Exploring Early Human Presence in West Central Africa’s Rainforests: Archeo-Paleontological Surveys, Taphonomy, and Insights from Living Primates in Equatorial Guinea

Since 2014, the Paleoanthropology Group of the National Museum of Natural Sciences (CSIC), in collaboration with Equatoguinean researchers, has been conducting archeo-paleontological fieldwork in Equatorial Guinea, continuing a longstanding Spanish naturalist tradition in this region of West Central Africa. These multidisciplinary investigations, framed within an archeo-paleo-anthropological approach, aim primarily to identify early human occupation in the Central African rainforests. To date, robust evidence of Pleistocene human presence has been documented, particularly through lithic assemblages. Although the scarcity and fragmentation of well-dated sites in Central Africa complicate chronological placement, technological traits observed in the lithic industries recorded in Equatorial Guinea show clear affinities with the African Middle Stone Age (MSA). Complementary taphonomic analyses of faunal remains have been undertaken to better understand bone preservation and fossilization processes under tropical rainforest conditions, thereby contributing to the interpretation of archeological contexts. In parallel, ongoing primatological research within the project—focused on extant primates in their natural habitats—seeks to provide ethological models relevant to the study of hominin locomotor evolution. Notably, the project has led to the ecogeographic characterization of the Engong chimpanzee group in Monte Alén National Park, one of the country’s most pristine protected areas.