Este proyecto trata de comprender la naturaleza de los asentamientos neandertales entre hace 115 y 45 mil años en el valle de Alzolaras (Gipuzkoa). Para ello se ha revisado el yacimiento de Amalda I y se están desarrollando excavaciones arqueológicas en Amalda III.

Death and mortality is an experience shared by all humans. This is why death plays an important role in almost all cultures around the world. A central part of this shared experience is the presence of funerary rites and practices. However, little is known about when these practices emerged. The EU-funded DEATHREVOL project aims to reach a conclusion on the time of the first emergence of this 'culture of death'. As such, it will conduct classical and innovative taphonomic analyses in addition to researching fossil records concerning samples from the Middle Pleistocene and European Paleolithic periods to find traces of funerary rites. The project's results will reveal important insights regarding various behavioral aspects of these early populations.

PUSHH is a Marie Sklodowska-Curie European Training Network (ETN), a scientific commitment by the European Union, within the framework of excellence and innovation, to advance in paleoproteomics science. This European project aims to develop a strategic, powerful training platform to equip the next generation of palaeoanthropologists, palaeontologists and archaeologists, with the skills to exploit the latest biomolecular technologies and to significantly advance our knowledge about biological and cultural evolution of humans. One of the most important pillars in the PUSHH project is its multidisciplinary, through the creation of a coherent and powerful training environment, and by promoting collaborative initiatives on different research disciplines with the same common goal. At the same time, the project develops a community of scientists who confidently communicate with each other, combining advanced concepts across highly specialized disciplines from both humanities and experimental sciences.

El proyecto está dedicado a la investigación del comportamiento humano durante el Pleistoceno Inferior en África del Este, está financiado por la Fundación PALARQ con un importe de 15.000 € El objetivo general de este proyecto es la formulación de modelos interpretativos de la conducta de Homo erectus durante la primera fase del Achelense, mediante el análisis de su conducta tecnológica, subsistencial y de las dinámicas de ocupación del territorio, que permitirán comprender sus características esenciales, y determinar si las diferencias observadas con los yacimientos achelenses de menos de 1 Ma son debidas a la variabilidad de la adaptación al medio de Homo erectus o a otras causas.

This research project proposes to conduct comprehensive paleoanthropological investigations at the Early Stone Age site of Tighennif (ex. Ternifine) (Algeria). Tighennif has yielded the oldest North African hominins associated with faunas and Acheulean stone tools. The Principal Investigator and his team recently launched new research at Tighennif and has discovered in situ fossil bones and Acheulean stone tools, with great potential to investigate H. erectus behavioral patterns and how this hominin species lived in dry/open environment during the Lower-Middle Pleistocene boundary. Our multidisciplinary investigations at Tighennif consist of expanding the excavations in the deposits excavated recently, and to assess the integrity of the site; reconstructing North African paleoecology for understanding the relationship between the environment and H. erectus tool use behavior; characterizing the Acheulean lithic technology; exploring H. erectus subsistence patterns; and firmly dating Tighennif deposits. The proposed research at Tighennif is part of a broader research framework of key Algerian Lower Paleolithic sites for investigating ancestral hominin biological and behavioral evolution in North Africa.

The open-air archaeological evidence in and around the valley of the Guadiana River has been known since the 1960s and 1970s, with abundant Acheulean assemblages on the surface. These findings indicate the strong potential of the region for studying Acheulean occupations, although the scarcity of evidence in the stratigraphy and the lack of any chronostratigraphic framework give rise to great uncertainties about their nature, formation processes and age. This project centers on the Paleolithic occupations in the valleys of the rivers Guadiana and Jabalón for the purpose of studying the cited Acheulean assemblages, to reconstruct the cultural and environmental processes that produced these accumulations. This research, which started in 2011, is currently focused on the landscape of Albalá, where previous studies noted the presence of materials on the surface and recent surveys enabled archaeological remains to be identified in the stratigraphic sequence of a Guadiana River fluvial terrace. In the wake of these discoveries, excavations got under way in 2017, which are still ongoing, with the support of the Heritage and Archaeology Service attached to the Consejería de Educación, Cultura y Deportes of the Junta de Castilla-La Mancha.

The results obtained by the three excavation campaigns accomplished have confirmed the great scientific interest of the El Sotillo site. The project under way is yielding significant finds in relation to Acheulean and Mousterian industry in a key sector of the peninsular interior, offering new chronological data and consolidating the link between the Acheulean of the Iberian Peninsula, and indeed of southern Europe, with the technocomplex that arose 1.6 million years ago in East Africa.

This project, dedicated to the Iberian Peninsula Middle Pleistocene, is co-financed by the Junta de Castilla y León and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) for a total amount of €264,000 (Ref. CEN154P20). The general objective of the project consists of advancing the study of key sites distributed over the northern half of the Peninsula, compiling new information so that the characteristics of the different technological traditions recorded in this territory during the phase mentioned can be compared. Using a geoarchaeological methodology, work will take place on the technological interpretation and raw materials economy of the lithic industry, taphonomy and functionality of the occupations, paleoenvironment and chronology.