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EFCHED Project:

Investigating dispersal patterns of our earliest Ancestors outside Africa

Contact: Paul Valdes

Motivation
Recent archaeological sites have demonstrated that the first Hominin (early humans) left Africa by 1.8 million years ago. This date is surprising as it was previously believed that this occurred only 1 million years ago. However we still only have a few well-dated sites. Figure 1 shows the distribution of some of the Hominin finds, as well as estimates of their ages.

Figure 1: dated Hominin sites outside Africa used in the first stage of the project.

Figure 1: dated Hominin sites outside Africa used in the first stage of the project.

It is not possible to be certain from this small number of fossil sites the path these early pioneers took as they left Africa. A number of different effects have also been suggested as important in controlling the direction of their movement. The following have been highlighted as being amongst some of the most important:

  • How important are mountain ranges?
  • To what extent did climate limit where they could go?
  • Were they able to exploit coastal regions?
  • How were they affected by global vegetation patterns?

A number of dispersal routes which involve a combination of these and other factors have been proposed. With insufficient data to test these suggestions (figure 1) it is difficult to draw conclusions about which are the dominant effects. This situation is the motivation for the current project.

By combining the different effects into a single model of dispersal we can attempt to investigate the importance of each effect. The modelling approach can also lend support to such controversial issues in archaeology as the apparently late arrival of Hominin in central Europe.

Why BRIDGE?
In order to simulate global dispersal of Hominin it is important to have estimates of the environment into which they are dispersing. Using the knowledge pool of the BRIDGE group we are able to produce estimates of the global conditions (vegetation patterns, temperature, precipitation etc). These predictions of environmental conditions can then be used in the dispersal model.