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This article offers a new look at the stratigraphy and chronology of Mesolithic and Neolithic deposits at Lepenski Vir, particularly based on newly available Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS) dating and aDNA genomic evidence. It focuses on a detailed analysis of several key contexts for which new radiocarbon dates are available while at the same time reviewing taphonomic and age-offset problems when dating human remains and other materials affected by the aquatic reservoir effect in the Danube Gorges area. The robust chronological evidence as well as available stratigraphic data overwhelmingly show that the start of the main and iconic phase of the occupation of this site, represented by the architecture of trapezoidal buildings and sculpted sandstone boulders, should unequivocally be dated to the period of the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in the last two centuries of the seventh millennium cal BC. At this time, local forager populations of distinct hunter-gatherer genetic ancestry came into contact and mixed with incoming Neolithic, farming populations of north-western Anatolian genetic ancestry, based on the available genomic data but also supported by studies of material culture traditions. The article deals directly with the recent criticism of this chrono-stratigraphic model for Lepenski Vir.

In the last decade, a number of specialist analyses were made on the material from old excavations of Mesolithic-Neolithic sites in the Danube Gorges. These new results altered significantly our understanding of the Lepenski Vir culture. The question of chronology of this regional phenomenon has been acute since the discovery of Lepenski Vir in the 1960s, and it remains of key importance for understanding the character of Mesolithic-Neolithic transformations in this and the neighbouring regions. The most heated debate was fuelled by the initial stratigraphic and chronological attribution of the type-site itself. There remained the question about the adequate dating of the most prominent phase at this site characterized by buildings with trapezoidal bases covered with limestone floors and with rectangular stone-lined hearths placed in the centre of these features. There have been suggestions that these features also contain Early Neolithic Starčevo type pottery and other similar items of material culture and should thus be dated to the Early Neolithic historical context. Moreover, the first series of conventional radiocarbon determinations (21 dates) also suggested that the absolute chronology of these features should be confined to the period from around 6400-5500 cal BC (Fig. 1). Due to the importance of defining more precisely the chronology for the start of construction of these particular features at Lepenski Vir and for establishing the life-span of these buildings and their associated material culture, we have AMS (Accelerator Mass Spectrometry) dated a number of contexts from this site. The results are presented in this paper. The project was made possible through the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerate Dating Service (ORADS) programme funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) of the Great Britain. Apart from those dates presented in this paper, there are 29 previously published radiometric dates from Lepenski Vir 21 made by the conventional 14C dating of charcoal and 8 AMS dates made on animal (3 dates) and human bones (5 dates). There is also a series of 20 new AMS dates made on human bones from Lepenski Vir. The last group of dates has not been published with all the contextual details and are of limited use in our analyses of absolute chronology and stratigraphy of Lepenski Vir. New dates are listed in Table 1. From 32 dated contexts from Lepenski Vir, 27 contexts are stratigraphically related to trapezoidal buildings while 5 dates are connected with the area outside of buildings. From those contexts related to trapezoidal structures, 24 contexts are dated with animal and 3 with human bones. The emphasis on the dating of animal bones is connected with problems of precision when dating samples made on human and dog bones due to the reservoir effect and the deposition of 'old' carbon. Dated remains of animal and human bones originate from the following types of stratigraphic contexts a) beneath building floors, i.e. stratigraphically the oldest contexts in the settlement (2 dates) (Fig. 2); b) between two superposed floors of trapezoidal buildings as 'sealed' contexts (8 dates) (Fig. 3); c) lying directly on top of the floors of trapezoidal buildings but not overlapped by a later floor (17 dates) (Fig. 3); d) outside of trapezoidal buildings, found in contexts such as pits, domed ovens, and burials, or in contexts that can be attributed to the occupation layer only (6 dates) (Fig. 4). The new dates indicate a very long duration of the Mesolithic period, from around 9400 to around 7500 cal BC (Fig. 2, 23). These early dates are concentrated in two particular periods that may point to two separate phases within these two millennia, with settlement discontinuities. It remains possible that there were many more occupation episodes that these dates do not encompass, and more AMS dates may indicate whether these two groupings with three dates per grouping are meaningful and representative of two separate and defined phases of occupation at this locale. This early period would correspond with the phase that the excavator of Lepenski Vir defined as Proto-Lepenski Vir although his ideas about the spatial distribution of this phase, its interpretation, duration and relation to the later phase of trapezoidal buildings must be revised in the light of new AMS dates and other available data. The phase with trapezoidal buildings most likely starts only around 6200 cal BC and most of the trapezoidal buildings might have been abandoned by around 5900 cal BC. The absolute span of only two or three hundred years and likely even less, for the flourishing of