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- 40,000 years later: what we know about the presence of Neanderthals in Portuguese territory and their extinctionPublication . Cardoso, João Luís; Cascalheira, JoãoBrief presentation of the theme addressing the history of investigations carried out in Portugal about the presence of Neanderthals, the sites with anhtropological and archaeological record and their antiquity. Considering their close resemblance with our own species and long‑term success across Eurasia, Neanderthals ought to have had all it takes to persist. However, sometime between c. 45,000 and 30,000 years ago, Neanderthals ultimately disappear from the archaeological record, being replaced by modern humans. This cultural and biological replacement process is considered one of the most significant turning points in human evolutionary history. In recent years, knowledge of the processes involved in the disappearance of the Neanderthals and the successful expansion of our species across Eurasia has substantially increased. Still, the spatiotemporal variability of the presumed mechanisms behind Neanderthals’ demise – climate change, fragile demography, inter‑species competition – makes evaluating the replacement at a continental scale very challenging. The Iberian Peninsula, due to its cul‑de‑sac position and the role of its southern regions as one of the last refugia for the Neanderthals, represents an ideal natural setting for testing models of cultural and demographic trajectories leading to the final disappearance of those populations. Focusing on the Iberian archaeological record, in this paper we address the current state of the art and future directions regarding the study of the latest Neanderthals on earth.
- 40,000 years later: what we know about the presence of Neanderthals in Portuguese territory and their extinctionPublication . Cardoso, João Luís; Cascalheira, JoãoBrief presentation of the theme addressing the history of investigations carried out in Portugal about the presence of Neanderthals, the sites with anhtropological and archaeological record and their antiquity. Considering their close resemblance with our own species and long‑term success across Eurasia, Neanderthals ought to have had all it takes to persist. However, sometime between c. 45,000 and 30,000 years ago, Neanderthals ultimately disappear from the archaeological record, being replaced by modern humans. This cultural and biological replacement process is considered one of the most significant turning points in human evolutionary history. In recent years, knowledge of the processes involved in the disappearance of the Neanderthals and the successful expansion of our species across Eurasia has substantially increased. Still, the spatiotemporal variability of the presumed mechanisms behind Neanderthals’ demise – climate change, fragile demography, inter‑species competition – makes evaluating the replacement at a continental scale very challenging. The Iberian Peninsula, due to its cul‑de‑sac position and the role of its southern regions as one of the last refugia for the Neanderthals, represents an ideal natural setting for testing models of cultural and demographic trajectories leading to the final disappearance of those populations. Focusing on the Iberian archaeological record, in this paper we address the current state of the art and future directions regarding the study of the latest Neanderthals on earth.
- A estação solutrense do Olival do Arneiro (Rio Maior)Publication . Cardoso, João Luís; Cascalheira, João; Martins, FilipeThe Solutrean site of Arneiro, or Olival do Arneiro, was identified by Manuel Heleno in 1942 and successively explored by him, in several intermittent campaigns of limited duration, until October 1944. It had already been the subject of a preliminary study in the seventies by Zbyszewski and collaborators. However, the authors were not aware of the contents of Manuel Heleno’s field notebooks with importante informations on the spatial distribution of materials, as a result of the ditches that were opened, as well as their typology and stratigraphy. Such elements appear essential for the framing of the results now presented, corresponding to the study of the whole collection, in the light of new morphometric and morphological criteria performed. In this way, the study of the 30 bifacial points identified and separated from the rest of the collection by O. da Veiga Ferreira, constituting to date the most important set of solutrean points from one single place of the Portuguese territory, was completed by the studyof the remaining part of the original set, consisting of 391 bifacial points in different stages of execution belonging to the Museu Nacional de Arqueologia collections, of which only 51 are near the final stage of execution. The general conclusion obtained through the different analytical methodologies adopted led to the integration of this second set of pieces also in the Solutrean techno‑complex. However, as there is no possibility of confronting this operative chain with another one known to be solutrean or more modern, it remains to demonstrate its true chronology.