Noel Amano

Noel received a BA in Cell and Molecular Biology and an MSc in Archaeology from the University of the Philippines. In 2017, he completed a PhD in Quaternary Prehistory at the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, France and the Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution in Tarragona, Spain. His dissertation explored Late Pleistocene to Mid-Holocene paleoenvironment and human subsistence strategies in Eastern Java, Indonesia.

In addition to working on Southeast Asian hunter gatherer sites, he has been involved in research projects looking at early agricultural communities in Southeast Asia, specifically the introduction/spread of domestic animals in Vietnam and the Philippines.

In the last two years, he has co-directed excavations of cave and open-air sites in Sri Lanka with the aim of looking at early human colonisation of the region. He has also co-directed fieldwork in the Philippines and the Southern Caucasus and has ongoing research in Vietnam and Indonesia.

Selected Journal Articles

2023. Amano, N., Wedage, O., Ilgner, J., Boivin, N., Petraglia, M., Roberts, P.  Of forests and grasslands: Human, primate, and ungulate palaeoecology in Late Pleistocene-Holocene Sri Lanka. Frontiers in Earth Science 11,583. 

2023. Roberts, P., Kaplan, J.O., Findley, D.M., Hamilton, R., Caetano-Andrade, V.L., Amano, N., Kay, A.U., Renn, J. and Winkelmann, R., 2023. Mapping our reliance on the tropics can reveal the roots of the Anthropocene. Nature Ecology & Evolution https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-023-01998-x

2022. Findley, D. M., Acabado, S., Amano, N., Kay, A. U., Hamilton, R., Barretto-Tesoro, G., Bankoff, G., Kaplan, J. O., Roberts, P. Land Use Change in a Pericolonial Society: Intensification and Diversification in Ifugao, Philippines Between 1570 and 1800 CE. Frontiers in Earth Science doi.org/10.3389/feart.2022.680926

2022. Antoine P-O., Reyes, M., Amano, N., Bautista, A., Chang, H-S., Claude, J., De Vos, J., Ingicco, T. A new rhinoceros clade from the Pleistocene of Asia sheds light on mammal dispersals to the Philippines. Zoological Journal of the Linnaean Society 194(2): 416-430.

2021. Hamilton, R., Wolfhagen, J.; Amano, N., Boivin, N., Findley, D. M., Iriarte, J., Kaplan, J. O., Stevenson, J., Roberts, P. Non-uniform tropical forest responses to the ‘Columbian Exchange’ in the Neotropics and Asia-Pacific. Nature Ecology & Evolution, s41559-021-01474-4.

2021. Patalano, R., Hamilton, R., Finestone, E., Amano, N., Heddell-Stevens, P., Itambu, M., Petraglia, M., and Roberts, P. Microhabitat Variability in Human Evolution. Frontiers in Earth Science 9: 1208. doi.org/10.3389/feart.2021.787669

2021. Amano, N., Wang, Y., Boivin, N., Roberts, P. ‘Emptying forests?’ A review of past human and non-human primate interactions and implications for conservation. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 36(4): 345-359.

2021. Ingicco, T., Amano, N., Setiagama, K., Moigne, A.-M., Budiman, Sémah, A.-M., Simanjuntak, T. and Semah, F. From food to grave good: A Reply to Nijman. Current Anthropology 62(3): 387-388.

2021. Martinon-Torres, M., d’Errico, F., Santos, E., Alvaro Gallo, A., Amano, N., Archer, W., Armitage, S. J., Luis Arsuaga, J., Bermudez de Castro, J.M., Blinkhorn, J., Crowther, A., Douka, K., Dubertnet, S., Faulkner, P., Fernandez-Colon, P., Kourampas, N., Gonzaels Garcia, J., Larreina, D., Le Bourdennec, F.X., MacLeod, G., Martin-Frances, L., Massilani, D., Mercader, J., Miller, J.M., Ndiema, E., Notario, B., Pitarch Marti, A., Prendergast, M.E., Quefflec, A., Rigaud, S., Roberts, P., Shoaee, M. J., Shipton, C., Simpson, I., Boivin, N., Petraglia, M.D. Earliest known human burial in Africa. Nature, 593: 95-100.

2021. Vanwezer, N., Taylor, W.T.T., Bayarsaikhan, J., Breitenbach, S.F., Amano, N., Louys, J., del Val, M., Boivin, N. and Petraglia, M. 2021. Hunting, herding, and people in the rock art of Mongolia: New discoveries in the Gobi-Altai Mountains. Archaeological Research in Asia, p.100267.

