Research at the RGZM
Main Researches
Early Human Expansion and the Colonization of Western Eurasia
In only 2, 5 million years, humans have adapted to different habitats and therefore were able to expand across the entire globe. The goal of this concentration is the detailed research on the quantity and the types of expansion as well as the underlying mechanisms. A topic of special interest is the extent to which geographical and paleo-climatic conditions, or rather the development of special cognitive abilities, either encouraged the expansion or opposed it. Data from many different scientific disciplines are combined into models on the colonization of western Eurasia. After the completion of studies on the earliest human expansion beyond the borders of Africa approximately 1.8-1 million years, the researches now focus on the final stage of the Pleistocene, the transition from the Middle Paleolithic to the Upper Paleolithic in western Eurasia and the resettlement of northern Europe after the last glacial period between 20,000 and 8,000 BC. An important contribution came from the development of a 14C-Databank planned for 2007 and the refinement of a calibration curve in glacial climate periods.
In the context of this research focus, Sonja Grimm, doctoral candidate at the Monrepos Research Centre in the year 2006, created maps of the late glacial Europe.
These maps are available for download now.
Contact:
MONREPOS Archaeological Research Centre and Museum for Human Behavioural Evolution
Schloss Monrepos
56567 Neuwied
Tel.: +49 (0) 2631 97720
Fax: +49 (0) 2631 76357