate andmeaningfulecologicalnichepredictions.Todothis,wereliedontheresults of a Bayesian age model that was based on the existingcorpus of archaeologically and stratigraphically reliable

Identifying early modern human ecological niche expansions and associated cultural dynamics in the South African Middle Stone Age

The archaeological record shows that typically human cultural traits emerged at different times, in different parts of the world, and among different hominin taxa. This pattern suggests that their emergence is the outcome of complex and nonlinear evolutionary trajectories, influenced by environmental, demographic, and social factors, that need to be understood and traced at regional scales. The application of predictive algorithms using archaeological and paleoenvironmental data allows one to estimate the ecological niches occupied by past human populations and identify niche changes through time, thus providing the possibility of investigating relationships between cultural innovations and possible niche shifts. By using such methods to examine two key southern Africa archaeological cultures, the Still Bay [76–71 thousand years before present (ka)] and the Howiesons Poort (HP; 66–59 ka), we identify a niche shift characterized by a significant expansion in the breadth of the HP ecological niche. This expansion is coincident with aridification occurring across Marine Isotope Stage 4 (ca. 72–60 ka) and especially pronounced at 60 ka. We argue that this niche shift was made possible by the development of a flexible technological system, reliant on composite tools and cultural transmission strategies based more on “product copying” rather than “process copying.” These results counter the one niche/one human taxon equation. They indicate that what makes our cultures, and probably the cultures of other members of our lineage, unique is their flexibility and ability to produce innovations that allow a population to shift its ecological niche.

Analysis of Site Formation and Assemblage Integrity Does Not Support Attribution of the Uluzzian to Modern Humans at Grotta del Cavallo

Based on the morphology of two deciduous molars and radiocarbon ages from layers D and E of the Grotta del Cavallo (Lecce, Italy), assigned to the Uluzzian, it has been proposed that modern humans were the makers of this Early Upper Paleolithic culture and that this finding considerably weakens the case for an independent emergence of symbolism among western European Neandertals. Reappraisal of the new dating evidence, of the finds curated in the Taranto Antiquities depot, and of coeval publications detailing the site’s 1963–66 excavations shows that (a) Protoaurignacian, Aurignacian and Early Epigravettian lithics exist in the assemblages from layers D and E, (b) even though it contains both inherited and intrusive items, the formation of layer D began during Protoaurignacian times, and (c) the composition of the extant Cavallo assemblages is influenced in a non-negligible manner by the post-hoc assignment of items to stratigraphic units distinct from that of original discovery. In addition, a major disturbance feature affected the 1960s excavation trench down to Mousterian layer F, this feature went unrecognized until 1964, the human remains assigned to the Uluzzian were discovered that year and/or the previous year, and there are contradictions between field reports and the primary anthropological description of the remains as to their morphology and level of provenience. Given these major contextual uncertainties, the Cavallo teeth cannot be used to establish the authorship of the Uluzzian. Since this technocomplex’s start date is ca. 45,000 calendar years ago, a number of Neandertal fossils are dated to this period, and the oldest diagnostic European modern human fossil is the <41,400 year-old Oase 1 mandible, Neandertal authorship of the Uluzzian remains the parsimonious reading of the evidence.

The Archaeology of Teaching: A Conceptual Framework

Studying the emergence of teaching in our lineage entails identifying learning strategies among human and non-human groups, understanding the situations in which they occur, evaluating their performance, recognizing their expression in the archaeological record, identifying trends in the way knowledge transmission changed through time, and detecting the key moments in which members of our lineage complemented pre-existing transmission strategies with those that led our species to develop cumulative culture and eventually ‘teaching’ as we know it. Here we explore how learning processes function in spatial, temporal, and social dimensions and use the resulting situations to build a tentative framework, which may guide our interpretation of the archaeological record and ultimately aid our identification of the learning processes at work in animal and past hominin societies. We test the pertinence of this heuristic approach by applying it to a handful of archaeological case studies.

High-Resolution Casts for Lithic Use-Wear Analysis

ABSTRACT This paper describes a method for creating positive epoxy casts of lithic artifacts that can be subjected to use-wear examination. This method overcomes problems associated with examining patinated artifactsfor microscopie traces of use and limitations documented for other casting methodologies. These limitations include having to work with negative casts or surface peels, air bubbles on cast surfaces, and long-term east integrity. To demonstrate the utility andaccuracy of the described casting methodology, use-wear features were documented on a sample of patinated Middle Paleolithic stone tools from the site of Solutré-Village (Saône-et-Loire), France. Epoxy casts were made of these tools, and the same use-wear features observed on the tools were located and documents on the casts. The results demonstrate that this methodology allows for the systematic functional analysis of stone tool assemblages independent of artifact color or chemical weathering.

The expansion of Central and Northern European Neolithic populations was associated with a multi-century warm winter and wetter climate

It is still debated whether climate changes had an impact on the emergence, spread, and disappearance of early production-based (Neolithic) adaptations. To date, and despite the incorporation of various paleoclimatic proxies, there exists no spatial reconstruction of the regional impact of the North Atlantic cooling events on Central–Western European climate and environments during the early Holocene. In order to address these two issues, we estimated seasonal and annual temperature and precipitation from a marine pollen record from Trondheimsfjord (central Norway) along with 68 pollen records distributed across Central–Western Europe for the time period associated with the Linearbandkeramik (LBK) cultural tradition, 7600–6900 yr cal. BP. Two distinct vegetation-derived rapid, <100 years, climate changes, contemporaneous with reduced warm Atlantic water (AW) inflow and winter storminess in the northern North Atlantic, bracket the expansion of the LBK. The geographic expansion of LBK populations appears to coincide with winter warming by ca. 2.5°C on average, and an increase in summer and winter precipitation, while its decline is associated with decreases in winter temperature, by ~1.5°C on average, and summer rainfall. Our results confirm that LBK subsistence practices were well-adapted to wet and relatively warm winters and cool summers, which are favorable to some cultigens, such as einkorn. This is in contrast to the hypothesis that cooler and wetter climatic conditions would induce increased instability of agricultural communities leading to the decline of LBK populations.

A Middle Archaic burial from east central Kansas

In late 2001, investigators excavated a solitary Middle Archaic burial from the Plains-Prairie border in east-central Kansas. The burial was contained in a dissected colluvial apron at the foot of the valley wall, in a soil horizon that began accumulating around 9000 B.P. Burial goods include deer bone, a drill, and a side-notched projectile point/knife, the morphology of which is consistent with side-notched Middle Archaic points of the North American Central Plains and Midwest. Use-wear analysis shows that the stone tools were used before being placed with the burial and were not manufactured specifically as burial goods. A radiocarbon assay of the deer bone in direct association with the burial yielded a radiocarbon age of 6160 ± 35 B.P. This is one of only a few burials older than 5,000 years in the region. Comparison of this burial to other coeval regional burials shows similarities in burial practices.