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The Central Balkans are a key biogeographical region in Southern Europe, influenced by a central European-Mediterranean climate, which acted as a refugium for flora and fauna, and favored the dispersion of Neanderthals and migration of modern human populations during Late Glacial Period. This study presents pollen analyses of sediment and hyaena coprolites from Pešturina Cave in Serbia to reconstruct the vegetation landscapes faced by Balkan Neanderthals and early Anatomically Modern Humans between MIS 5e-3. Between MIS 5e-5c (archaeological layers 4c and 4b) and MIS 5b-5a (layer 4a), semi-forested environments prevailed, characterized by Pinus, deciduous Quercus, Tilia and other angiosperm woody taxa, accompanied by heliophytes such as Artemisia and Poaceae. During MIS 4-3 (layers 3-2), the vegetation was dominated by Artemisia-Poaceae steppes with Quercus patches, conifers and legumes. Overall across the sequence, pollen assemblages are highly diverse and include a number of deciduous trees and sclerophylls. In addition, the occurrence of several herbaceous taxa reinforces the view that the Balkans were outstanding for endemicity. Neanderthals and early Upper Palaeolithic hominins lived in a highly diverse refugium, offering multiple opportunities for survival during the warm interstadials and, more critically, the cold stadials of the Pleistocene.

The Marine Isotope Stage 3 (MIS 3) is characterized by signifcant climatic changes associated with abrupt atmospheric shifts over Greenland (Dansgaard-Oeschger events) and episodes of massive iceberg discharge into the North Atlantic (Heinrich events), enhancing cold and dry conditions at mid-to-low latitudes. The extreme conditions and fuctuating climatic and environmental conditions of Marine Isotope Stage 3 signifcantly afected many aspects of the lives of prehistoric populations, including settlement and mobility patterns. Many ethnographic studies show that settlement and mobility patterns are conditioned by numerous factors such as climate conditions, terrain morphology, group preferences, animal behavior, resource availability, etc. Although the Balkan peninsula has been characterized as a refugial region, hominine populations could still be afected by the unstable conditions of Marine Isotope Stage 3. With extensive research conducted during the last few decades in the Balkan peninsula, available data shows mostly diverse practiced settlement models during MIS 3. This study aims to examine settlement and mobility patterns of the hominine groups during Marine Isotope Stage 3 on the Balkan peninsula with a specifc accent on the factors that could have infuenced them. The study is based on published data from the Middle and Upper Paleolithic sites in the Balkan peninsula, dated to Marine Isotope Stage 3. We consider several parameters to assess the settlement and mobility patterns of the hunter-gatherer groups. Two analyses have been conducted: bivariate WABI (Whole assemblage behavior index) and multivariate PCA (Principal component analysis) for the following variables: lithic density, retouched frequency, core, blanks, and chips frequency as well as tool diversity, which are frequently used to assess settlement patterns of prehistoric human populations. Including both Middle and Upper Paleolithic sites, diferences in the settlement patterns are inspected bet

Recent research into the transition from the Middle to the Upper Paleolithic in the Lower Danube has shown that there is a concentration of sites from the early phase of the settlement of modern humans in the area. The Initial Upper Paleolithic was confirmed at sites in northern Bulgaria, while several (Proto) Aurignacian sites were recently identified in northeastern Serbia - at the exit from Iron Gates Gorge. All these layers pre-date the CI eruption (42-40 ka cal BP). In contrast, all of the sites located on the other side of the Iron Gates and the Carpathian-Balkan mountain range in eastern Serbia are dated to the period after the eruption. The geographical distribution and chronology of the Aurignacian sites supports the hypothesis that the Danube was an important corridor at this time, especially since the sites that could be linked to the IUP and proto-Aurignacian have not yet been recorded deeper in the interior of the Balkans. This suggests the possibility that in the period before, and especially after the eruption, there was aggregation and social and cultural integration of the Aurignacian groups in the southwestern Carpathian Mountains. The richness and variability of Aurignacian industries in Banat, as well as the appearance of cave art in Coliboaia and (perhaps) Selačka Pećina 3, may indirectly attest to this.