building activity related to trapezoidal structures at Lepenski Vir significantly compresses Srejović's phase I. Thus, it is difficult to maintain the excavator's five subphases which, similarly to Ivana Radovanović's more recent re-phasing of Lepenski Vir into I-1-3, remain largely guess works before more extensive and systematic dating of each building is accomplished along with statistical modeling in order to narrow the magnitude of error. On the whole, new dates from these contexts better correspond with Srejović's stratigraphic logic of sequencing buildings to particular phases on the basis of their superimposing and cutting than with Radovanović's stylistic logic, i.e. her typology of hearth forms, ash-places, entrance platforms, and presence/absence of -supports around rectangular hearths used as reliable chronological indicators. The short chronological span for phase I also suggests that phase Lepenski Vir II is not realistic. This has already been shown by overlapping plans of the phase I buildings and stone outlines that the excavator of the site attributed to Lepenski Vir II phase. According to Srejović, Lepenski Vir phase II was characterized by buildings with stone walls made in the shape of trapezes, repeating the outline of supposedly earlier limestone floors of his phase I. However, the trapezoidal buildings must be envisioned as dug-in features with their rear, narrow side dug deep into the slope since these features were dug into the sloping terrace where the site is situated. It is more likely that these stone constructions assigned to a separate phase were part of the same trapezoidal buildings with limestone floors assigned by the excavator to phase I. Thus, vertical stone walls existed on the level above limestone floors, built in dry wall technique around buildings' floors and cuts. The visual overlap of phases I and II clearly shows the match between these stone constructions and trapezoidal limestone floors (Fig. 27). Even on the published section of the western part of the settlement of Lepenski Vir which runs through the backs of Houses 43, 34, 27, 20, 33 and 32, phase II is not marked (see Fig. 28), which might lend further support to our conclusion about its elusive character. Furthermore, no activity areas were reported with regard to the 'floor' level of these structures, with the exception of the largest building at the site, XLIV. Therefore, trapezoidal stone walls previously attributed to phase II were part of the same phase I buildings. Henceforth we suggest treating Srejović's phases I and II as a single phase and we refer to this building horizon as Lepenski Vir I-II (see Table 2). The new dating programme also suggests no temporal break between phases Lepenski Vir I-II and phase III. The dates indicate that Srejović was right to separate the latter as it seems that most of the trapezoidal buildings were abandoned by 5900 cal BC and that new and different occupation pattern commenced at the site in the period following 5900 cal BC. Yet, some of the dates indicate that, at the current resolution of the chronological scale there could have been some overlapping between the use of particular trapezoidal buildings, perhaps primarily for the interment of human burials (e.g. House 21 and Burials 7/I and II, see Fig. 11), and the new types of contexts that appear around 5900 cal BC. These new contexts included a number of pits, dug primarily in the rear area of the site, outside of the zone with trapezoidal buildings. There are also several domed ovens the function of which remains unclear. Also, crouched inhumations became the dominant burial rite (of possibly migrant individuals) during this phase. Some of these crouched burials were found lying on the floors of trapezoidal buildings. This seems to have been the time of significant changes in patterns of habitation of the Lepenski Vir community. Bones of domestic animals were also found in those features assigned to phase III. We have directly dated four samples that come from domestic animals (sheep/goat, cattle and pig) found in these contexts at Lepenski Vir. In this way, it was possible to directly date the introduction of domestic animals to the site. The results suggest that the these domestic animals must have been introduced to Lepenski Vir in the post-5900 cal BC period. The upper limit of this Middle Neolithic phase Lepenski Vir III remains to be elucidated further. While previous charcoal dates indicated that the site was used up until around 5400 cal BC, the upper limit of new dates is around 5700 cal BC. Existing dates from the neighbouring site of Padina suggest that some trapezoidal buildings at that site (Houses 15 and 18) might have been used up until 5500 cal BC. It is possible that future dates will move this limit to the end of the Middle Neolithic, i.e. c. 5500 cal BC. At this time, previously occupied sites on the Danube, such as Lepenski Vir, Padina, Vlasac, etc., were abandoned for more than a millennium. Lepenski Vir is used again during the Eneolithic period, when a burial of the Salkuţa culture, AMS dated to around 4300 cal BC, was interred here (see Burial 2, Fig. 25). New radiometric dates from Lepenski Vir, together with all other newly available data, demand a revision of conclusions previously made with regard to the absolute chronology of particular phases as well as stratigraphic attribution of certain contexts. Such a revision inevitably leads us to suggest a new stratigraphic division and phasing of Lepenski Vir (see Table 2). This revised phasing largely keeps the old nomenclature of the excavator of Lepenski Vir. We would like to avoid confusions and complications in suggesting completely new labels for particular phases when there is no need for such a radical break from the original understanding of the site's stratigraphy. We are aware that the future dating of Lepenski Vir may affect certain elements of our conclusions and that the suggested changes thus remain tentative. Yet, at present, our conclusions are firmly grounded in the available data.

Ancient DNA research in the past decade has revealed that European population structure changed dramatically in the prehistoric period (14,000-3000 years before present, YBP), reflecting the widespread introduction of Neolithic farmer and Bronze Age Steppe ancestries. However, little is known about how population structure changed from the historical period onward (3000 YBP - present). To address this, we collected whole genomes from 204 individuals from Europe and the Mediterranean, many of which are the first historical period genomes from their region (e.g. Armenia and France). We found that most regions show remarkable inter-individual heterogeneity. At least 7% of historical individuals carry ancestry uncommon in the region where they were sampled, some indicating cross-Mediterranean contacts. Despite this high level of mobility, overall population structure across western Eurasia is relatively stable through the historical period up to the present, mirroring geography. We show that, under standard population genetics models with local panmixia, the observed level of dispersal would lead to a collapse of population structure. Persistent population structure thus suggests a lower effective migration rate than indicated by the observed dispersal. We hypothesize that this phenomenon can be explained by extensive transient dispersal arising from drastically improved transportation networks and the Roman Empire's mobilization of people for trade, labor, and military. This work highlights the utility of ancient DNA in elucidating finer scale human population dynamics in recent history., Competing Interests: MA, CW, SS, VO, HM, JS, OC, BZ, EP, KÖ, LD, PG, DF, ML, TA, SA, PA, CB, ŽB, AB, LB, PB, EB, DB, FC, MC, DD, ID, KE, MF, AG, GG, FG, SG, ZH, RJ, KV, GJ, IK, KK, HK, AK, SK, MK, VK, MK, DK, FL, ML, SL, TL, TL, WL, AS, VM, YC, NM, IM, NM, BM, LN, MN, AN, CN, JN, AO, JP, LP, DP, KP, SP, MR, MS, AS, AS, TS, MT, IT, DT, JT, DV, TW, DW, MŽ, MF, MČ, MŠ, DB, MN, AC, RP, JP No competing interests declared, ZG Reviewing editor, eLife, MB Affiliated with Palisada Ltd. The author has no financial interests to declare, JB, DL Affiliated with Kaducej Ltd. The author has no financial interests to declare, RM Affiliated with Skupina STIK. The author has no financial interests to declare, (© 2024, Antonio, Weiß, Gao et al.)

Western Eurasia witnessed several large-scale human migrations during the Holocene 1-5 . Here, to investigate the cross-continental effects of these migrations, we shotgun-sequenced 317 genomes-mainly from the Mesolithic and Neolithic periods-from across northern and western Eurasia. These were imputed alongside published data to obtain diploid genotypes from more than 1,600 ancient humans. Our analyses revealed a 'great divide' genomic boundary extending from the Black Sea to the Baltic. Mesolithic hunter-gatherers were highly genetically differentiated east and west of this zone, and the effect of the neolithization was equally disparate. Large-scale ancestry shifts occurred in the west as farming was introduced, including near-total replacement of hunter-gatherers in many areas, whereas no substantial ancestry shifts happened east of the zone during the same period. Similarly, relatedness decreased in the west from the Neolithic transition onwards, whereas, east of the Urals, relatedness remained high until around 4,000 BP, consistent with the persistence of localized groups of hunter-gatherers. The boundary dissolved when Yamnaya-related ancestry spread across western Eurasia around 5,000 BP, resulting in a second major turnover that reached most parts of Europe within a 1,000-year span. The genetic origin and fate of the Yamnaya have remained elusive, but we show that hunter-gatherers from the Middle Don region contributed ancestry to them. Yamnaya groups later admixed with individuals associated with the Globular Amphora culture before expanding into Europe. Similar turnovers occurred in western Siberia, where we report new genomic data from a 'Neolithic steppe' cline spanning the Siberian forest steppe to Lake Baikal. These prehistoric migrations had profound and lasting effects on the genetic diversity of Eurasian populations., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

By sequencing 727 ancient individuals from the Southern Arc (Anatolia and its neighbors in Southeastern Europe and West Asia) over 10,000 years, we contextualize its Chalcolithic period and Bronze Age (about 5000 to 1000 BCE), when extensive gene flow entangled it with the Eurasian steppe. Two streams of migration transmitted Caucasus and Anatolian/Levantine ancestry northward, and the Yamnaya pastoralists, formed on the steppe, then spread southward into the Balkans and across the Caucasus into Armenia, where they left numerous patrilineal descendants. Anatolia was transformed by intra-West Asian gene flow, with negligible impact of the later Yamnaya migrations. This contrasts with all other regions where Indo-European languages were spoken, suggesting that the homeland of the Indo-Anatolian language family was in West Asia, with only secondary dispersals of non-Anatolian Indo-Europeans from the steppe.

We present the first ancient DNA data from the Pre-Pottery Neolithic of Mesopotamia (Southeastern Turkey and Northern Iraq), Cyprus, and the Northwestern Zagros, along with the first data from Neolithic Armenia. We show that these and neighboring populations were formed through admixture of pre-Neolithic sources related to Anatolian, Caucasus, and Levantine hunter-gatherers, forming a Neolithic continuum of ancestry mirroring the geography of West Asia. By analyzing Pre-Pottery and Pottery Neolithic populations of Anatolia, we show that the former were derived from admixture between Mesopotamian-related and local Epipaleolithic-related sources, but the latter experienced additional Levantine-related gene flow, thus documenting at least two pulses of migration from the Fertile Crescent heartland to the early farmers of Anatolia.

Literary and archaeological sources have preserved a rich history of Southern Europe and West Asia since the Bronze Age that can be complemented by genetics. Mycenaean period elites in Greece did not differ from the general population and included both people with some steppe ancestry and others, like the Griffin Warrior, without it. Similarly, people in the central area of the Urartian Kingdom around Lake Van lacked the steppe ancestry characteristic of the kingdom's northern provinces. Anatolia exhibited extraordinary continuity down to the Roman and Byzantine periods, with its people serving as the demographic core of much of the Roman Empire, including the city of Rome itself. During medieval times, migrations associated with Slavic and Turkic speakers profoundly affected the region.

The evolution of modern human reproductive scheduling is an aspect of our life history that remains vastly uncomprehended. The present work aims to address this gap by validating a non-destructive cutting-edge methodology to infer adult life-history events on modern teeth with known life history and then applying it to fossil specimens. We use phase-contrast synchrotron X-ray microtomography to visualize the dental cementum of 21 specimens: nine contemporary humans; 10 Neanderthals from Krapina (Croatia, 130-120 kyr); one Neolithic Homo sapiens from Ajmana (Serbia); and one Mesolithic H. sapiens from Vlasac (Serbia). We were able to correctly detect and time (root mean square error = 2.1 years; R 2 = 0.98) all reproductive (menarche, parturition, menopause) and other physiologically impactful events in the modern sample. Nonetheless, we could not distinguish between the causes of the events detected. For the fossil specimens, we estimated age at death and age at occurrence of biologically significant events. Finally, we performed an exploratory analysis regarding possible sexual dimorphism in dental cementum microstructure, which allowed us to correctly infer the sex of the Neolithic specimen, for which the true value was known via DNA analysis.

The article presents evidence about the Middle Palaeolithic and Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition interval in the karst area of the Danube Gorges in the Lower Danube Basin. We review the extant data and present new evidence from two recently investigated sites found on the Serbian side of the Danube River - Tabula Traiana and Dubočka-Kozja caves. The two sites have yielded layers dating to both the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic and have been investigated by the application of modern standards of excavation and recovery along with a suite of state-of-the-art analytical procedures. The presentation focuses on micromorphological analyses of the caves' sediments, characterisation of cryptotephra, a suite of new radiometric dates (accelerator mass spectrometry and optically stimulated luminescence) as well as proteomics (zooarchaeology by mass spectrometry) and stable isotope data in discerning patterns of human occupation of these locales over the long term., (© 2021 The Authors. Journal of Quaternary Science Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.)

Forager focus on wild cereal plants has been documented in the core zone of domestication in southwestern Asia, while evidence for forager use of wild grass grains remains sporadic elsewhere. In this paper, we present starch grain and phytolith analyses of dental calculus from 60 Mesolithic and Early Neolithic individuals from five sites in the Danube Gorges of the central Balkans. This zone was inhabited by likely complex Holocene foragers for several millennia before the appearance of the first farmers ~6200 cal BC. We also analyzed forager ground stone tools (GSTs) for evidence of plant processing. Our results based on the study of dental calculus show that certain species of Poaceae (species of the genus Aegilops ) were used since the Early Mesolithic, while GSTs exhibit traces of a developed grass grain processing technology. The adoption of domesticated plants in this region after ~6500 cal BC might have been eased by the existing familiarity with wild cereals., Competing Interests: EC, AR, AZ, AG, AD, CO, MC, SV, MC, DA, TP, DB No competing interests declared, (© 2021, Cristiani et al.)

Archaeological dental calculus, or mineralized plaque, is a key tool to track the evolution of oral microbiota across time in response to processes that impacted our culture and biology, such as the rise of farming during the Neolithic. However, the extent to which the human oral flora changed from prehistory until present has remained elusive due to the scarcity of data on the microbiomes of prehistoric humans. Here, we present our reconstruction of oral microbiomes via shotgun metagenomics of dental calculus in 44 ancient foragers and farmers from two regions playing a pivotal role in the spread of farming across Europe-the Balkans and the Italian Peninsula. We show that the introduction of farming in Southern Europe did not alter significantly the oral microbiomes of local forager groups, and it was in particular associated with a higher abundance of the species Olsenella sp. oral taxon 807. The human oral environment in prehistory was dominated by a microbial species, Anaerolineaceae bacterium oral taxon 439, that diversified geographically. A Near Eastern lineage of this bacterial commensal dispersed with Neolithic farmers and replaced the variant present in the local foragers. Our findings also illustrate that major taxonomic shifts in human oral microbiome composition occurred after the Neolithic and that the functional profile of modern humans evolved in recent times to develop peculiar mechanisms of antibiotic resistance that were previously absent., Competing Interests: The authors declare no competing interest., (Copyright © 2021 the Author(s). Published by PNAS.)

This paper provides results from a suite of analyses made on human dental material from the Late Palaeolithic to Neolithic strata of the cave site of Grotta Continenza situated in the Fucino Basin of the Abruzzo region of central Italy. The available human remains from this site provide a unique possibility to study ways in which forager versus farmer lifeways affected human odonto-skeletal remains. The main aim of our study is to understand palaeodietary patterns and their changes over time as reflected in teeth. These analyses involve a review of metrics and oral pathologies, micro-fossils preserved in the mineralized dental plaque, macrowear, and buccal microwear. Our results suggest that these complementary approaches support the assumption about a critical change in dental conditions and status with the introduction of Neolithic foodstuff and habits. However, we warn that different methodologies applied here provide data at different scales of resolution for detecting such changes and a multipronged approach to the study of dental collections is needed for a more comprehensive and nuanced understanding of diachronic changes.

Objective: The objective of the study, which consisted of a motivational lecture and hands-on training, was to evaluate the role of oral hygiene education for adolescents., Methods: The study population included sixty-two high school students between fourteen and fifteen years of age (thirty males and thirty-two females). The response rate was 76.5%. The measurement of oral hygiene level was performed using the modified Green Vermilion Index (GVI). The values were recorded at baseline, one week, three months, and six months after education through motivational lecture and hands-on training was performed. Descriptive and nonparametric statistical methods were used in statistical analysis. Level of significance was 0.05., Results: At the beginning of the study, the GVI of all examined subjects was 3.52 (SD = 0.70). One week after the motivational lecture and training, it decreased to 2.64 (SD = 0.69). Three months later, the level of plaque index had the lowest value (1.44; SD = 0.66). At the end of the study the level of plaque index increased to 2.52 (SD = 0.86)., Conclusions: A significant oral hygiene improvement in adolescents as a result of education was presented. However, due to a decline in oral hygiene level six months after the education, there is a need for educational programmes continuity.

Objective: The objective of this retrospective study was to assess the prevalence of hypodontia in the permanent dentition among Croatian orthodontic patients. The occurrence was evaluated concerning gender, specific missing teeth, the location, pattern of distribution in the maxillary and mandibular arches and sagittal and vertical skeletal pattern., Material and Methods: The sample consisted of 194 patients (75 males and 119 females) from the Department of Orthodontics, Dental Clinic, Clinical Hospital Center Zagreb. Based on the severity of hypodontia the sample was divided into mild (1-2 missing teeth), moderate (3-5 missing teeth) and severe groups (6 or more missing teeth). The location of missing teeth was used to further divide the sample into anterior (intercanine region), posterior (premolars and molars) and anteroposterior groups. In addition, jaw localization of hypodontia was also considered., Results: Permanent dentition hypodontia among Croatian orthodontic patients was found to be generally mild (80%), and a distribution was similar in the maxilla (39%) and the mandible (41%), as well as in the anterior and posterior segments of dental arch (44%). The number of missing teeth per person ranged from 1 to 12, with no significant difference between genders. The severity and location of hypodontia did not differ significantly between the genders, as well as in between the categories of sagittal and vertical skeletal patterns., Conclusion: Present results suggest that the treatment plan for patients with hypodontia in permanent dentition should be individualized and adjusted for each case., Competing Interests: Conflict of interest: None declared

Archaeological evidence indicates that pig domestication had begun by ∼10,500 y before the present (BP) in the Near East, and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) suggests that pigs arrived in Europe alongside farmers ∼8,500 y BP. A few thousand years after the introduction of Near Eastern pigs into Europe, however, their characteristic mtDNA signature disappeared and was replaced by haplotypes associated with European wild boars. This turnover could be accounted for by substantial gene flow from local European wild boars, although it is also possible that European wild boars were domesticated independently without any genetic contribution from the Near East. To test these hypotheses, we obtained mtDNA sequences from 2,099 modern and ancient pig samples and 63 nuclear ancient genomes from Near Eastern and European pigs. Our analyses revealed that European domestic pigs dating from 7,100 to 6,000 y BP possessed both Near Eastern and European nuclear ancestry, while later pigs possessed no more than 4% Near Eastern ancestry, indicating that gene flow from European wild boars resulted in a near-complete disappearance of Near East ancestry. In addition, we demonstrate that a variant at a locus encoding black coat color likely originated in the Near East and persisted in European pigs. Altogether, our results indicate that while pigs were not independently domesticated in Europe, the vast majority of human-mediated selection over the past 5,000 y focused on the genomic fraction derived from the European wild boars, and not on the fraction that was selected by early Neolithic farmers over the first 2,500 y of the domestication process., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2019 the Author(s). Published by PNAS.)

The spread of early farming across Europe from its origins in Southwest Asia was a culturally transformative process which took place over millennia. Within regions, the pace of the transition was probably related to the particular climatic and environmental conditions encountered, as well as the nature of localized hunter-gatherer and farmer interactions. The establishment of farming in the interior of the Balkans represents the first movement of Southwest Asian livestock beyond their natural climatic range, and widespread evidence now exists for early pottery being used extensively for dairying. However, pottery lipid residues from sites in the Iron Gates region of the Danube in the northern Balkans show that here, Neolithic pottery was being used predominantly for processing aquatic resources. This stands out not only within the surrounding region but also contrasts markedly with Neolithic pottery use across wider Europe. These findings provide evidence for the strategic diversity within the wider cultural and economic practices during the Neolithic, with this exceptional environmental and cultural setting offering alternative opportunities despite the dominance of farming in the wider region.

