Luciani, M., Fragnoli, P., Gilstrap, W.D., Sterba, J.H., Klainscek, D., Greene, J.A., Bourke, S., Donnelly, P., 2026. Creating a brand. Genesis, transformation and diffusion of Qurayyah Painted Ware. PLoS One 21, e0351296. read more
By Martin Kuhlwilm HEAS scientists have mapped the genetic “footprints” of natural selection across all great apes, offering fresh insight into how our closest living relatives adapted to their environments. By analysing genomic diversity in bonobos, chimpanzees, eastern and western gorillas, and Bornean and Sumatran orangutans, the team pinpointed gene regions recently favoured by evolution as well as long-standing “balancing” hotspots where different gene versions are maintained because each can be useful. The team highlights DNA changes that likely helped each species thrive in its niche, from genes tied to sperm production that hint at intense mating competition, to sensory genes involved in vision and sound perception (including hearing in bonobos), to metabolism genes that may reflect different diets. Mountain gorillas stand out: an enrichment of hair-keratin genes points to thicker, longer coats suited to life at high altitude. Immune defenses also emerge as repeated battlegrounds, with some gene variants maintained because each can help against fast-evolving pathogens, and other immune genes showing recent selective surges across species. The study also flags candidates tied to social behaviour, potentially relevant to bonobos’ famously peaceful societies, and shows that even neighbouring ape populations may have faced different recent pressures. These findings deliver testable leads for future lab work and chart the diverse evolutionary paths that shaped great ape biology. Funding: Vienna Science…
Huang, X., Chen, S., Han, S., Kuhlwilm, M., 2026. Genomic landscapes of natural selection in great apes. Genome Biology. read more
Crego-Walters, M., Cuadros-Espinoza, S., Ruiz-Gartzia, I., Han, S., Hermosilla-Albala, N., Helsen, P., Frandsen, P., Brumwell-Prats, A.M., Alentorn-Moron, P., Fontsere, C., Alvarez-Estape, M., Ngofuna, M., Monghiemo, C., Leendertz, F., Thompson, J., Fasbender, D., Dieguez, P., Lokasola, A.L., Brand, C., Ndjango, J.-B., Georgiev, A.V., Giles, J.A., Liu, W., Li, Y., Sharp, P.M., Pereboom, Z., Andrés, A.M., Kuhlwilm, M., Gronau, I., Kuehl, H., Wessling, E.G., Narat, V., Surbeck, M., Hart, J.A., Hart, T.B., Hvilsom, C., Krützen, M., Stevens, J., Hahn, B.H., Lizano, E., Prado-Martinez, J., Marques-Bonet, T., 2026. Targeted chromosomal sequencing of wild bonobos identifies a genetically distinct subpopulation east of the Lomami river. Genome Biology. read more
Obrochta, W.M., Marcinkowska, U.M., Ball, M.E., Brittain, R.S.A., Galbarczyk, A., Klimek, M., Nenko, I., Stephen, I.D., Windhager, S., Jasienska, G., 2026. The evaluation of facial features as markers of cardiometabolic health in women of post-reproductive age. Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health 14. read more
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 might expect. At the Natural History Museum Vienna (NHM), archaeological textiles, jewellery, and reconstructed garments are no longer confined to museum showcases and archives. Through an innovative collaboration with the Vienna design school KunstModeDesign Herbststraße, prehistoric clothing has become a source of inspiration for contemporary design, demonstrating that archaeology is not only about preserving the past—it can also help shape the future. The project "Hallstatt Revisited – From Archaeological Research to Contemporary Design" (2025/26) was conceived as an interdisciplinary dialogue between archaeology, fashion, craftsmanship, and sustainability. Rather than copying prehistoric costumes, design students were encouraged to understand the ideas behind them: the technologies, materials, aesthetics, and cultural meanings that shaped textile and jewellery production during the Bronze and Iron Ages in Europe. These insights then served as the foundation for entirely new artistic creations rooted in scientific evidence. Archaeology as a Design Laboratory The Hallstatt salt mine in Austria is internationally renowned for preserving one of Europe's richest collections of prehistoric textiles (Fig. 1). Thanks to the exceptional conservation conditions created by rock salt, more than 700 textile fragments dating between approximately 1400 and 400 BCE have survived. These…