Based on the premise that Lower Paleolithic sites in the Central Balkans can be expected in the vicinity of primary and secondary deposits of raw materials, intensive explorations have been carried out in the last decade in the area of the spread of the Vardar geotectonic zone with pronounced Miocene volcanism and rich opal and chalcedony deposits formed under hydrothermal conditions. At the largest of these deposits - in the area of the Radan Mountain - we identified a large number of lithic scatters with numerous artifacts from the Lower Paleolithic. At one of them - at the location of Petrovac 1 - test excavations showed that there are at least two layers with Paleolithic artifacts. The deepest layer (3) contained unipolar, bipolar and irregular cores, very small, often elongated flakes, and a small number of slightly modified tools on flakes, as well as massive chopper-like tools made from fragments of pyroclastic rocks. The upper layer (2) contained an industry characterized by SSDA, centripetal and preferential cores, but without elaborate Levallois products. Although attempts at radiometric dating have not been successful so far, the assemblage from the layer 3 can be attributed to the core and flake (Mode 1) industries that occurred in the Balkans from more than a million years ago (Kozarnika) until 500-300 thousand years ago (Marathousa, Dealul Guran). The findings from layer 2 do not have close parallels with other sites in the Balkans, since so far only a few Chibanian (previously Middle Pleistocene) sites with the small tool assemblages have been identified. The Radan site has a great potential for studying the development of Lower Paleolithic technology in this part of Europe.

Despite the abundance of publications in the last forty years, as detailed studies on reduction processes, the existence and co-existence of Levallois and non-Levallois laminar strategies and their variability in the Middle Paleolithic in Europe still need to be better understood. Many reasons could influence the appearance of these two types of laminar products: technological traditions, land use strategies, subsistence, mobility, and raw material availability, but also different ways of utilization of lithic products. The wider research scope of our study covers all the listed factors; however, we have chosen to focus on the function of the tools and their relations to the behavioral patterns of the Neanderthal communities in the late Middle Paleolithic of Central Balkans. The analyzed material comes from five archaeological sites, dating in MIS 3. Totally 15 Levallois and 65 non-Levallois laminar blanks are studied technologically and functionally. The complexity of activities obtained with those tools is viewed and discussed with raw material procurement data and metrics as indicators of their potential for carrying and reshaping with an aim to represent the fundamental differences between curated and expedient technological strategies.

A recent study from Central Europe has changed our perception of the cat’s domestication history. The authors discuss how this has led to the development of an interdisciplinary project combining palaeogenetics, zooarchaeology and radiocarbon dating, with the aim of providing insight into the domestic cat’s expansion beyond the Mediterranean.

esearch has shown that the territory present-day Serbia was continuously inhabited from the earliest prehistoric to historic times. Covering most of what is Serbia today, the Central Balkans acted as an important migration corridor that connected Southwest Asia with Central and Western Europe. Moreover, the Central Balkans represented an important ecological and social refugium for European human communities during harsh glacial periods and other crises. The highest population densities throughout the region’s prehistory were recorded in river valleys, as well as the lowland and low hilly areas at their peripheries, while occupations of hilly-mountainous areas were more frequent during Paleolithic and Metal Ages. Apart from historical and social circumstances, population densities and the occurrence of specific settlement patterns were also influenced by the distribution of mineral and food resources exploited during particular intervals. Prehistoric cultural and demographic links between the Balkans and Central Europe or Southwest Asia have been well documented. However, the Balkans also saw the rise of authentic cultural manifestations such as the Lepenski Vir culture which have not been documented in other parts of Europe.

