From Newsgroup: sci.anthropology.paleo



https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0328218

On the ecological impact of prehistoric
hunter-gatherers in Europe: Early Holocene
(Mesolithic) and Last Interglacial
(Neanderthal) foragers compared


Abstract
Recent studies have highlighted evidence of
human impact on landscapes dating back to
the Late PleistocenerColong before the advent
of agriculture. Quantifying the extent of
vegetation transformations by hunter-gatherers
remains a major research challenge. We address
this challenge by comparing climate-based
potential natural vegetation cover with
pollen-based vegetation reconstructions for
the Last Interglacial and the Early Holocene.
Differences between these datasets suggest
that climate alone cannot fully explain the
pollen-based vegetation patterns in Europe
during these periods. To explore this issue,
we used an upgraded version of the HUMan impact
on LANDscapes (HUMLAND) agent-based model (ABM),
combined with a genetic algorithm, to generate
vegetation change scenarios. By comparing ABM
outputs with pollen-based reconstructions, we
aimed to identify parameter values that yield
HUMLAND results closely matching the
pollen-based vegetation cover. The updated ABM
covers a broad temporal range, and incorporates
the effects of hunting on herbivores and their
influence on vegetation regeneration. The
results show that the combined effects of
megafauna, natural fires, and climatic
fluctuations alone lead to vegetation cover
estimates that are inconsistent with
paleoecological reconstructions. Instead,
anthropogenic burning played a key role, with
modelling results suggesting that European
landscapes were already substantially modified
by humans by the Early Holocene. In scenarios
where human-induced burning was minimal or
absent, foragers still shaped landscapes
indirectly through hunting, which influenced
herbivore densities and their impact on
vegetation dynamics. Our study revealed that
Neanderthals and Mesolithic humans influenced
similar-sized areas around their campsites and
shared comparable preferences for vegetation
openness. Our results challenge the assumption
that pre-agricultural humans had minimal
ecological impact. Instead, this study provides
strong evidence that both Neanderthals and
Mesolithic foragers actively shaped European
interglacial ecosystems, influencing vegetation
dynamics long before agriculture.
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