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The genomic history of ice-age Europeans

An extensive genomic time series has been produced for 356 humans from across ice-age Europe. The data reveal how climate change affected the ranges of hunter-gatherer populations as they developed diverse cultures.
  1. Ludovic Orlando

    1. Ludovic Orlando is at the Centre for Anthropobiology and Genomics of Toulouse (CNRS UMR 5288), Paul Sabatier University, 31000 Toulouse, France.

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For most of the past 100,000 years, the glacial conditions of the last ice age prevailed across Europe. About halfway through this period, the first anatomically modern humans arrived on the continent1,2. Groups of hunter-gatherers developed breathtaking art, diverse lithic industries (which made tools from stone) and funerary practices across Europe. Then, around 9,000 years ago (9 ka), farmers from Anatolia started to settle3. Whether the pre-farming cultures reflect isolated biological entities or regional differences between highly interconnected groups is highly debated. Also unknown is what happened as the climate changed, including during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM; between about 26 and 19 ka)4, when large parts of the continent became uninhabitable. Writing in Nature, Posth et al.5 provide unprecedented insight into the genomic make-up of ice-age European hunter-gatherers, clarifying the biological underpinnings of several cultures and the relationships between them.

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Nature 615, 41-42 (2023)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-00371-z

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Competing Interests

The author declares no competing interests.

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