Atapuerca Mountains

The Atapuerca Mountains is a karstic hill formation near the village of Atapuerca in Castile and León, northern Spain. In a still ongoing excavation campaign rich fossil deposits and stone tool assemblages were discovered in the complex of local caves that are attributed to the earliest known hominin residents in Western Europe. This "exceptional reserve of data" has been deposited during extensive Lower Paleolithic presence as the Atapuerca Mountains served as the preferred occupation site of Homo erectus, Homo antecessor and Homo heidelbergensis communities. The earliest specimen yet unearthed and reliably dated confirm an age between 1.2 Million and 600,000 years. The site was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site, under the name, Archaeological Site of Atapuerca.