Human occupations of upland and cold environments in inland Spain during the Last Glacial Maximum and Heinrich Stadial 1: The new Magdalenian sequence of Charco Verde II.

The settlement of cold and arid environments by Pleistocene hunter-gatherers has been a heated topic in Paleolithic Archaeology and the Quaternary Sciences for years. In the Iberian Peninsula, a key area for studying human adaptations to such environments is composed by the large interior and upland regions of the northern and southern plateaus (Mesetas) and bordering areas. As, traditionally, these regions have been relatively under-investigated compared to the ecologically more favored coastal areas of the peninsula, our knowledge of the human settlement of the whole Iberian hinterland remains scarce for the Last Glacial.

First modern human settlement recorded in the Iberian hinterland occurred during Heinrich Stadial 2 within harsh environmental conditions.

As the south-westernmost region of Europe, the Iberian Peninsula stands as a key area for understanding the process of modern human dispersal into Eurasia. However, the precise timing, ecological setting and cultural context of this process remains controversial concerning its spatiotemporal distribution within the different regions of the peninsula. While traditional models assumed that the whole Iberian hinterland was avoided by modern humans due to ecological factors until the retreat of the Last Glacial Maximum, recent research has demonstrated that hunter-gatherers entered the Iberian interior at least during Solutrean times.

Response to Comment on "U-Th dating of carbonate crusts reveals Neandertal origin of Iberian cave art".

Slimak challenge the reliability of our oldest (>65,000 years) U-Th dates on carbonates associated with cave paintings in Spain. They cite a supposed lack of parietal art for the 25,000 years following this date, along with potential methodological issues relating to open-system behavior and corrections to detrital or source water Th. We show that their criticisms are unfounded.

U-Th dating of carbonate crusts reveals Neandertal origin of Iberian cave art.

The extent and nature of symbolic behavior among Neandertals are obscure. Although evidence for Neandertal body ornamentation has been proposed, all cave painting has been attributed to modern humans. Here we present dating results for three sites in Spain that show that cave art emerged in Iberia substantially earlier than previously thought.

A context for the last Neandertals of interior Iberia: Los Casares cave revisited.

Introduction And Objectives: Although the Iberian Peninsula is a key area for understanding the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition and the demise of the Neandertals, valuable evidence for these debates remains scarce and problematic in its interior regions. Sparse data supporting a late Neandertal persistence in the Iberian interior have been recently refuted and hence new evidence is needed to build new models on the timing and causes of Neandertal disappearance in inland Iberia and the whole peninsula. In this study we provide new evidence from Los Casares, a cave located in the highlands of the Spanish Meseta, where a Neandertal-associated Middle Paleolithic site was discovered and first excavated in the 1960's.