Modeling initial Neolithic dispersal. The first agricultural groups in

In previous research, the SE-NW time-trend in the age of the earliest Neolithic sites across Europehas been treated as a signal of a global-scale process that brought farming/herding economies tothe continent. Residual variation from this global time-trend is generally treated as ‘noise’. A Com-plex Adaptive Systems perspective views this empirical record differently. The apparent time-trendis treated as an emergent consequence of the interactions of individuals and groups of differentscale.Here, we examine the dynamics of agricultural dispersals, using the rich body evidence available fromthe Iberian Peninsula as a case study. We integrate two complementary approaches: (1) creating a high Agent Based Modeling environment to simulate different processes that may have driven the of farming; (2) collecting and synthesizing empirical archeological data for the earliest Neolithicsettlements that we use to evaluate our models results.Our resultssuggestthat,(a)thesourceofradiocarbondatausedtoevaluatealternativehypothesesplayan important role in the results; and (b) the model scenario that produces de best fit with archeologicaldata implies a dispersal via northwestern and southern routes; a preference for leap-frog movement; aninfluence of ecological conditions (selecting most favorable agricultural land) and demographic factors(avoiding settled regions).This workrepresentsafirstattemptathigh-resolutionbottom-upmodelingofthisimportantdynamicin human prehistory. While we recognize that other social and environmental drivers could have alsoaffected thedispersalofagropastoralsystems,thoseconsideredhereincludemanythathavebeenwidelyconsidered important in prior research and so warrant inclusion.© 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.