Weaving social networks from cultural similarities on the neolithisation process in the Western Mediterranean: Evolutionary trajectories using projectile tools.

In this paper, we concentrate on the neolithisation process in Mediterranean Iberia through a diachronic view (from 8600-6800 cal. BP), focusing on social interaction as a factor in articulating new cultural ties. To do this, we apply techniques centred on similarities in material culture by applying Social Network Analysis (SNA).

The spread of agriculture in Iberia through Approximate Bayesian Computation and Neolithic projectile tools.

In the present article we use geometric microliths (a specific type of arrowhead) and Approximate Bayesian Computation (ABC) in order to evaluate possible origin points and expansion routes for the Neolithic in the Iberian Peninsula. In order to do so, we divide the Iberian Peninsula in four areas (Ebro river, Catalan shores, Xúquer river and Guadalquivir river) and we sample the geometric microliths existing in the sites with the oldest radiocarbon dates for each zone. On this data, we perform a partial Mantel test with three matrices: geographic distance matrix, cultural distance matrix and chronological distance matrix.

The genomic history of the Iberian Peninsula over the past 8000 years.

We assembled genome-wide data from 271 ancient Iberians, of whom 176 are from the largely unsampled period after 2000 BCE, thereby providing a high-resolution time transect of the Iberian Peninsula. We document high genetic substructure between northwestern and southeastern hunter-gatherers before the spread of farming. We reveal sporadic contacts between Iberia and North Africa by ~2500 BCE and, by ~2000 BCE, the replacement of 40% of Iberia's ancestry and nearly 100% of its Y-chromosomes by people with Steppe ancestry.