Exploring the evolutionary roots of human behaviour, biology, and culture through interdisciplinary research and debate.

Paleoanthropology and archaeology employ various proxy measures of hominin cognition, including endocranial volume, the complexity of material culture, or encephalization quotients (EQ). Competing sce...

The UCL Institute of Archaeology is supporting applications for Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowships with an internal deadline of 16 October 2026 for consideration of applications.

Objects found in a cave in southwestern China suggest that these enigmatic ancient humans were accomplished hunters.

Identification and proteomic analysis of bone fragments and teeth from an excavation in Southwest China provide insight into the evolution and phenotype of Denisovans and fill a geographical gap in th...

Evidence from Bianfu Cave shows specialized hunting, expedient stone-tool production and extensive bone use of Denisovans, providing new insights into their ecology, behaviour and cultural legacy in e...

Katerina Harvati, one of the world’s leading paleoanthropologists, will receive this year’s Albert Einstein World Award of Science from the World Cultural Council in recognition of her groundbreaking ...

Stone tools from a lakeside site in Saudi Arabia hint that Neanderthals were adapted to the arid Arabian interior, not just to cold places.

A team of researchers from the University of Burgos and the Atapuerca Foundation has published the first detailed analysis of the bone retouchers found in the Valdegoba cave, in the municipality of Hu...

Neanderthals had a robust build, but the genetic basis remains unclear. Kanis et al. show that a Neanderthal growth hormone receptor variant increases cellular growth signaling and is inherited by som...

By: Karina Grömer and Christina Dörfler What can a 2,700-year-old textile fragment from the salt mine Hallstatt or a bronze belt decorated in “Situla-Style” tell a fashion designer? More than one migh...

The ancient genetic variant is most common in people of South and East Asian ancestry.

Technological complexity has been a continuous trope in archaeological research from its beginnings in the nineteenth century. Based on a concept of unidirectional cultural evolution, archaeological m...

Admixture between modern humans and extinct hominins has shaped the genomes of present-day individuals, but reconstructing this history has been constrained by the scarcity of archaic samples and unad...

Saunderson, K., Zimmermann, A., Grömer, K., 2026. A New Tablet Weaving Technique from Bronze Age Hallstatt. EXARC Journal, 1. The salt mines of Hallstatt, Upper Austria, bear some of the most signific...

The spatial organization of early Homo sapiens populations in North Africa during Marine Isotope Stage 5 (MIS 5) remains a key question for understanding past demographic and cultural dynamics. Climat...

Größeres Gehirn, kleineres Gesicht: Die menschliche Evolution verlief anders als gedacht. Eine neue Studie der Universität Tübingen und der University of Tennessee in Knoxville stellt langjährige Anna...

Ancient DNA traces in teeth and genes reveal that insects played a minor role in prehistoric European diets.