Abstract
Most modern mammalian populations exhibit higher mortality at both ends of the age-at-death distribution. Yet our hominin ancestors reportedly do not exhibit this same distribution, with explanations ranging from predation to taphonomic causes. This paper compares mortality distributions of extant non-human primates to fossil hominins by applying the D0-14/D ageat-death estimation method. Using subadult and adult counts for four extinct hominin taxa, we fitted the hominin data to a modern human mortality curve, resulting in hypothetical mortality distributions. With the expectation that fossil hominin taxa likely fall somewhere on the continuum of non-human primate to human life histories, we compared the distributions to those of five extant catarrhine primate populations. Subadult mortality amongst the extinct hominin groups was typically within the range of that of extant non-human primate groups,
and the previously reported high mortality amongst young and middle aged adults in hominin assemblages may be explained by normal, multi-cause deaths.
and the previously reported high mortality amongst young and middle aged adults in hominin assemblages may be explained by normal, multi-cause deaths.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 289-315 |
Number of pages | 27 |
Journal | Journal of Anthropological Research |
Volume | 78 |
Issue number | 3 |
Early online date | 25 Aug 2022 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Sept 2022 |
Bibliographical note
AcknowledgementsThe authors wish to thank the anonymous reviewers and the editor for their constructive and helpful feedback, which has undoubtedly improved this manuscript.
Data Availability Statement
The data that support the findings of this study are available from published resources as cited within the manuscript and collated on Github https://github.com/claremcfadden/fossil-hominin-mortality.git.Keywords
- Paleoanthropology
- Paleodemography
- Catastrophic mortality
- Life history