The evolution of non-metric dental variation in Europe

Abstract

Abstract: The potential for dental morphology to answer questions about human evolution in the Middle to Late Pleistocene has only recently begun to be appreciated. Non-metric dental traits provide useful information for taxonomic diagnosis as well as for assessing biological relationships among living and ancient populations. This study uses dental morphology to assess temporal change in Europe. Homo erectus serves as the presumptive primitive condition for later humans and change over time is assessed by calculating estimates of divergence between groups based on the mean measure of divergence multivariate statistic. The samples include Homo erectus (n = 12), early modern humans from Africa and West Asia (n = 12), early Neandertals (n = 16), late Neandertals (n = 20), Upper Paleolithic Europeans (n = 28) and contemporary Europeans (n = 47). The results show a marked disruption in continuity from early modern to later modern humans when Neandertals are incorporated into the temporal sequence. If Neandertals are left out of the sequence the change in divergence values conforms to expectations for gradual evolution toward the modern human condition (e.g., distance values get progressively smaller through time). At minimum this should set to rest any idea that modern Europeans evolved directly from Neandertal ancestors. Late Neandertals are somewhat less ‘specialized ’ than early Neandertals; the implications of

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