by Martin Kuhlwilm A new ancient DNA study from a Saka-era burial site in Kyrgyzstan led by HEAS researchers offers a rare glimpse into the family structures of Iron Age nomads. Researchers analyzed genetic material from 12 people buried at Boz-Barmak, dating to the 4th–2nd centuries BCE. The individuals fit within the genetic range of ancient and modern groups from Central Eurasia and Siberia. While the team found no immediate family pairs (such as parent-child or siblings), they detected several second- and third-degree connections, suggesting a broader web of kin across the community. Strikingly, all the men shared the same Y chromosome lineage, which is also common in present-day Kyrgyz populations, while mitochondrial DNA, inherited from mothers, was notably diverse. This pattern supports a patrilocal social system, where men remained in their home group and women moved in from elsewhere, boosting genetic diversity. Despite the modest amount of recoverable DNA, the findings add to our understanding of how kinship, mobility, and social organization shaped the population history of Central Eurasia’s nomadic societies. Funding: Vienna Science and Technology Fund (WWTF) grant 10.47379/VRG20001 (Martin Kuhlwilm); European Research Council (ERC) SHADOWS project (101163057) and Austrian Science Fund (FWF) 10.55776/P36433 (Pere Gelabert); Austrian Science Fund (FWF) 10.55776/ESP546 (Sojung Han). https://www.heas.at/research/publications/genomic-insights-into-the-iron-age-saka-of-boz-barmak-kyrgyzstan/
Saunderson, K., Zimmermann, A., Grömer, K., 2026. A New Tablet Weaving Technique from Bronze Age Hallstatt. EXARC Journal, 1. read more
We are delighted to announce the results of the HEAS Seed Grants June 2026 round. The following projects by HEAS members will be funded: Applicant Round Project Amount Granted Manasij Pal Chowdhury, Andreas G. Heiss,Dimitra Kourtidou,Kerstin Kowarik June 2026 Hot Pots: Integrated analysis of cooking vessel contents from the Late Neolithic lakeshore settlement of Mooswinkel, Lake Mondsee (Upper Austria) 5000 Katerina Douka, Konstantina Saliari June 2026 Testing the limits of palaeoproteomics: fossil age, taxonomy and protein preservation in the Cradle of Humankind, South Africa 5000 Pamela Fragnoli,Laura Dietrich,Karina Grömer June 2026 Reading Ceramic Biographies: Integrating Robotics and Morphometrics to Decipher Surface Traces 5000 Judith Escobar, Lyndelle Webster June 2026 Chemical and multi-element analyses of anthropogenic sediments at Svinjarička Čuka 4505 https://www.heas.at/research/seed-grants/
Rymbekova, A., Gelabert, P., Llanos-Lizcano, A., Balakrishnan, K., Hämmerle, M., Han, S., Cheronet, O., Abdykanova, A., Kasymkulov, K., Hrivnyak, M., Eng, J.T., Pinhasi, R., Kuhlwilm, M., 2026. Genomic insights into the Iron Age Saka of Boz-Barmak, Kyrgyzstan. Scientific Reports. read more
Stanton, D.W.G., Bergström, A., Heintzman, P.D., van der Valk, T., Carmagnini, A., Ersmark, E., Pawar, H., Sandoval-Velasco, M., Androsov, S., Fedorov, S., Kuhlwilm, M., Nagel, D., Plotnikov, V., Protopopov, A., Shapiro, B., Barnett, R., Sinding, M.-H.S., Marques-Bonet, T., Yamaguchi, N., Gilbert, M.T.P., Götherström, A., Skoglund, P., Frantz, L., Dalén, L., 2026. Paleogenomes reveal the evolutionary relationship between modern and cave lions. Cell 189, 4425-4436.e4411. read more
Schmid, V.C., Sifogeorgaki, I., Abruzzese, T., Blik, S., Huang, L., Dusseldorp, G.L., 2026. Wind(ow) of change: The end of the Middle Stone Age and the beginning of the Later Stone Age at Umhlatuzana rockshelter showcasing concurrent technological and techno-economic shifts. Quaternary Science Reviews 377, 109806. read more
Val, A., Tribolo, C., Schmid, V.C., Igreja, M., Texier, P.-J., Mercier, N., Galy, A., Pécheyran, C., Barbotin, G., Porraz, G., 2026. Bone retouchers and end-scrapers side by side at Bushman Rock Shelter: Exploring a ca. 100,000-year-old technological imbrication in southern Africa. Journal of Human Evolution 217, 103845. read more
