Neanderthal the first residents of Meganisi

Recent paleontological studies in the island complex of Meganisi, conducted by the Department of History and Archaeology of the University of Crete in collaboration with the 36th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities, brought to light traces from the first inhabitants of the island that relate to the ancestral human kind of Neanderthal. As archaeologists indicate, during the Middle Paleolithic Age, the Neanderthal people used to wander around the areas of the Ionian Sea at a time when the geographical terrain, the climate and the landscape were totally different. That time, the sea level would change very frequently and there were times when the islands of Meganisi and Lefkada were almost reachable on foot from the opposite mainland coasts. The archaeological findings in the island of Meganisi show the existence of human beings since the Mesolithic era, following small interruptions that cover few thousand of years from the Neolithic era to the Post Roman times. This research not only focuses on the paleontology and archaeological facts, but also on the scientific sectors, like history, geophysics and anthropology.