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Hepatitis B virus (HBV) has been infecting humans for millennia and remains a global health problem, but its past diversity and dispersal routes are largely unknown. We generated HBV genomic data from 137 Eurasians and Native Americans dated between ~10,500 and ~400 years ago. We date the most recent common ancestor of all HBV lineages to between ~20,000 and 12,000 years ago, with the virus present in European and South American hunter-gatherers during the early Holocene. After the European Neolithic transition, Mesolithic HBV strains were replaced by a lineage likely disseminated by early farmers that prevailed throughout western Eurasia for ~4000 years, declining around the end of the 2nd millennium BCE. The only remnant of this prehistoric HBV diversity is the rare genotype G, which appears to have reemerged during the HIV pandemic., The research was funded by the Max Planck Society, the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (771234–PALEoRIDER, to W.H.; 805268–CoDisEASe to K. Bos; 834616–ARCHCAUCASUS to S.H.), the Slovak Academy of Sciences and the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme and Marie Curie Actions under the Programme SASPRO (1340/03/03 to P.C.R.), the ERA.NET RUS Plus–S&T programm of the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (277–BIOARCCAUCASUS to S.Re. and S.H.), the Werner Siemens Stiftung (“Paleobiochemistry”, to CW), the Award Praemium Academiae of the Czech Academy of Sciences (to M.E.), the Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences (RVO 67985912, to M.Dobe.), the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (19-09-00354a, to M.K.K. and V.V.K.; 19-78-10053 to SSh), the German Research Foundation (DFG-HA-5407/4-1–INTERACT to W.H. and RE2688/2 to S.Re.), the French National Research Agency (ANR-17-FRAL-0010–INTERACT, to M.F.D., M.Ri., S.Ro., S.Sai., D.Bi., and P.Le.), the Wenner-Gren Dissertation Fieldwork Grant (9558 to S.Sab.), and the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan (AP08856654 to L.B.D., L.M., and E.Kh. and AP08857177 to A.Z.B.).

This study characterises the mortar materials used in the construction of walls and floors at the Arroyo de la Dehesa de Velasco site, located near the Roman city of Uxama Argaela (the modern Burgo de Osma&mdash, Ciudad de Osma, Soria, Spain). Multilayer mortars have been characterised by petrographic, mineralogical (X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy with energy dispersive analyses and geochemical analysis (X-ray fluorescence). Additionally, radiocarbon dating of the mortar binder fraction was performed in order to establish the chronology of the building in the absence of other archaeological chronological records. The results showed that similar siliceous aggregates and lime binders were used in the fabrication of multilayer system mortars. Some multilayer wall mortars show ceramic fragments or brick powder to produce hydraulic mortars and improve the resistance to moisture. The raw materials used for the construction of the site were of local origin and the construction was built during the first century BC, according to radiocarbon dating.

Here we report a detailed archaeomagnetic and rock-magnetic study of a pottery kiln from Burgos (Spain) to reconstruct its burning conditions and date its last use and abandonment age. During the course of a rescue archaeological excavation carried out in 2015 in the center of Burgos city, a medieval pottery workshop was discovered. Two well-preserved kilns appeared and archaeomagnetic analyses were performed on one of them. In addition to a large amount of pottery remains, some numismatic and documental evidences provided a general chronological estimation, but the abandonment age of the workshop remains unknown. On the basis of the existing archaeological information we carried out an archaeomagnetic study in order to date its last use. 69 archaeomagnetic samples were collected from the combustion chamber and the kiln's fire tunnel. Stepwise alternating field and thermal demagnetization of the natural remanent magnetization (NRM) were carried out to retrieve the mean direction. Additional experiments consisted in the acquisition of isothermal remanence (IRM), low-field magnetic susceptibility and its anisotropy as well as thermomagnetic curves. Despite the high temperatures expected in the combustion chamber, it appeared that the bricks´ samples from the fire tunnel exhibit the most successful directional results. Magnetite and variable contributions of hematite are the main ferromagnetic minerals observed in the thermomagnetic curves. The type of lithology studied, its previous magnetic history and their location in the kiln strongly condition the observed directional and rock-magnetic results. Additionally, AMS data revealed the manufacturing fabric of the fire tunnel's bricks, showing moderately high anisotropy degrees, but not enough to casts doubts on the directional NRM record. In order to test the reproducibility of the dating results, archaeomagnetic dating was carried out using different geomagnetic field models and the Iberian paleosecular variation curve. The small differences observed in the dating results are mainly due to the density and type of input data of these records. The combination of the archaeomagnetic analyses with the archaeological and documental suggests that last kiln's usage took place during the first half of the XVIth century CE. Overall, this paper illustrates how the combination of archaeological data and archaeomagnetic analyses may improve our understanding about the manufacturing processes, use and age of abandonment of archaeological combustion structures., European Social Fund (Operational Programme for Castilla y León) and the Junta de Castilla y León (Consejería de Educación). Authors also thank the support of the project CGL2016-77560-C2 financed by Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) and European Fund of Regional Development (EFRD), the project BU235P18 funded by Junta de Castilla y León and EFRD, and the projects PID2019-108753GB-C21 and PID2019-105796GB-I00 financed by Agencia Estatal de Investigación (Spain) [AEI /10.13039/501100011033].

