The LATEUROPE project aims to explore the question why the earliest hominins occupied Western Europe later than other portions of Eurasia. Early Hominins, conquered Eurasia, long before Modern Humans, the single Homo species living now on the earth, but left Europe empty during almost 1 million years (M.-H. Moncel).
Early hominins conquered much of Eurasia in a rapid “Out of Africa” movement but left Europe unoccupied during almost 1 million years. Western Europe did indeed face environmental constraints. This subcontinent is in a remote corner of Eurasia, but other large Eurasian peninsulas are dead-ends as well. Certainly, Western Europe's mixture of various environments and topographies did change a lot over time and the succession of climates then caused favorable territories for human occupations to fluctuate. However, archaeology in Asia and the Levant shows that hominins did overcome variable climatic conditions and geographies in other settings.
Investigating why Western Europe remained out of the “Oikumene” for so long is the core question the LATEUROPE project seeks to address, based on datasets of interdisciplinary and behavioural materials, enriched by new fieldworks in several specific sites and biomes for the key period before 500 ka.