The story begins in the sheltering rock and alluvial valleys of Morocco. Archaeological layers spanning the Epipalaeolithic–Neolithic transition (the earliest samples in this dataset date to c. 8400 BCE) show hunter‑gatherer lifeways gradually layering with early farming practices. Key Moroccan sites sampled here — Ifri n'Amr or Moussa, Kelif el Boroud, Kaf Taht el‑Ghar, and Skhirat‑Rouazi — preserve a sequence of stone tools, early domesticates, and burial practices that mark local cultural continuity and regional exchange.
By the later prehistoric period, maritime voyages carried people and their material culture westward across the Atlantic margin to the Canary Islands. The primary era represented in this dataset, Canarias_Guanche, reflects communities on Tenerife and Gran Canaria that archaeologists identify with the Guanche cultural horizon. Archaeological data indicates island colonization involved small pioneering groups whose lifeways adapted to volcanic landscapes and insular resources.
Limited evidence suggests that these developments were neither singular nor simple: multiple currents — indigenous Epipalaeolithic lineages, incoming Neolithic farmers with Mediterranean connections, and later movements — combined in northern Africa. Radiocarbon dates and stratigraphic contexts anchor this sequence, but the full picture remains provisional where sample coverage is sparse or uneven across millennia.