Pere Gelabert Our Neanderthal heritage Did you know that there were once several Neanderthal groups, but only some of them encountered modern humans and had offspring? This means some people today still carry a fraction of the original Neanderthal genome. The Neanderthals were the first truly pan-European human population. Traces of them span more than 250,000 years and can be found across Europe. However, until recently, our understanding of them was fragmented: different countries had their own datasets, and scientists specialising in archaeology, anthropology, genetics and geology often worked in isolation. To unite this knowledge, the COST Action ‘Integrating Neanderthal Legacy: From Past to Present’ (iNEAL) brought together experts from across the continent. They shared data, aligned their research methods, and created a more complete picture of who the Neanderthals were and how they lived. Connecting minds and reconstructing the past “The Action developed a shared database and research guidelines, helping researchers across Europe work with the same standards”, explained Professor Ivor Janković, Chair of the Action from the Institute for Anthropological Research in Croatia. A major result was the Catalogue of Neandertal Sites, listing 127 archaeological sites across the continent. “This publication is already being used by scholars”, said Ivor Janković. “And we’re committed to continuing data collection for a future update that will serve as a starting point…
Gallup, A.C., Windhager, S., Eldakar, O.T., 2026. Faces reveal accurate information about overhand throwing ability in men. Animal Behaviour 237, 123621. read more
By Gerhard Weber The fossils found from Ethiopia are in Vienna for the first time for examination at the Department of Evolutionary Anthropology at the University of Vienna. An interdisciplinary and international research team led by the Department of Evolutionary Anthropology at the University of Vienna was on the road in the Somali region in eastern Ethiopia in the years 2000-2009 to search for the ancestors of mankind. For the first time in the history of Austria, it has been possible to make some finds of australopithecines and even earlier hominins. These date back to a time of over 5 million to 3 million years ago. Now an export permit has finally been obtained in order to be able to examine the finds in Vienna using state-of-the-art methods. It is particularly interesting that the fossils all come from a locally narrowly defined area of less than 100 km2, but cover exactly the period in which our first truly identifiable precursors, the australopithecines, developed. Such sites from the early Pliocene are very rare and it is hoped that the detailed examination of the finds will provide further information about the beginnings of the incarnation. The project was initiated in 2000 by the anthropologist Univ. Prof. Horst Seidler and continued for ten years. In the desert-like sediments around…
By Tabea Truntschnig On the 30th of March 2026, researchers from across the World gathered in Vienna for the second international pXRF conference, Where Physics, Chemistry and Archaeology Meet: Applications and Case Studies in (p)XRF. The conference was organized as a collaborative effort between the Global pXRF Network, the Vienna Institute for Archaeological Science, the Natural History Museum Vienna, the Austrian Archaeological Institute and the Human Evolution and Archaeological Sciences Network (HEAS). One day earlier on the 29th of March 2026, the conference participants had the opportunity to come together for an icebreaker event, offering an early opportunity for informal exchange and networking. The programme began with a guided tour of the laboratory facilities at the Austrian Archaeological Institute on Georg-Coch-Platz, where Michael Brandl provided insights into ongoing research and analytical practices. In the late afternoon, participants continued with an exclusive guided visit to the historic spaces of St. Stephen’s Cathedral, including its catacombs and rooftop, offering both a cultural and panoramic perspective on Vienna. The day concluded with a self-funded group dinner at Kaffee Alt Wien, which further fostered informal discussion and community building ahead of the main conference sessions. The Conference Portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF) has become an important tool in archaeometry, conservation, and heritage research, helping researchers investigate past technologies, material origins, and exchange…
Végh, E.I., Afjehi-Sadat, L., Giannì, M., Horejs, B., Yazbeck, C., Higham, T., 2026. Tiny Hopes─Assessing Protein Preservation in Collagen-Depleted Bones. Journal of Proteome Research. read more
Menéndez, L.P., Veigl, S., It Takes Two to Tango: A Pluralist Account for Building Comprehensive Explanations in Human Evolution. American Anthropologist read more
By Sonja Windhager Our article, “Associations of Facial Shape With Physical Strength and 2D:4D in a Turkish Male and Female Sample,” published in the American Journal of Human Biology, was recognized by Wiley as one of the journal’s top 10% most-viewed papers published in 2024. The study examines links between facial shape, physical strength, and prenatal testosterone exposure (via 2D:4D). Using geometric morphometric morphs, we visualized facial shape changes associated with handgrip strength, 2D:4D, and sexual dimorphism, allowing these trait-related patterns to be compared directly and intuitively. https://www.heas.at/research/publications/associations-of-facial-shape-with-physical-strength-and-2d4d-in-a-turkish-male-and-female-sample/
Grunstra, N.D.S., Humans are not unique: difficult birth is common in placental mammals. Biological Reviews read more
By Nicole Grunstra Human childbirth is widely believed to be uniquely difficult and risky in the animal kingdom. The dominant evolutionary explanation attributes this to the combination two human-defining traits: bipedalism (small pelvis!) and large brains (big-headed babies!). But a new comparative analysis of birth complications and birth-related mortality among mammals challenges this assumption. Quantitative and qualitative data on actual births and their outcomes in domesticated, captive and wild mammals show considerable overlap with humans in terms of complication frequencies, types of complications, and female mortality. Obstructed labor due to a baby that is too large to fit through the birth canal is well known in humans, but also in domesticated cows and sheep, captive elephants and primates, and has also been observed in sea lions, deer and other ungulates in the wild. This demonstrates that humans do not have exceptionally difficult childbirth as long thought. It also shows that birth difficulties occur in a wide range of placental mammals irrespective of absolute and relative brain size, mode of locomotion, and indeed, the presence of a bony pelvis. Whales and dolphins lack a bony birth canal but still suffer from obstructed labor. Such a mismatch between fetus and maternal pelvis is more common in precocial species delivering relatively large and well-developed offspring than in altricial species, which have smaller and…
By Magdalena Blanz Ellen Green, osteoarchaeologist at the AOC Archaeology Group in Reading is giving a talk titled “Death is only the beginning: Romano-British ritual practices in Surrey, England” Tuesday, 9 June 2026, 18:30 at the ÖAI, Meeting Room on 3rd floor, Dominikanerbastei 16, 1010 Vienna. The lecture is organised by the Bioarchaeological Society (BAG) and will be held in English in hybrid format in collaboration with the ÖAI. https://bag.or.at/event/death-is-only-the-beginning/ Abstract: Shortly after the Roman conquest of Britain, a small roadside settlement in Ewell, Surrey developed into a ritual center. Large shafts were cut into the chalk and backfilled with a variety of artifacts and ecofacts. One shaft however stood out, with an assemblage c. 11, 000 bones from 300 humans and animals, all deposited within a 50 year span. The sheer scale of deposition in unique in Britain, and offers a detailed look into ritual practices in the period, including a case of possible human sacrifice. This paper will seek to cover not only why this impressive sequence of depositions may have been made, but also how. By using stratigraphic, taphonomic and osteological analysis, the ritual processes can be reconstructed, revealing a complex set of actions that highlight the fusion of Iron Age British and Roman practices in the immediate post conquest practice. Additionally by using the same recording…
Edeltin, L., Niespolo, E., Kracht, O.M., Alon, S., Amos, L., Friesem, D.E., Goder-Goldberger, M., Grono, E., Lavi, R., Porat, N., Schechter, H.C., Tejero, J.-M., Ujma, C., Wieler, N., Marder, O., 2026. Dawn of the Initial and Early Upper Paleolithic blade industries in the Levant: Mobility and interactions as reflected from Shualim Rockshelter, Israel. Journal of Human Evolution 215-216, 103846. read more
Kirchengast, N.I., Kunst, G.K., 2026. Bones of contention: A reformative approach to deposits of cattle long bone splinters from Roman period sites. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 72, 105778. read more
