New dating of the Matalascanas footprints provides new evidence of the Middle Pleistocene (MIS 9-8) hominin paleoecology in southern Europe.

ABSTRACT: Hominin footprints were recently discovered at Matalascañas (Huelva; South of Iberian Peninsula). They were dated thanks to a previous study in deposits of the Asperillo cliff to 106 ± 19 ka, Upper Pleistocene, making Neandertals the most likely track-makers. In this paper, we report new Optically Stimulated Luminescence dating that places the hominin footprints surface in the range of 295.8 ± 17 ka (MIS 9-MIS 8 transition, Middle Pleistocene). This new age implies that the possible track-makers are individuals more likely from the Neandertal evolutionary lineage. Regardless of the taxon attributed to the Matalascañas footprints, they supplement the existing partial fossil record for the European Middle Pleistocene Hominins being notably the first palaeoanthropological evidence (hominin sk

SUBMITTER: Mayoral E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9581921 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature