Early Settlements

Europe

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ORIGINS
Out of Africa

Modern Human beings evolved in Africa from a variety of hominid species over a few million years. The first humans to leave the African continent were Homo erectus (upright man), who migrated northeast about 2 million years ago when present day deserts were grassland. These early hunters are thought at first to have been driven by changes in climate to follow migrating animal herds. Over time, they colonized the Middle East, southern Russia, India, the Far East and Southeast Asia. Homo erectus fossils have been dated in Georgia to 1.8 million years ago and in Java to 1.6 million years ago. Human fossil evidence from sites such as Atapuerca in Spain suggests that they were a form of Homo erectus (sometimes called Homo ergaster). Initial colonization was limited to the Mediterranean, but was probably not continuous with humans retreating to warmer environments during the colder phases of climate. There is slight evidence of humans in northern Europe from perhaps 700,000 years ago, but there seems to have been a major expansion over most areas from 500,000 years ago. These humans have been called Homo heidelbergensis after the site of Mauer near Heidelberg in Germany.

We must remember that the evolutionary evidence is sparse and doesn’t form a complete picture, and there are these somewhat inconsistent findings:

The oldest non-African hominids date back to 1.8 million years ago and are based on three fossil finds in Georgia (an ex-state of the former USSR) representing what appears to be a series of evolutionary sequences from Homo habilis-like to increasingly Homo erectus-like. (Click here for more information on Homo georgicus at www.talkorigins.org.)

These fossils question the commonly held belief that Homo erectus/Homo ergastar was the first hominid to hot-foot it out of Africa. Skeptics, however, are of the opinion these fossils represent shrunken Homo erectus, which would make it a close relative of the diminutive Homo floresiensis.  Nevertheless, these skulls have been named Homo georgicus, and were only 1.5 m in stature and possessing a cranial capacity as low as 600cc. (Click here for more details on Homo georgicus at http://en.wikipedia.org.)

Homo antecessor tools (Acheulian) were similar to Homo erectus. Some Homo antecessor bones are anatomically similar to the East African (Turkana Boy) Homo ergaster which date back 1.9 to 1.4 million years ago.  However, Homo heidelbergensis is more closely related to southern African Homo rhodesiensis which was the likely ancestor of Homo sapiens idaltu (Herto Man) who was the ancestor of Homo sapiens sapiens.

This evolutionary line is the evolutionary background for the “Out of Africa” hypothesis describing a single species origin for all of the World’s people.  In Europe Homo heidelbergensis probably evolved into the shorter, but even more heavily built Homo neanderthalensis – an Ice Age specialist.

So when modern humans decided to look west rather than east while pondering their future in a cold Central Asia they would have found Europe already occupied by Homo neanderthalensis, who had separated from the main evolutionary line some 500,000 years ago. About 40,000 years ago, the Central Asian steppes would have extended from China to Europe (Germany) with an abundance of migrating herd animals that would be available on virtually any trek they wished to make. Why had modern humans not explored Europe earlier? About 10,000 years previously, they had fully colonized Australia which required at least a 100 km boat trip across the Wallace line. Most anthropologists believe that the Ice Age and the extensive Saudi Arabian desert is the main reason for modern man not seeking an occidental homeland. The opening up of the “Fertile Crescent” about 40,000 years ago is the key to entering Europe.

mtDNA-based chart of large human migrations

By this time humans had the skills to make hand axes and to hunt and kill large game, such as deer, horse and rhinos. Several spears have been found at Schöningen in Germany, over 2m in length and carefully made from the heartwood of spruce. The site is thought to date to about 400,000 years ago. Evidence for the use of fire has been found at this date from Beeches Pit in England and from Bilzingsleben in Germany. By 130,000 years ago these people displayed the characteristics we classify as Neandertal (or Neanderthal), such as short, robust builds, broad noses, and surprisingly large brain cases (larger, in fact, than ours). Neandertals survived in Europe until 30,000 years ago.

Most scientists believe that modern humans evolved not from Homo erectus and their many descendants, but from a later species which originated in Africa about 150,000 years ago and spread around the globe, gradually replacing archaic humans in each location with little or no genetic mixing. Modern humans and Neandertals existed side-by-side in Europe for example for perhaps 15,000 years before the earlier species became extinct.

Our modern ancestors probably first left Africa about 100,000 years ago when water levels were low enough to allow easy passage across the mouth of the Red Sea. The ancestors of modern Europeans then branched off from those who first arrived in southern Arabia. Their northwest migration had to wait until at least 50,000 years until a moist, warm climate greened the Arabian Desert. There were no such constraints for their eastbound cousins – the beach-combers who pressed around the shores of the Indian Ocean and arrived in Australia over 60,000 years ago, long before Europe was colonized.

Modern Man (Homo sapiens sapiens) arrived relatively recently in Europe (~40,000 years ago) compared to colonization that occurred in South East Asia and Australia which date back more than 55,000 years ago.  One of the first arrivals of Homo sapiens sapiens is referred to as Cro Magnon, but they were not the first humans to have arrived in Europe.

Europe was a geographical cul-de-sac, an inaccessible peninsula jutting out north-west from the original beachhead in southwest Asia. Genetically as well as geographically, Europeans are a side-branch of the out-of-Africa human tree, and the immediate ancestors of Europeans were Asian rather than African. “Peninsular Europe” was most likely the recipient and beneficiary of the earliest Palaeolithic innovations, rather than their place of origin.

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