The earliest human occupation of Sicily: A review

Abstract

Abstract Sicily, the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, is widely known for its crucial role as a crossroads for human colonization from the Holocene through to at least the Middle Ages. Yet the role played by Sicily in terms of human dispersal along the coastal margins of the western and central Mediterranean during the Pleistocene remains largely unclear. For instance, Sicily is often cited in the literature as being the first Mediterranean island to have been populated by Aurignacian human groups—a scenario that has been heavily debated, if not entirely disproven. In this paper, I present a critical reanalysis of the purported early colonization events of the island known from the literature, together with recently published radiometric dates and sophisticated geological modeling, to show that there is currently no basis to postulate a Sicilian Aurignacian phase (∼45 − 33 ka BP). Additionally, I suggest that there is cause to reconsider the timing and modalities of the colonization of the island by Epigravettian human groups and that the colonization of Sicily could represent the first evidence of an island in the Central and Western Mediterranean colonized by watercraft. Contextualizing the relevance of Sicily in the early seafaring debate, the conclusions presented further suggest a reconsideration of the current pre-Holocene model of human dispersion for the entire Mediterranean.