2021. Ono, R., Fuentes, R., Amano, N., Sofian, H.O., Sriwigati, Aziz, N., Pawlik, A. Development of bone and lithic technologies by anatomically modern humans during the late Pleistocene to Holocene in Sulawesi and Wallacea. Quaternary International doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2020.12.045

2021. Amano, N., Bankoff, G., Findley, D.M., Barretto-Tesoro, G. and Roberts, P. Archaeological and historical insights into the ecological impacts of pre-colonial and colonial introductions into the Philippine Archipelago. The Holocene 31(2): 313-330.

2020. Langley, M. C., Amano, N., Wedage, O., Deraniyagala, S., Pathmalal, M. M., Perera, N., Boivin, N., Petraglia, M. and Roberts, P. Bows and arrows and complex symbolic displays 48,000 years ago in the South Asian tropics. Science Advances 6(24): eaba3831. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aba3831.

2020. Ingicco, T., Reyes, M.C., de Vos, J., Belarmino, M., Albers, P.C.H., Lipardo, I., Gallet, X., Amano, N., van den Bergh, G. D., Cosalan, A.D. and Bautista, A. Taphonomy and chronosequence of the 709 ka Kalinga site formation (Luzon Island, Philippines). Scientific Reports 10: 11081. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-68066-3.

2020. Ingicco, T., Amano, N., Setiagama, K., Moigne, A.-M., Budiman, Sémah, A.-M., Simanjuntak, T. and Semah, F. From food to grave good: nonhuman primate exploitation in Early to Mid-Holocene Eastern Java (Indonesia). Current Anthropology 61(2): 708186.

2020. Wedage, O., Roberts, P., Faulkner, P., Crowther, A., Douka, K., Picin, A., Blinkhorn, J., Deraniyagala, S., Boivin, N., Petraglia, M. and Amano, N. Late Pleistocene to early-Holocene rainforest foraging in Sri Lanka: Multidisciplinary analysis at Kitulgala Beli-lena. Quaternary Science Reviews 231: 106200.

2019. Wedage, O*., Amano, N*., Langley, M., Douka, K., Blinkhorn, J., Crowther, A., Deraniyagala, S., Kourampas, N., Simpson, I., Perera, N., Picin, A., Boivin, N., Petraglia, M., Roberts, P. Specialized rainforest hunting by Homo sapiens ~45,000 years ago. Nature Communications 10: 739.

2019. Roberts, P., Amano, N. Plastic pioneers: hominin biogeography across the Movius Line during the Late Pleistocene. Archaeological Research in Asia, 17: 181-192.

2019. Boulanger, C., Ingicco, T., Piper, P. J., Amano, N., Grouard, S., Ono, R., Hawkins, S., and Pawlik, A.  Coastal subsistence strategies and Mangrove swamp evolution at Bubog I rockshelter (Ilin Island, Mindoro, Philippines) from the late Pleistocene to the mid-Holocene. Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology, 14(4): 584-604. 

2018. Ingicco, T., van den Bergh, G.D., Jago-on, C., Bahain, J-J., Chacon, G., Amano, N., Forestier, H., King, C., Manalo, K., Nomade, S., Pereira, A., Reyes, M., Semah, A-M., Shao, Q., Voinchet, P., Falgueres, C., Celiberti, V., Albers, P., Lyras, G., Lising, M., Bautista, A., de Vos, J.  Earliest known hominin activity in the Philippines by 709 thousand years ago. Nature 557, 233-237.

2018. Acabado, S., Barretto-Tesoro, G., Amano, N., Status differentiation, agricultural intensification, and pottery production in precapitalist Kiyyangan, Ifugao, Philippines. Archaeological Research in Asia 15: 55-69.

Book Chapters

2022. Amano N., Ingicco, T., Moigne, A-M., Semah, A-M., Simanjuntak, T., Semah, F. 2022. Monkey Hunting in Early to Mid-Holocene Eastern Java. In: B. Urbani, D. Youlatos, AT Antczak (Eds).  World Archeoprimatology: Interconnections of Humans and Non-human Primates in the Past. Cambridge: University Press, Cambridge

2020. O’Connor, S., Bulbeck, D., Amano, N., Piper, P., Brockwell, S., McWilliam, A., Fenner, J. N., O’Connor-Veth, J., Whitau, R., Maloney, T., Langley, M. C., Lister, M., Lankton, J., Gratuze, B., Dickinson, W.R., Barham, A. and Wilan, R. C. The Fortified Settlement of Macapainara, Lautem District, Timor-Leste. In: O’Connor, S., McWilliam, A., Brockwell, S. (Eds) Forts and Fortification in Wallacea: Archaeological and Ethnohistoric Investigations. Terra Australis 53: 13-48. http://doi.org/10.22459/TA53.2020