Although the project aimed to extend the primary landscape mapping methodology developed over as large an area as possible, this was achieved over a vast area of c, 185,000 km2. Prior to this work, knowledge of settlement or in situ activity was, restricted globally to onshore, and nearshore environments (<12km from land). Beyond this, evidence of human activity was solely represented by chance discoveries, lacking any archaeological context. Detailed consideration of the project mapping, in conjunction with behavioural data and geomorphological assessment, identified key localities where prehistoric activity might be located and accessible to coring and dredging. In project field work, directed by our research, recovered the first, globally, directly prospected prehistoric artefact from a deep marine context. This marks a paradigm shift in the study of marine palaeolandscapes, providing a base methodology to locate human activity in deep sea regions globally.
The project also made major technological advances. Before the start of Europe’s Lost Frontiers, sedimentary DNA was a, largely, unproven technology in archaeology, but project application, supported by traditional environmental studies, made a significant contribution to the field of sedaDNA and our understanding of the early Holocene world of the Doggerland area.
Research on human-scale effects of landscape inundation through computer simulation was also largely untried. The suite of technologies used within Europe’s Lost Frontiers had individually shown potential but were previously untried within a unified, inter-disciplinary project. The simulations have proven to be essential adjuncts to study pattern of sea level change and the taphonomy of environmental proxies, justifying their presence as tools of data integration.
Our goal to create a new research paradigm for inundated landscapes globally using these technologies was successful.