By Thomas Beard What is the ESRF?: The European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) is a circular particle accelerator that is capable of a varied range of radiation-based analyses, which in the ESRF’s own words makes it a “giant microscope”. A famous example of a synchrotron-like particle accelerator is that of the CERN Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland. The ESRF works on the same principles as CERN but it is only speeding up the particles not trying to collide them. All synchrotrons use electromagnetic fields to propel ions to very high speeds with recent renovations at the ESRF giving it the brightest beam of any synchrotron facility in the world. Researchers based at a university in a country contributing to the ESRF project can use the facility for free, if their grant proposal is successful. If you are interested, I would suggest checking out the ESRF’s website, which has a lot of useful information and you can even see if your research would be possible at the facility. Who and Why?: One of the main aims of the MicroStratDNA group is to understand how ancient DNA (aDNA) preserves in archaeological cave sediments. Within current literature there are many theories about what the source of the aDNA could be including; bones, faecal matter or even DNA bound to minerals found…
By Dr Emese Végh As a postdoc at the Department of Evolutionary Anthropology, I usually spend my days in relatively quiet labs or in front of the computer trying to decipher questions in human evolution and archaeological science. But last Friday, I traded my lab coat for a microphone (or rather a voice recorder on my phone) and headed out into the vibrant chaos of the Lange Nacht der Forschung (Long Night of Research) in Vienna. There were many stations representing researchers and themes from HEAS, and I wanted to see what type of outreach and attention they get. From the modern halls of the University Biology Building (UBB), to the historic buildings of the Academy of Sciences and the University Main Building, I caught up with colleagues who were busy translating complex science into hands-on puzzles, and explanations for thousands of curious visitors. My first stop was visiting Dr Nicole Grunstra’s station at the UBB. Her research tackles a classic ‘human’ problem: why is birth so difficult for us? The traditional view is that humans are uniquely cursed with difficult births because of our big brains and narrow pelvises. But Nicole’s station, complete with 3D-printed pelvises and tiny animal skulls, tells a different story. Many precocial species (i.e., animals whose young stand up shortly after birth, like cows,…
The project LEGION – machine LEarninG-enabled Identification of archaeological Objects in the middle daNube river basin, led by HEAS member Dominik Hagmann as a researcher at the OeAI/OeAW in collaboration with colleagues from the TU Wien Computer Vision Lab, has been recently approved within the Heritage Science Austria 2.0 programme. The project integrates machine learning and archaeological expertise to establish a unified, AI-supported typochronology for Roman common ware from the ancient metropolis of Carnuntum (Austria). Based on a corpus of c. 70,000 digitized profile drawings, LEGION develops a scalable and reproducible framework for the classification, dating, and interpretation of archaeological mass finds, combining eXplainable AI (XAI) and human-in-the-loop (HITL) approaches. By linking morphological and contextual data, the project generates new insights into production, distribution, and settlement dynamics along the UNESCO World Heritage Site “Danube Limes,” while providing an open, FAIR- and CARE-compliant digital research infrastructure for future applications in Heritage Science. Funding ÖAW – Heritage Science Austria 2.0 (Heritage_2024-12_LEGION): https://www.oeaw.ac.at/foerderungen/foerderprogramme/heritage-science-austria Project webpage: https://www.oeaw.ac.at/en/oeai/research/historical-archaeology/archaeology-of-the-roman-provinces-in-the-latin-west/legion
Kirchengast, S., Bühler, B., Hagmann, D., 2026. Sexual Dimorphism in the Association Between Status Symbols and Body Height in the Early Medieval Avar Population from the Csokorgasse Burial Ground (Vienna, Austria). Nature & Anthropology2026, 4, 10004 read more
Menéndez, L.P., Luisi, P., López-Sosa, M.C., Da Silva, S.M., Buck, L.T., Kuzminsky, S.C., Sánchez, M.Q., Le Maître, A., Chappard, C., Rios, C., 2026. µCT scanning effects on aDNA and a multi-step workflow for archaeological petrous portions. PLoS One 21, e0334682. read more
Akbari, A., Perry, A., Barton, A.R., Kariminejad, M., Gazal, S., Li, Z., Zeng, Y., Mittnik, A., Patterson, N., Mah, M., Zhou, X., Price, A.L., Lander, E.S., Pinhasi, R., Rohland, N., Mallick, S., Reich, D., 2026. Ancient DNA reveals pervasive directional selection across West Eurasia. Nature. read more
