Introduction: Europe in the Mesolithic

By the end of the Paleolithic , large parts of Europe were covered with glaciers and thus uninhabitable. It is estimated that only 5,000 to 130,000 people lived scattered across the continent at that time. These populations concentrated in relatively small habitable areas, known as refugia. 

After the end of the Ice Age, these groups began to repopulate Europe: this was the beginning of the Mesolithic or Middle Stone Age. For parts of Europe that were not strongly influenced by the Ice Age, the term Epipaleolithic is also used. . The Mesolithic was a transitional period between the end of the last Ice Age and the rise of agriculture.

The Mesolithic in the Balkans began around 13,000 BC. In Western Europe, the early Mesolithic started around 12,000 BC with the Azilian in the region of Northern Spain and Southern France. In other parts of Europe, the Mesolithic began around 9500 BC, at the beginning of the Holocene. The period ended with the introduction of agriculture, depending on the region, between 6500 and 3500 BC.

During the Mesolithic, smaller tools and weapons were developed, and hunting and gathering diversified. There was a decline in large-scale group hunting of big animals and a shift towards smaller, versatile technologies.

The Western Hunter-Gatherers (WHG) are one of the most significant Mesolithic populations.

The DNA of the WHG is also called the Villabruna cluster, named after a find in Northern Italy of a grave from around 12,000 BC, with a skeleton showing the earliest form of this DNA. The Villabruna cluster is closely related to the Paleolithic Epigravettian culture from Italy and the Balkans.

The people with the Villabruna cluster DNA spread around 17,000 BC to Italy and the Iberian Peninsula. On the Iberian Peninsula, they mixed with the local population of the Magdalenian culture. These Cro-Magnons or Early European Modern Humans (EEMH) had arrived in the region more than 30,000 years ago.

After the Ice Age, around 12,000-10,000 BC, the Villabruna cluster spread to the rest of Europe. There, it replaced the DNA of the Magdalenian population.

The WHG likely had dark skin and blue eyes. After the arrival of the early Neolithic farmers (EEF), the skin color of European populations became lighter.

The WHG were gradually displaced in the Neolithic by the early farmers, but their genetic influence remained present in some European populations. In some areas, both peoples lived alongside each other for a long time. In other regionss, such as the Baltic states and the Iberian Peninsula, both populations merged.

The second important Mesolithic population group are the Eastern European Hunter-Gatherers (EHG). The boundary between WHG and EHG ran from the Danube to the western Baltic Sea. The EHG inhabited an area from the Baltic Sea to the Urals and further to the Pontic-Caspian steppe.

Genetically, the EHG primarily came from the Ancient North Eurasians (ANE) from Siberia, with a smaller contribution from the WHG. The exact relationship between ANE and EHG is not yet known.

In the Neolithic and early Copper Age, around 5200 to 4000 BC, the EHG mixed with Caucasian hunter-gatherers (CHG), leading to the genetic branch of the Western Steppe Herders (WSH), a group that from around 3500 BC spread the Indo-European languages and culture across Europe, India, and Anatolia.

The EHG likely had light skin, brown eyes, and light hair.

The EHG reached Scandinavia from the north, while the WHG had already settled in Scandinavia from the south. The two population groups merged into the Scandinavian Hunter-Gatherers (SHG).

The cultures of the WHG, EHG, and SHG differed from each other, yet they had several similarities. They conducted simpler burials. Many settlements were located near the sea or lakes, which provided an abundant food supply. 

The climate was characterized by the retreat of the ice caps and the rapid warming of the climate. In the areas that were formerly tundra's, forests developed, initially light pine and birch forests, and later mixed oak forests. This led to changes in the living environment and food supply. The large herds of the Late Paleolithic moved away, causing the focus to shift to hunting forest animals, such as red deer, roe deer, and wild boar, as well as fish, birds, and small animals. People also gathered fruits and nuts, with the hazelnut making a significant contribution to the diet and possibly being the first cultivated plant in Europe.

Characteristic of the Mesolithic are microliths, stone tools smaller than 3 cm used in composite tools. This was a clear advancement over the larger stone tools from the Paleolithic. In some regionss, such as Ireland and the Tyrrhenian islands, however, a macrolithic technology remained in use. Shaft axes of flint and daggers with organic handles were also manufactured, as found in Northern Russia.

There are indications that people already built structures with a ritual or astronomical significance, such as the earliest structures of Stonehenge and Warren Field in Scotland. Additionally, archaeological excavations of settlements, such as in Denmark and Northern Germany, revealed structures ranging from windbreaks and huts to semi-permanent dwellings with floors made of birch bark and logs. In Northern Europe and Scandinavia, early houses and pit houses have also been found, such as the Tingby house in Sweden and gressbakken houses in Norway.

Relatively few artworks from the Mesolithic have been preserved, with the exception of some rock paintings in the Iberian Mediterranean region and the Urals, depicting people in dynamic poses. Additionally, some engraved pendants, wooden artifacts, and small animal sculptures have been found, such as the elk head from Huittinen.

In some regions, people used grasses and young twigs to make shoes and baskets. Some of these baskets were decorated with dyes. A number of baskets have been found in the Cueva de los Murciélagos in southern Spain, dating from around 8000 BC. This indicates that advanced weaving techniques were already applied in the early Mesolithic period, possibly for both practical and aesthetic purposes. Textile clothing was not yet made.

In Northeast Europe, Siberia, and parts of Southern Europe and North Africa, there was between 9500 and 7500 BC a 'ceramic Mesolithic': the hunter-gatherers learned to bake pottery. This likely began around Lake Baikal in Siberia, from where it spread to other cultures, such as the Dnieper-Donets culture in Ukraine and Russia, the Narva culture around the Baltic Sea, the Ertebølle culture in Denmark, and the Swifterbant culture in the Low Countries.

The pottery had pointed or knobbed bases and flared rims. Due to the similarities in ceramics of these peoples, it is likely that they adopted the tradition from each other, and not from the Neolithic farmers they lived alongside. This was more related to the technological transfer between hunter-gatherers than the spread of agriculture.

In Russia, these cultures are already considered Neolithic, because in the Russian archaeological tradition, the Neolithic is defined by the development of ceramics, and not by the emergence of agriculture.

Around 7000 BC, the first farmers moved from Anatolia to the area around the Aegean Sea. This marked the beginning of the Neolithic and brought a fundamental lifestyle shift. The farmers brought with them the so-called neolithic package, consisting of agriculture, animal husbandry, polished stone axes, and pottery.

Although the rise of agriculture defined the beginning of the Neolithic, this transition did not occur everywhere at the same pace or completely.

Some communities fully embraced agriculture and settled permanently in one area. Others combined elements of agriculture and hunting-gathering. Yet other communities chose to continue their traditional foraging lifestyle. Such communities, like those in the Blätterhöhle near Hagen, maintained their hunter-gatherer lifestyle for more than 2000 years after the introduction of agriculture.

This process shows how flexible Mesolithic communities were in adapting to changing environments and socio-economic conditions.