The archaeological site of Lepenski Vir is widely known after its remarkable stone art sculptures that represent a unique and unprecedented case of Holocene hunter-gatherer creativity. These artworks were found largely associated with equally unique trapezoidal limestone building floors around their centrally located rectangular stone-lined hearths. A debate has raged since the discovery of the site about the chronological place of various discovered features. While over years different views from that of the excavator about the stratigraphy and chronology of the site have been put forward, some major disagreements about the chronological position of the features that make this site a key point of reference in European Prehistory persist. Despite challenges of re-analyzing the site's stratigraphy from the original excavation records, taphonomic problems, and issues of reservoir offsets when providing radiocarbon measurements on human and dog bones, our targeted AMS (Accelerator Mass Spectrometry) dating of various contexts from this site with the application of Bayesian statistical modelling allows us to propose with confidence a new and sound chronological framework and provide formal estimates for several key developments represented in the archaeological record of Lepenski Vir that help us in understanding the transition of last foragers to first farmers in southeast Europe as a whole.

Objectives: The objective of this study was to determine whether the linear measures of the maxilla, mandible and cranial base were predictors of facial growth rotation in a Croatian population with Class III malocclusion by cephalometric radiographic methods., Material and Methods: The examined sample consisted of pretreatment lateral cephalometric records of 201 (111 females and 90 males) untreated Class III patients of Caucasian Croatian ancestry from the Department of Orthodontics at Zagreb University. The measurements were divided into five categories for analysis: cranial base, skeletal maxillary and skeletal mandibular relationships, sagittal intermaxillary and vertical relationships. Five multiple linear regression models were used to identify predictors of facial rotation pattern., Results: The effective length of the mandible was the most important predictor of facial rotation pattern, with the increased length largerly predisposing the tendency to the vertical growth pattern. No significant dichotomy was found regarding gender apart from the fourth model in which the posterior rotation of maxilla is related to female gender., Conclusion: These predictors could help orthodontists determine timing and therapy for Croatian patients with Class III malocclusions., Competing Interests: Conflict of interest: None declared

In this contribution we dismantle the perceived role of marine resources and plant foods in the subsistence economy of Holocene foragers of the Central Mediterranean using a combination of dental calculus and stable isotope analyses. The discovery of fish scales and flesh fragments, starch granules and other plant and animal micro-debris in the dental calculus of a Mesolithic forager dated to the end of the 8th millenium BC and buried in the Vlakno Cave on Dugi Otok Island in the Croatian Archipelago demonstrates that marine resources were regularly consumed by the individual together with a variety of plant foods. Since previous stable isotope data in the Eastern Adriatic and the Mediterranean region emphasises that terrestrial-based resources contributed mainly to Mesolithic diets in the Mediterranean Basin, our results provide an alternative view of the dietary habits of Mesolithic foragers in the Mediterranean region based on a combination of novel methodologies and data.

Farming was first introduced to Europe in the mid-seventh millennium bc, and was associated with migrants from Anatolia who settled in the southeast before spreading throughout Europe. Here, to understand the dynamics of this process, we analysed genome-wide ancient DNA data from 225 individuals who lived in southeastern Europe and surrounding regions between 12000 and 500 bc. We document a west-east cline of ancestry in indigenous hunter-gatherers and, in eastern Europe, the early stages in the formation of Bronze Age steppe ancestry. We show that the first farmers of northern and western Europe dispersed through southeastern Europe with limited hunter-gatherer admixture, but that some early groups in the southeast mixed extensively with hunter-gatherers without the sex-biased admixture that prevailed later in the north and west. We also show that southeastern Europe continued to be a nexus between east and west after the arrival of farmers, with intermittent genetic contact with steppe populations occurring up to 2,000 years earlier than the migrations from the steppe that ultimately replaced much of the population of northern Europe.