HEAS Network Associate José-Miguel Tejero is the Principal Investigator of the Spanish Consolidator Research Grant PHUMA (First Human Population of the Peruvian Andean Plateau), developed under the scientific co-direction of Leslye Valenzuela (French National Centre for Scientific Research, CNRS, and Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, PUCP). The project brings together several HEAS members, including Pere Gelabert, Olivia Cheronet, Tom Higham, Katerina Douka, and Mareike C. Stahlschmidt, alongside researchers from partner institutions: Xavier Mangado, Julien Le Guirriec, and Santiago Riera (University of Barcelona), Dagmara Socha (University of Warsaw), Ximena Suárez (University of São Paulo), Alessandra Caballero and Gerardo Vega Toscano (PUCP, Peru), Nick Taylor (Stony Brook University), and Lola Larssonneur (Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne University). PHUMA is a pioneering project combining archaeological and biomolecular approaches, including ancient DNA (aDNA), sedimentary ancient DNA (sedaDNA), and paleoproteomics, to investigate the cultural and biological adaptations of the first human populations to settle permanently on the Peruvian Andean Plateau at altitudes exceeding 3,500 metres above sea level. The project addresses the formidable environmental pressures these populations faced, including hypoxia, extreme cold, intense solar radiation, and scarce food resources, during the transition between the Late Pleistocene and the Early Holocene. PHUMA will generate extensive genomic and archaeological datasets from some of the oldest known Pleistocene sites in the region, contributing to a more comprehensive understanding…
HEAS Team Leaders Pere Gelabert and Benjamin Vernot were recently interviewed for Nature Magazine for their work in sediment DNA. The two researchers are pushing the boundaries of what we can learn from ancient dirt. Benjamin Vernot built a 1.6‑million‑probe capture panel to enrich for nuclear DNA in sediments - targeting Neanderthals, Denisovans, early modern humans, and even unknown archaic lineages. Such sediments typically contain very small amounts of human DNA, and lots of DNA from other species, and so Vernot also devised new computational methods to handle these challenges. He has applied these methods to sediments at caves like Galería de las Estatuas, where Neandertals lived for nearly 50,000 years. In this work, Vernot identified two distinct Neanderthal populationsm, with one replacing the other about 100,000 years ago. On the other side, Pere Gelabert showed you can brute‑force nuclear DNA from cave dirt with shotgun sequencing, and analyzed human, bison and wolf DNA from a single 25,000 year old sediment sample from Satsurblia cave. As Gelabert puts it, without sediment DNA, many of these human‑history clues would be impossible to uncover. Read Full Article
Within the Initiative Future Archaeology, the Austrian Archaeological Institute (OeAI–OeAW) is pleased to announce the workshop "The Long History of Inequality: Resources, Control, and Social Power", to be held in Vienna on 7–8 May. The event brings together international scholars to explore how access to resources—its extraction, circulation, and control—has shaped social and economic inequalities from the Neolithic to the present. Organisers: Pamela Fragnoli, Michael Brandl, and Mario Gavranović. Invitation_WORKSHOP-The Long History of Inequality_Zukunftarchäologie_Fragnoli-Jung-Brandl-Gavranovic_7-8 May 2026 Program_WORKSHOP-The Long History of Inequality_Zukunftarchäologie_Fragnoli-Jung-Brandl-Gavranovic_7-8 May 2026
Blanz, M., Balasse, M., Mainland, I., 2026. Tracing Seaweed as Food and Fodder in Archaeology: A Review of Current Methods. Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology, 1-29. read more
Congratulations to PhD Emily Pigott, who defended her doctoral thesis on Monday 30th March. Emily published two papers during her PhD research and has two more in review/submission. Her main paper was in PNAS and was about a small Neanderthal bone that she found using ZooMS from a site in the Crimea called Starosele. Her other paper was in the Journal of Palaeolithic Archaeology. She worked incredibly hard to finish in just under 3 years. An hour after the defence she found that she had been successful in her application for a 2 year post doc position working in Tubingen, Germany on Palaeolithic sites in Armenia. Congrats Dr Emily Pigott from everyone in HEAS!
