Beaver exploitation, 400,000 years ago, testifies to prey choice diversity of Middle Pleistocene hominins.

ABSTRACT: Data regarding the subsistence base of early hominins are heavily biased in favor of the animal component of their diets, in particular the remains of large mammals, which are generally much better preserved at archaeological sites than the bones of smaller animals, let alone the remains of plant food. Exploitation of smaller game is very rarely documented before the latest phases of the Pleistocene, which is often taken to imply narrow diets of archaic Homo and interpreted as a striking economic difference between Late Pleistocene and earlier hominins. We present new data that contradict this view of Middle Pleistocene Lower Palaeolithic hominins: cut mark evidence demonstrating systematic exploitation of beavers, identified in the large faunal assemblage from the c. 400,000 years old hom

SUBMITTER: Gaudzinski-Windheuser S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10643649 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature