Neanderthals on Naxos: The Ancient Site Rewriting Cycladic History

Long before Naxos became famous for its golden beaches, whitewashed villages and turquoise waters, the island was visited by some of Europe’s earliest human inhabitants.

At Stelida, a rocky hill on the island’s north-western side, archaeologists have uncovered hundreds of thousands of stone tools that offer a remarkable glimpse into prehistoric life in the Aegean. The discoveries suggest that human activity on Naxos stretches back hundreds of thousands of years, challenging long-held assumptions about when people first reached the Greek islands.

Stelida: A prehistoric treasure on Naxos

Located around three kilometres south-west of Naxos Town, Stelida is a geological formation rich in chert, a hard stone that fractures into sharp edges. Before metal tools became widespread, this material was valuable for making implements used in hunting, food preparation, woodworking and other everyday tasks.

The site was first reported by French archaeologists in 1981, who identified evidence of a prehistoric quarry and stone-tool workshop. Its significance became clearer through subsequent archaeological investigations, including excavations by researchers associated with the Naxos Archaeological Museum.

Unlike many better-known Cycladic sites, which are associated with Neolithic settlements and the Bronze Age, Stelida preserves evidence of activity dating to the Palaeolithic, or Old Stone Age.

Researchers have recovered approximately 270,000 stone artefacts, making the hill an exceptional record of prehistoric tool production and human activity.

Evidence of Neanderthals and early humans

The artefacts point to repeated visits by different human populations over a vast period.

Some of the oldest tools are associated with the Lower Palaeolithic, with activity at Stelida potentially beginning at least 250,000 years ago. Certain handaxes may have been produced by Homo heidelbergensis, an extinct human species that lived before the Neanderthals and modern humans.

Other tools, including examples made using the distinctive Levallois technique, have been linked to Neanderthal activity during the Middle Palaeolithic. Researchers have also identified artefacts associated with later Homo sapiens, or modern humans, as well as small tools attributed to Mesolithic hunter-gatherers.

The discoveries are significant because they suggest that the history of human activity in the Cyclades extends far beyond the first farming communities traditionally associated with the islands.

However, stone tools do not by themselves establish the exact identity of every person who made them. Dating and interpreting the finds remains essential to understanding who visited Stelida and when.

Could the Aegean have been an ancient migration route?

For decades, the Mediterranean islands were widely thought to have been settled relatively late, with early human movement into Europe often associated with routes over land.

Stelida has helped reopen the debate over whether earlier human populations also travelled through the Aegean.

During the Pleistocene, the period encompassing the last Ice Age, sea levels were substantially lower than today. Naxos formed part of a much larger landmass that connected many of the present-day Cycladic islands. At certain times, changing coastlines may have made movement between islands and neighbouring land areas easier.

These conditions could help explain how earlier human groups reached Stelida without undertaking the sea crossings that would be necessary today.

As the climate warmed and sea levels rose, waterways increasingly separated the islands. The possibility that later prehistoric populations crossed these stretches of water raises further questions about early seafaring and human adaptation.

The evidence does not settle every question about prehistoric travel in the Aegean, but it gives archaeologists an important site at which to investigate the relationship between changing landscapes and human movement.

How archaeologists uncover the past

Excavating Stelida involves far more than collecting stone tools from the ground.

Researchers first survey the hill, mapping the distribution of artefacts and identifying areas where soil deposits are likely to preserve archaeological material. Excavation then proceeds carefully, with each layer recorded through notes, photographs, drawings and surveying equipment.

Soil samples are also examined for microscopic evidence that can reveal details about past environments and human activity.

One dating technique used at the site is optically stimulated luminescence, which can help estimate when mineral grains were last exposed to sunlight before being buried. This provides a way to date sediment layers associated with archaeological finds.

Stelida’s soil conditions make preservation difficult. Plant remains and animal bones are scarce, although traces may survive in places where organic material was protected by burning.

As a result, the stone artefacts are particularly important for reconstructing the site’s long history.

An Ice Age landscape far removed from modern Naxos

Today, Naxos is known for its Mediterranean climate, olive groves, beaches and fertile valleys. During parts of the Pleistocene, however, the island’s landscape would have looked very different.

Lower temperatures and changing sea levels transformed the region, while vegetation and animal populations shifted with the climate.

Evidence from other parts of Greece provides clues to the environment that once surrounded Stelida. Dwarf elephants have been documented near Moutsouna on Naxos, while prehistoric animal remains from other Greek islands help researchers understand the wildlife that once inhabited the wider region.

Plant evidence preserved on Santorini also offers insight into ancient Mediterranean environments, including the presence of vegetation such as wild olives, palms and tamarisk.

Together, these findings help scientists reconstruct a landscape that cannot be fully understood from Stelida’s stone tools alone.

From prehistoric quarry to modern tourist destination

Stelida’s story did not end with the last prehistoric visitors.

For generations, the area was largely rural, used for grazing sheep and extracting local materials. Stone from the hill was quarried as recently as the 1980s, including for the construction of Naxos Airport’s runway.

The area has since become a sought-after destination for tourism and property development, with villas and hotels transforming parts of the landscape.

That growth has created a challenge: how can Stelida accommodate tourism and development while protecting an archaeological site of international importance?

Its value extends beyond the individual artefacts recovered from the ground. The hill provides a rare opportunity to investigate how different human populations used the same landscape across an extraordinary span of time.

Protecting Naxos’s prehistoric heritage

Stelida offers a compelling reminder that the history of the Cyclades began long before the ancient Greek world familiar from mythology, temples and classical civilisation.

Its stone tools provide evidence of prehistoric activity stretching back at least 250,000 years, with findings associated with Neanderthals and later modern humans adding new dimensions to the story of the Aegean.

Further research may help clarify the timing of these visits, the identities of the toolmakers and the environmental conditions that shaped their movements.

Protecting Stelida is therefore essential not only for Naxos, but also for the wider understanding of early human history in Europe.

Beneath the landscape of one of Greece’s most popular holiday islands lies a story that reaches deep into humanity’s distant past.

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