As repeatedly demonstrated by archaeological and ethnoarchaeological data, hunter-gatherers’ settlement patterns are known to differ between different groups and periods. How groups organized their movements and settlements in the landscape was to a large extent influenced by the important events in climate history and more intermediate environmental conditions. The goal of this study is to examine if and how hominin groups changed their settlement patterns as a response to fluctuating climatic and environmental conditions during the rather unstable Marine Isotope stages 3-1 on the Balkan peninsula. Based on the published data two analysis have been conducted: bivariate WABI (Whole assemblage behavior index) and multivariate PCA (Principal component analysis) analyses for the following variables: lithic density, retouched frequency, core, blanks and chips frequency as well as tool diversity, which are frequently used to access settlement patterns of prehistoric human populations. Both Middle and Upper Paleolithic sites are included in the study, which allowed us to detect changes in settlement in different time periods, different hominin populations and in different microregions of the Balkan Peninsula.

The oral microbiome plays key roles in human biology, health, and disease, but little is known about the global diversity, variation, or evolution of this microbial community. To better understand the evolution and changing ecology of the human oral microbiome, we analyzed 124 dental biofilm metagenomes from humans, including Neanderthals and Late Pleistocene to present-day modern humans, chimpanzees, and gorillas, as well as New World howler monkeys for comparison. We find that a core microbiome of primarily biofilm structural taxa has been maintained throughout African hominid evolution, and these microbial groups are also shared with howler monkeys, suggesting that they have been important oral members since before the catarrhine-platyrrhine split ca. 40 Mya. However, community structure and individual microbial phylogenies do not closely reflect host relationships, and the dental biofilms of Homo and chimpanzees are distinguished by major taxonomic and functional differences. Reconstructing oral metagenomes from up to 100 thousand years ago, we show that the microbial profiles of both Neanderthals and modern humans are highly similar, sharing functional adaptations in nutrient metabolism. These include an apparent Homo-specific acquisition of salivary amylase-binding capability by oral streptococci, suggesting microbial coadaptation with host diet. We additionally find evidence of shared genetic diversity in the oral bacteria of Neanderthal and Upper Paleolithic modern humans that is not observed in later modern human populations. Differences in the oral microbiomes of African hominids provide insights into human evolution, the ancestral state of the human microbiome, and a temporal framework for understanding microbial health and disease.

He specific character of the Iron Gates Mesolithic material culture derives from the geomorphological and ecological features of the Iron Gates gorge in the Early Holocene. However, the Mesolithic of this geographic area can be entirely linked to the general flows of Mesolithic development in Europe as well as to the phenomena observed in the Adriatic-Ionian and Aegean zones. This demonstrates that the cultural, technological and economic changes which occurred during the Early Holocene were influenced by the same or similar factors as the entire area of the Balkan Peninsula. The absence of Mesolithic settlements outside the Iron Gates raises the question of whether the interior parts of the Central Balkans were inhabited during the Early Holocene. As hinted by the research in the Iron Gates and the Adriatic hinterland, Mesolithic settlements were probably located outside the denser forested areas (in the littoral and high-altitude zones) but this remains to be confirmed. Based on the assessment of the demographic potential of Mesolithic and Neolithic communities, four scenarios of Neolithisation of different parts of the Balkan Peninsula have been proposed.

The Carpathian Basin is a key region for understanding modern human expansion into western Eurasia during the Late Pleistocene because of numerous early hominid fossil find spots. However, the corresponding archeological record remains less understood due to a paucity of well dated, contextualized sites. To help rectify this, we excavated and sampled Crvenka-At (Serbia), one of the largest Upper Paleolithic sites in the region to obtain radiometric ages for the archeological artifacts and evaluate their depositional context and subsequent site formation processes. Our results confirm that this locality represents a multiple-occupation Aurignacian site that dates to 36.4 +/- 2.8 ka based on modeling of luminescence ages. Electrical resistivity tomography measurements indicate that the site formed on a sandy-gravelly fill terrace covered by overbank deposits. Complex grain size distributions further suggest site formation in contrasting depositional environments typically occurring alongside fluvial channels, at lakeshores, in alluvial fan or delta settings. The site is thus the closest (ca. 50 km) known Aurignacian site to the earliest undisputed modern human remains in Europe at the Pestera cu oase and some intervals of the occupation may therefore have been contemporaneous with them. This suggests that modern humans, during their initial settlement of Europe, exploited a wider range of topographic and ecological settings than previously posited. Our findings indicate that lowland areas of the Carpathian Basin are an important part of understanding the early settlement patterns of modern humans in Europe.

