Early evidence of human resilience to earthquakes from southwestern Iberia
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Mitigating the devastating effects of earthquakes is crucial for communities living in seismic regions. Previous studies suggest that, beginning 13,000 years ago, Paleolithic humans developed long-term resilience strategies to cope with seismic risk. However, only with the rise of urban civilizations did our species regain normal lifeways within decades or centuries following destructive earthquakes. Here, we present geophysical, geological, geochronological, and archaeological evidence from the open-air site of Vale Boi in southwestern Iberia. Our findings demonstrate that humans exhibited resilience to ≥ Mw 5.7 earthquakes as early as 30,000 years ago—17,000 years earlier than previously thought. Our data indicate that Paleolithic hunter-gatherers returned to Vale Boi as little as 50–500 years after a major seismic rockfall, achieving resettlement timeframes comparable to those of modern sedentary communities. We argue that the tightly knit social networks of Vale Boi’s foragers played a key role in their ability to recover rapidly from seismic events. Our research challenges the notion that human resilience to earthquakes underwent a fundamental shift with the advent of sedentary lifestyles. Furthermore, we propose that strong social ties are a critical factor in post-quake recovery for societies exposed to recurrent seismic threats.