The Italian peninsula offers an excellent case study within which to investigate long-term regional demographic trends and their response to climate fluctuations, especially given its diverse landscapes, latitudinal range and varied elevations. In the past two decades, summed probability distributions of calibrated radiocarbon dates have become an important method for inferring population dynamics in prehistory. Recent advances in this approach also allow for statistical assessment of spatio-temporal patterning in demographic trends. In this paper we reconstruct population change for the whole Italian peninsula from the Late Mesolithic to the Early Iron Age (10,000–2800 cal yr BP). How did population patterns vary across time and space? Were fluctuations in human population related to climate change? In order to answer these questions, we have collated a large list of published radiocarbon dates (n = 4010) and use this list firstly to infer the demographic trends for the Italian peninsula as a whole, before addressing each of five sub-regions in turn (northern, central, and southern Italy, Sicily, Sardinia). We also compare population fluctuations with local paleoclimate proxies (cave, lake, marine records). At a pan-regional scale, the results show a general rapid and substantial increase in population in the Early Neolithic with the introduction of farming at around 8000 cal yr BP and further dramatic increases during the Bronze and Iron Age (~ 3800–2800 cal yr BP). However, different regional demographic trajectories exist across different regions of Italy, suggesting a variety of localised human responses to climate shifts. Population and climate appear to have been more closely correlated during the early–mid Holocene (Mesolithic–Neolithic), while later in the Holocene (Bronze–Iron Ages) they decouple. Overall, across the Holocene the population dynamics varied by region and depended on the long-term socio-ecological dynamics prevailing in a given area. Finally, we include a brief response to the paper ‘Radiocarbon dated trends and central Mediterranean prehistory’ by Parkinson et al. (J Word Prehist 34(3), 2021)—synchronously published by Journal of World Prehistory but wholly independently developed—indicating how our conclusions accord with or differ from one another.

意大利半岛提供了一个很好的案例研究，可以用来调查长期区域人口趋势及其对气候波动的反应，特别是考虑到其多样化的景观、纬度范围和不同的海拔。在过去的二十年中，校准放射性碳测年的概率分布总和已成为推断史前人口动态的重要方法。这种方法的最新进展还可以对人口趋势的时空模式进行统计评估。在本文中，我们重建了整个意大利半岛从中石器时代晚期到铁器时代早期（距今 10,000-2800 年）的人口变化。人口模式如何随着时间和空间的变化而变化？人口波动与气候变化有关吗？为了回答这些问题，我们整理了大量已发布的放射性碳日期列表（n = 4010），并首先使用该列表来推断整个意大利半岛的人口趋势，然后依次讨论五个次区域中的每一个（意大利北部、中部和南部、西西里岛、撒丁岛）。我们还将人口波动与当地古气候指标（洞穴、湖泊、海洋记录）进行比较。在泛区域范围内，结果表明，随着距今 8000 卡路里左右农业的引入，新石器时代早期人口普遍快速大幅增长，并在青铜器和铁器时代（约 3800-2800 卡路里/年）进一步急剧增加。英国石油公司）。然而，意大利不同地区存在不同的区域人口轨迹，这表明人类对气候变化有多种局部反应。在全新世早期到中期（中石器时代到新石器时代），人口和气候似乎更加密切相关，而在全新世后期（青铜时代到铁器时代），它们之间的关系则脱钩。总体而言，在整个全新世，人口动态因地区而异，并取决于特定地区普遍存在的长期社会生态动态。最后，我们对帕金森等人的论文“放射性碳测年趋势和地中海中部史前史”进行了简短回应。 （J Word Prehist 34(3), 2021）——由《世界史前史杂志》同步出版，但完全独立开发——表明我们的结论如何彼此一致或不同。