U disertaciji su razmatrane gravirane i slikane predstave na glacijalnim stenama u praistoriji Fenoskandije. Rad je imao za cilj da se sagledaju mogućnosti interpretacije ovih predstava (naročito sa aspekta šamanizma) i da se utvrdi da li se njihovo značenje menjalo tokom poslednjih deset hiljada godina. Proučavanja stenske umetnosti su dobila na značaju pre šezdesetak godina, dok su ranije bila prilično zanemarena. Njome su se uglavnom bavili amateri i entuzijasti, dok arheološkoj građi, odnosno arheološkom kontekstu nije poklanjano previše pažnje. Kad su proučavanja ove građe počela da uzimaju maha, arheolozi ali i mnogi amateri davali su različite interpretacije. U početku su preovlađivale kulturno-istorijske interpretacije kao što je lovna magija, zatim savremenije funkcionalističke i strukturalističke interpretacije, da bi se krajem osamdesetih godina prošlog veka pojavile i teorije koje govore o vezi između šamanizma i praistorijskih likovnih predstava na stenama. Interpretacije zasnovane na šamanizmu danas predstavljaju najprihvaćeniji model tumačenja ovih predstava u Južnoj Africi, Evropi i u Severnoj i Srednjoj Americi. Kod nas se ova vrsta arheološke građe do sada nije proučavala, niti se pominjala kao naučna tema. Široki hronološki opseg koji je ovde obuhvaćen odnosi se na skandinavsko kameno doba, pre svega mezolit i neolit, kao i na početak metalnog doba Fenoskandije. Areali čija su nalazišta sa stenskom umetnošću ovde predstavljena su Norveška, Švedska, Finska, Kola poluostrvo i oblast Karelije u severozapadnoj Rusiji. Sve pomenute regije su bile podložne velikim geološkim promenama tipičnim za rani holocen, samim tim i promenama predela koje su uticale na život u pomenutim paistorijskim periodima. Opisani lokaliteti sa predstavama na stenama su Ofoten i Alta u severnoj Norveškoj, Nemforsen u srednjoj Švedskoj, Valkeisaari u jugoistočnoj Finskoj, Kanozero na Kola poluostrvu i Vig na krajnjem severozapadu Rusije, na ušću u Belo more. U disertaciji je za, The dissertation studies carved and painted images on glacial rocks in the prehistory of Fenoscandia. The goal of the work was to examine the possibilities of interpretation of these images (especially in the context of shamanism) and to establish whether their meaning has changed during the last ten thousand years. Before it began to gain importance around sixty years ago, study of rock art was quite neglected. It was mostly pursued by amateurs and enthusiasts, with little attention given to archeological material and archeological context. When study of this material began to gain momentum, archeologists, as well as numerous amateurs, offered various interpretations. In the beginning, interpretations were predominantly of a cultural-historical nature, such as hunting magic. These were followed by more modern functionalist and structuralist interpretations, while the late 1980s saw the appearance of theories about the connection between shamanism and prehistoric images on rocks. Interpretations based on shamanism are today the most widely accepted model for interpreting such images in South Africa, Europe, and North and Central America. In our country, until now this type of archeological material has not been studied, or even mentioned as a subject of scholarly research. The wide chronological scope encompassed here refers to the Scandinavian Stone Age, primarily the Mesolithic and the Neolithic, as well as to the early Metal Age of Fenoscandia. Areas whose rock art sites are presented here are Norway, Sweden, Finland, and the Kola Peninsula and the Karelian region in Russia. All these areas were subjected to large-scale geological changes typical of the early Holocene, implying changes of landscape which influenced life during the abovementioned prehistoric periods. Sites with rock images that have been described are Ofoten and Alta in northern Norway, Nämforsen in central Sweden, Valkeisaari in southeast Finland, Kanozero on the Kola Peninsula, and Vyg at the ex