Pei, S;
Deng, C;
de la Torre, I;
Jia, Z;
Ma, D;
Li, X;
Wang, X;
(2019)
Magnetostratigraphic and archaeological records at the Early Pleistocene site complex of Madigou (Nihewan Basin): Implications for human adaptations in North China.
Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology
, 530
pp. 176-189.
10.1016/j.palaeo.2019.05.014.
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Abstract
The Nihewan Basin in North China contains the densest concentration of early Pleistocene Paleolithic sites outside Africa. This paper introduces a new archaeological site complex at Madigou (MDG) that was systematically excavated from 2011 to 2014 in the northeastern part of the Nihewan Basin. The site contains fossils and well-preserved stone artefacts in fluvio-lacustrine sediments. Our magnetostratigraphic results situate the MDG sedimentary sequence in the early Brunhes normal chron and the late Matuyama reverse chron, including the Jaramillo normal subchron. The MDG artifact layers are positioned within the pre-Jaramillo Matuyama chron, with an estimated age of ca. 1.2 Ma, close to the onset of Mid-Pleistocene climate transition. The MDG core and flake technology includes bipolar flaking of siliceous dolomite cobbles, and freehand flaking of chert and brecciated chert block fragments. Mammalian fauna and pollen compositions indicate that the MDG hominins lived in an open habitat varying from lightly-wooded grassland to an ecosystem dominated by sparse steppe near the shore of the Nihewan paleolake. Our combined results in the fields of archaeology, paleontology, palynology and magnetochronology suggest that innovations in technological behavior may correlate with adaptations to high environmental variability during the start of Mid-Pleistocene climate transition.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Magnetostratigraphic and archaeological records at the Early Pleistocene site complex of Madigou (Nihewan Basin): Implications for human adaptations in North China |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.palaeo.2019.05.014 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1016/j.palaeo.2019.05.014 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions. |
| Keywords: | Magnetostratigraphy; early human adaptations; Early Pleistocene; Madigou site complex; Nihewan Basin; North China |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS > Institute of Archaeology |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10077971 |
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