Miko, S., Doneus, N., Brunović, D., Hasan, O., Doneus, M., Kinnaird, T., Hus, P., Šegović, F., Ilijanić, N., Miko, M.Š., 2025. Dip Your Finger in the Sea... Geoarchaeological View on Coastal Setting and Maritime Accessibility of the Coastal Town of Osor, Northern Adriatic. Studia universitatis hereditati 13, 13-40. read more
We are delighted to announce the results of the HEAS Seed Grants February 2026 round. The following projects by HEAS members will be funded: Applicant Project Amount Granted Mario Gavranović, Olivia Cheronet, Gábor Sánta Ágnes Somogyvári Genetic and Isotope Tests of a Tumulus Culture Population in Southern Hungary: Newcomers or Locals? 4400 Doralice Klainscek, Pamela Fragnoli ,Johannes H. Sterba Looking at the Ground Raw Material Suitability in the Desert Landscape of NW Arabia 4920 Mareike Stahlschmidt, Laura van der Sluis, Peter Steier, Lyndelle Webster Radiocarbon dating of bones and charcoal preserved in resin impregnated sediment blocks 5000 Carla Gómez-Montes and Timothy Canessa Clarifying the Nature of Human-Animal Occupations in Chufín Cave with Chronological and Paleoproteomic Data 5000 https://www.heas.at/research/seed-grants/
We are pleased to announce that Dr. Alejandra Sánchez-Polo has been awarded a prestigious Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship (MSCA). Starting in early 2027, she will carry out her project under the joint supervision of two HEAS team leaders, Pamela Fragnoli (OEAI–OEAW) and Mareike Stahlschmidt (Department of Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Vienna). Her project, “Architectures of Earth during the Transition to the Iron Age in Iberia (2nd–1st Millennium BC): Technologies, Traditions and Knowledge Transmission” (IBEARTH), investigates how earthen architecture—particularly mudbrick construction—both shaped and reflected social transformations between the Late Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age (c. 1200–400 BC) in inland Iberia. Adopting an integrated approach that combines petrographic, micromorphological, microbotanical, and biomolecular analyses with ethnographic perspectives, the project examines the transmission of construction knowledge, the organisation of labour, and the social meanings embedded in building practices. In doing so, it offers new insights into often-overlooked dimensions of past societies, including gender roles and the diversity of labour contributions.
The Early Upper Palaeolithic of Iberia remains an actively debated record of human occupation, yet quantitative approaches to lithic assemblage variability are still lacking, especially among large-scale datasets that span the entire period and region. In this study, we utilised a newly compiled dataset of Aurignacian assemblages to explore techno-typological variability and test its spatial and temporal dimensions. Our work has been able to show that variability has a spatial – rather than temporal – character to the effect that assemblage dissimilarities increase with spatial distance. Our findings thus challenge the application of the classic Aquitaine model of techno-typological change and suggest that temporal change in the Aurignacian may be more unstructured than otherwise deemed. This has wider implications for the detection and characterisation of the technocomplex at large, corroborating previous claims of mosaicism and an inconsistent representation of diagnostic traits. https://www.heas.at/research/publications/unpacking-lithic-assemblage-variability-in-the-early-upper-palaeolithic-a-multivariate-approach-to-the-structure-of-the-iberian-aurignacian/