Researchers agree that domesticated plants were introduced into southeast Europe from southwest Asia as a part of a Neolithic "package," which included domesticated animals and artifacts typical of farming communities. It is commonly believed that this package reached inland areas of the Balkans by ∼6200 calibrated (cal.) BC or later. Our analysis of the starch record entrapped in dental calculus of Mesolithic human teeth at the site of Vlasac in the Danube Gorges of the central Balkans provides direct evidence that already by ∼6600 cal. BC, if not earlier, Late Mesolithic foragers of this region consumed domestic cereals, such as Triticum monococcum, Triticum dicoccum, and Hordeum distichon, which were also the main crops found among Early Neolithic communities of southeast Europe. We infer that "exotic" Neolithic domesticated plants were introduced to southern Europe independently almost half a millennium earlier than previously thought, through networks that enabled exchanges between inland Mesolithic foragers and early farming groups found along the Aegean coast of Turkey., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Responsible health behavior plays an important role in every individual. Oral health quality results from the level of information available, attitudes, habits and nutrition. Family is the most important environment where children can acquire knowledge, attitudes and habits related to oral health. The aim of the study was to compare the habits of parents and children related to their oral health, and to conclude how parental behavior influences oral health of their children. The study included 101 parent-child pairs (age 11-15 years), their knowledge and behavior according to their oral hygiene, fluoro-prophylaxis and nutrition assessed by anonymous questionnaire. Oral health of parents was estimated according to their tooth loss and compensation, while oral health of children was assessed by dental examination. A total of 101 child-parent pairs were included. Most children were excellent pupils (43.56%). In the group of parents, most participants were mothers (73.27%). Most parents had high school education (65.35%) and were employed (61.62%), and most perceived themselves to be living with average financial situation (86%). A comparable proportion of parents (95%) and children (87%) believed that it was necessary to wash teeth at least twice a day (p=0.125) and most of them thought it necessary to brush teeth for 1-3 minutes (57% of children and 57.43% of parents; p=0.599). The majority of children (56%) and parents (72%) considered it necessary to use dental floss with a toothbrush and toothpaste (p=0.065), while 63% of children and 71.72% of parents believed that toothpaste contained fluoride (p=0.156). Most of the parents (72.3%) and children (65.35%) brushed teeth in the morning and at bedtime (p=0.167) for 1-3 minutes (p=0.098). About 30% of parents and children used the handler for brushing teeth (p=1). Most children (86.32%) and parents (92.1%) had 3-5 meals a day (p=0.181), and 80% of them had their teeth examined by a dentist the year before (p=0.658). The children believing that teeth should be brushed only in the morning have a 3.38-fold greater chance to develop tooth disorders (DMFT >0; p=0.004). Those that do not know that caries and periodontal diseases can be prevented have a 26.3-fold greater chance to develop caries compared to those who are aware of it. Children of parents who only brush their teeth in the morning have a 25 times higher chance of developing CEP >0 as compared with those that brush their teeth after each meal (p=0.016). Children of parents who give them money to buy snacks are 2.9 times more likely to develop CEP >0 (p=0.01) compared to children without money for snack. Children of parents who feel that their health is not good have 3.9 times higher chance of developing CEP >0 as compared to those whose parents think they have a neat bite (p=0.017). Oral hygiene in Croatia is still not at a level of the standards in Western countries. Ignorance about oral hygiene and irresponsible health behavior are the main causes of the poor condition of the teeth. Results of this study showed the close relationship between family attitudes about oral hygiene, as children follow their parents’ habits and behavior. In conclusion, by educating parents, we influence their children’s behavior and knowledge about oral health, and this is the way that health workers should plan interventions to prevent oral diseases.

Questions about how farming and the Neolithic way of life spread across Europe have been hotly debated topics in archaeology for decades. For a very long time, two models have dominated the discussion: migrations of farming groups from southwestern Asia versus diffusion of domesticates and new ideas through the existing networks of local forager populations. New strontium isotope data from the Danube Gorges in the north-central Balkans, an area characterized by a rich burial record spanning the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition, show a significant increase in nonlocal individuals from ∼6200 calibrated B.C., with several waves of migrants into this region. These results are further enhanced by dietary evidence based on carbon and nitrogen isotopes and an increasingly high chronological resolution obtained on a large sample of directly dated individuals. This dataset provides robust evidence for a brief period of coexistence between indigenous groups and early farmers before farming communities absorbed the foragers completely in the first half of the sixth millennium B.C.