Tracing Hominin Occupations of and Migrations through the Levant: Reviving Paleolithic Research in Lebanon

Project Information

REVIVE

Grant agreement ID: 101001889

DOI

10.3030/101001889

EC signature date 22 February 2021

Start date 1 June 2021

End date 31 May 2028

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 1 999 875,00

EU contribution

€ 1 999 875,00

Coordinated by

EBERHARD KARLS UNIVERSITAET TUEBINGEN
Germany

Periodic Reporting for period 3 - REVIVE (Tracing Hominin Occupations of and Migrations through the Levant: Reviving Paleolithic Research in Lebanon)

Reporting period: 2024-06-01 to 2025-11-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Mounting archaeological, anthropological, and genetic discoveries over the last 20 years have been forcing us to drastically change our perception of hominin dispersals across the Old-World continents. The traditional Out of Africa theory, which postulates that hominins left Africa to occupy other continents in two strictly-defined and unidirectional waves, is giving way to a more nuanced and dynamic view of movements of hominin populations/species across the Old-World continents over several millions of years. These movements possibly involved dispersals of various hominins out, but also back to Africa, out of Europe, and into Asia, with encounters potentially also resulting in several interbreeding events.

One of the world’s best geographic study areas to enhance our poor understanding of these hominin dispersions and interactions is the region which lies at the cross-roads of the three Old-World continents, i.e. the Levant. At its heart is Lebanon, a country whose rich Paleolithic record remains practically unexplored as initial investigation attempts were forcefully stopped almost half a century ago by the outbreak of the civil war.

In close collaboration with the Lebanese Directorate of Antiquities (Ministry of Culture), the REVIVE project has started to revive Paleolithic research in Lebanon to help us understand the different hominin migrations and dispersals and to shed light on how our species finally managed to spread across the whole world and become the only hominin species alive today.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

The REVIVE project is conducting the first large-scale, interdisciplinary, and systematic research targeting the Paleolithic Period in Lebanon. It is 1) surveying previously known sites to document their preservation status and further archaeological potential after fifty years of mostly being forgotten, 2) conducting new fieldwork in the form of surveys in areas never previously surveyed for prehistoric periods to locate new sites as well as excavations of new and previously known sites, 3) analyzing and re-evaluating previously and newly collected archaeological material, and 4) establishing a chronological and paleoenvironmental frameworks for the Lebanese Paleolithic so it can be linked to the regional and global records of this period. The first two clusters of activities, i.e. the surveys of old sites and new regions have already been completed. All other activities are currently ongoing and significant progress has been made on all levels. Re-excavations of some old sites has been conducted. Excavations of new sites are planned. Analyses of previously and newly collected archaeological material ranging from lithics, to faunal and hominin remains are underway. These analyses include traditional as well as state-of-the-art methodologies in each of the different fields. Samples for dating and paleoenvironmental reconstructions are being collected from various sites and their analysis ongoing. Results of all these scientific activities have just started to emerge and will start be made available to the scientific community and public soon.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The progress made by the REVIVE project so far has followed expectations and in some cases even exceeded them. Using state-of-the-art methodologies from the different sub-disciplines of archeological sciences that we are incorporating, we expect progress to continue to be made through the second half of the project to eventually be able to taxonomically classify the hominin remains recovered from Lebanon and to accordingly allocate different behavioral repertoires to their respective hominin species. This, in turn, would then allow us to better understand hominin occupations of the Levant and their dispersals through this area on their journeys across the globe.

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