We assembled genome-wide data from 271 ancient Iberians, of whom 176 are from the largely unsampled period after 2000 BCE, thereby providing a high-resolution time transect of the Iberian Peninsula. We document high genetic substructure between northwestern and southeastern hunter-gatherers before the spread of farming. We reveal sporadic contacts between Iberia and North Africa by ~2500 BCE and, by ~2000 BCE, the replacement of 40% of Iberia's ancestry and nearly 100% of its Y-chromosomes by people with Steppe ancestry. We show that, in the Iron Age, Steppe ancestry had spread not only into Indo-European-speaking regions but also into non-Indo-European-speaking ones, and we reveal that present-day Basques are best described as a typical Iron Age population without the admixture events that later affected the rest of Iberia. Additionally, we document how, beginning at least in the Roman period, the ancestry of the peninsula was transformed by gene flow from North Africa and the eastern Mediterranean., J.M.F., F.J.L.-C., J.I.M., F.X.O., J.D., and M.S.B. were supported by HAR2017-86509-P, HAR2017-87695-P, and SGR2017-11 from the Generalitat de Catalunya, AGAUR agency. C.L.-F. was supported by Obra Social La Caixa and by FEDER-MINECO (BFU2015- 64699-P). L.B.d.L.E. was supported by REDISCO-HAR2017-88035-P (Plan Nacional I+D+I, MINECO). C.L., P.R., and C.Bl. were supported by MINECO (HAR2016-77600-P). A.Esp., J.V.-V., G.D., and D.C.S.-G. were supported by MINECO (HAR2009-10105 and HAR2013-43851-P). D.J.K. and B.J.C. were supported by NSF BCS-1460367. K.T.L., A.W., and J.M. were supported by NSF BCS-1153568. J.F.-E. and J.A.M.-A. were supported by IT622-13 Gobierno Vasco, Diputación Foral de Álava, and Diputación Foral de Gipuzkoa. We acknowledge support from the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (PTDC/EPH-ARQ/4164/2014) and the FEDER-COMPETE 2020 project 016899. P.S. was supported by the FCT Investigator Program (IF/01641/2013), FCT IP, and ERDF (COMPETE2020 – POCI). M.Si. and K.D. were supported by a Leverhulme Trust Doctoral Scholarship awarded to M.B.R. and M.P. D.R. was supported by an Allen Discovery Center grant from the Paul Allen Foundation, NIH grant GM100233, and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. V.V.-M. and W.H. were supported by the Max Planck Society.

Se presentan los resultados del estudio histórico-arqueológico realizado sobre la portada meridional y otros elementos románicos de la iglesia de Nuestra Señora de la Llana (Cerezo de Río Tirón, Burgos). El trabajo incluye la compilación de fotografías históricas que permiten hacer un estudio comparativo de los elementos cuando se encontraban in situ antes de 1929, tras su remonte en 1933 en el Parque de la Isla y en la actualidad; el análisis de paramentos murarios bajo los principios metodológicos de la Arqueología de la Arquitectura, y la biografía del expolio y traslado de los restos a partir del estudio archivístico., The results of the historical-archaeological study carried out on the southern doorway and in other Romanesque elements of the church of Nuestra Señora de la Llana (Cerezo de Río Tirón, Burgos) are presented here. The work includes the compilation of historical photographs to compare the elements when they were in situ before 1929, after his reconstruction in 1933 in the Park of the Island and at present; the analysis of walls according to the methodology of the Archaeology of Architecture, and the biography of the plunder and the archival study.

Agriculture first reached the Iberian Peninsula around 5700 BCE. However, little is known about the genetic structure and changes of prehistoric populations in different geographic areas of Iberia. In our study, we focus on the maternal genetic makeup of the Neolithic (~ 5500–3000 BCE), Chalcolithic (~ 3000–2200 BCE) and Early Bronze Age (~ 2200–1500 BCE). We report ancient mitochondrial DNA results of 213 individuals (151 HVS-I sequences) from the northeast, central, southeast and southwest regions and thus on the largest archaeogenetic dataset from the Peninsula to date. Similar to other parts of Europe, we observe a discontinuity between hunter-gatherers and the first farmers of the Neolithic. During the subsequent periods, we detect regional continuity of Early Neolithic lineages across Iberia, however the genetic contribution of hunter-gatherers is generally higher than in other parts of Europe and varies regionally. In contrast to ancient DNA findings from Central Europe, we do not observe a major turnover in the mtDNA record of the Iberian Late Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age, suggesting that the population history of the Iberian Peninsula is distinct in character. Concerning research in the Alto Ribatejo, authors wish to thank Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia the support of research on the dawn of farming in the Tagus valley (project “Moving Tasks Accross Shapes” – PTDC/EPH-ARQ/4356/2014), as well as the Geosciences Centre of Coimbra University (strategic project UID/Multi/00073/2013). This study was funded by the German Research Foundation (Grant no. Al 287/14–1).

In European Neolithic populations, the arrival of farmers prompted admixture with local hunter-gatherers over many centuries, resulting in distinct signatures in each region due to a complex series of interactions. David Reich and colleagues analyse genome-wide data from 180 individuals from the Neolithic and Chalcolithic periods of Hungary, Germany and Spain to study the population dynamics of Neolithization in European prehistory. They examine how gene flow reshaped European populations during the Neolithic period, including pervasive admixture—the interbreeding between previously isolated populations—between groups with different ancestry profiles. In each region, they find that the arrival of farmers prompted admixture with local hunter-gatherers, over the course of 3,000 years. Ancient DNA studies have established that Neolithic European populations were descended from Anatolian migrants1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 who received a limited amount of admixture from resident hunter-gatherers3,4,5,9. Many open questions remain, however, about the spatial and temporal dynamics of population interactions and admixture during the Neolithic period. Here we investigate the population dynamics of Neolithization across Europe using a high-resolution genome-wide ancient DNA dataset with a total of 180 samples, of which 130 are newly reported here, from the Neolithic and Chalcolithic periods of Hungary (6000–2900 bc, n = 100), Germany (5500–3000 bc, n = 42) and Spain (5500–2200 bc, n = 38). We find that genetic diversity was shaped predominantly by local processes, with varied sources and proportions of hunter-gatherer ancestry among the three regions and through time. Admixture between groups with different ancestry profiles was pervasive and resulted in observable population transformation across almost all cultural transitions. Our results shed new light on the ways in which gene flow reshaped European populations throughout the Neolithic period and demonstrate the potential of time-series-based sampling and modelling approaches to elucidate multiple dimensions of historical population interactions.

The until now unpublished hoard of weapons from «Los Cascajos» is exceptional in its geographical context, since it is the only one recovered in the province of La Rioja, and it is also exceptional at the Peninsular level for the pieces that make it up: number, typology, origin and conservation. It’s a set of metal pieces from the transit of the Late Bronze Age I to the Late Bronze Age II (1200-1000 B.C.), some of them unpublished in the Peninsula, since they are not of local manufacture but imported from other territories of the Atlantic Bronze Age. The formal characteristics of some pieces point to the Thames Valley as place of origin, although it is not possible to dismiss the Gallic origin of others.El hasta ahora inédito depósito de armas de «Los Cascajos» es excepcional dentro de su contexto geográfico, ya que es el único recuperado en la provincia de La Rioja, pero también a nivel peninsular por las piezas que lo integran: por su número, tipología, origen y conservación. Se trata de un conjunto de metales del tránsito del BFI al BFII (1200-1000 a.C.), algunos de ellos inéditos en la Península, ya que no son de factura local, sino importados de otros territorios del Bronce Atlántico. Las características formales de algunas piezas señalan el Valle del Támesis como lugar de procedencia, aunque sin descartar el origen galo de otras.

Recientes trabajos arqueológicos en la Sierra de San Blas, en Ágreda (Soria), han permitido identificar un sistema inédito de tres atalayas o torres-vigíafechadas en el siglo X, concebido para la defensa del núcleo emiral de Ágreda y de esta región de frontera de la Marca Media Hispánica. Este complejo es el contrapunto al vacío de estaciones afines que se viene postulando para el oriente soriano frente a la densa red defensiva del occidente, al tiempo que permite introducir nuevas acotaciones histórico-arqueológicas sobre la desaparición del núcleo califal de Ágreda en un momento avanzado del siglo X. A pesar de la simpleza de las estructuras que se han conservado hasta nuestros días, todas siguen un modelo constructivo similar al de otras estaciones afines de sierras próximas, como las de la Sierra del Madero, con las que mantendrían relación funcional. Este sincronismo vendríaavalado por la homogeneidad de los materiales arqueológicos recuperados en San Blas, los cuales vienen a enriquecer el registro conocido hasta el momento en Soria.

The archaeological excavation at the site El Prado has documented an Early Neolithic open air settlement and has discovered almost thirty negative structures that were part of an habitat belonging to the early vth millennium cal bc. Its location on a valley bottom beside the gorge of Pancorbo –natural corridor exploited from prehistory times to connect the Ebro valley and the Meseta–, partly explains the location of the settlement. Amongst the documented structures are several storage pits she athed with clay, a well pit and two burials. The latter are both for their structural characteristics and for their ritual, an important contribution to the knowledge of funerary practices during the Early Neolithic, and they will supplement the meagre map and the unequal distribution of findings documented in the peninsula until the end of the vth millennium cal bc. The palynological study provides interesting data on bioclimatic characteristics and anthropization of the environment, and the archaeological material recovered shows clear connections with the contexts of the Ebro valley, but also showing the cultural peculiarities of the Duero basin., La excavación arqueológica realizada en el yacimiento de El Prado ha permitido documentar un asentamiento al aire libre del Neolítico antiguo a partir del registro de casi una treintena de estructuras negativas que formaron parte de un poblado en los inicios del v milenio cal bc. Su situación geográfica en un fondo de valle, junto al desfiladero de Pancorbo, corredor natural aprovechado desde la Prehistoria para conectar el valle del Ebro y la Meseta, explica en parte la elección del asentamiento. Entre las estructuras documentadas destacan varios silos acondicionados con gruesos manteados de barro, un pozo/abrevadero y dos fosas funerarias. Estas últimas suponen, tanto por sus características estructurales como por el ritual, una importante aportación al conocimiento de las prácticas funerarias durante el Neolítico antiguo y vienen a completar el exiguo mapa y la desigual distribución de hallazgos documentados a nivel peninsular hasta finales del v milenio cal bc. El estudio palinológico proporciona interesantes datos sobre las características bioclimáticas y la antropización del medio; y el material arqueológico recuperado pone de manifiesto una clara conexión con los contextos del valle del Ebro, aunque sin ser ajeno a las peculiaridades culturales de la cuenca del Duero.

Las intervenciones arqueológicas realizadas en las plazas de San Juan de Lerma y de Vega de la ciudad de Burgos, han puesto de relieve la existencia de dos fuentes de agua que tuvieron vigencia en el tránsito entre la Plena y Baja Edad Media. Estos dos testimonios relacionados con el abastecimiento público de agua permiten bosquejar la configuración y evolución urbana de sus entornos como dos elementos más en el paisaje medieval de ambos núcleos históricos, exponentes de una realidad histórica y arqueológica en general poco conocida., The archaeological work conducted in the squares in San Juan of Lerma and Vega in the city of Burgos, have revealed the existence of two water sources that were in used in the transition between Medium and Late Middle Ages.These two statements related to public water supplies allow analyzing the configuration and evolution of urban environments as two more elements in the medieval landscape of these historical nucleuses, examples of historical and archaeological reality generally little known.

La excavación arqueológica realizada en el hábitat al aire libre de Valdescusa (Hervías, La Rioja, España) pone de relieve la sincronía estratigráfica y cultural entre elementos tradicionalmente considerados como Campaniformes y del Bronce Pleno, actuando como eslabón espaciotemporal entre las síntesis regionales de la Meseta y la Cuenca Alta-Media del Ebro, donde la acotación cronológica del fenómeno campaniforme resulta muy desigual. Esta controvertida perduración subraya la necesidad de regionalizar y periodizar un fenómeno, pretendidamente lineal, cuyos modelos explicativos no encuentran en los escasos lugares de hábitat documentados un punto de convergencia con el esquema de élites y tumbas suntuarias que lo han construido.