Prehistoric demography has recently risen to prominence as a potentially explanatory variable for episodes of cultural change as documented in the archaeological and ethnographic record. While this has resulted in a veritable boom in methodological developments seeking to address temporal changes in the relative size of prehistoric populations, little work has focused on the manner in which population dynamics manifests across a spatial dimension. Most recently, the so-called Cologne Protocol has led the way in this endeavour. However, strict requirements of raw-material exchange data as analytical inputs have prevented further applications of the protocol to regions outside of continental Europe. We apply an adjusted approach of the protocol that makes it transferable to cases in other parts of the world, while demonstrating its use by providing comparative benchmarks of previous research on the Late Glacial Final Palaeolithic of southern Scandinavia, and novel insights from the early Holocene pioneer colonization of coastal Norway. We demonstrate again that population size and densities remained fairly low throughout the Late Glacial, and well into the early Holocene. We suggest that such low population densities have played a significant role in shaping what may have been episodes of cultural loss, as well as potentially longer periods of only relatively minor degrees of cultural change.

This article is part of the theme issue ‘Cross-disciplinary approaches to prehistoric demography’.

史前人口学最近作为考古和民族志记录中记载的文化变迁事件的潜在解释变量而声名鹊起。虽然这导致了寻求解决史前人口相对规模的时间变化的方法论发展的真正繁荣，但很少有工作关注人口动态在空间维度上的表现方式。最近，所谓的科隆议定书在这一努力中处于领先地位。然而，作为分析输入的原材料交换数据的严格要求阻止了该协议在欧洲大陆以外地区的进一步应用。我们应用了协议的调整方法，使其可以转移到世界其他地区的案例中，同时通过提供先前对斯堪的纳维亚南部晚期冰川末期旧石器时代研究的比较基准，以及来自挪威沿海早期全新世先驱殖民化的新见解来证明其用途。我们再次证明，在整个晚冰期和全新世早期，种群规模和密度仍然相当低。我们认为，如此低的人口密度在塑造可能发生的文化丧失事件以及可能发生的仅相对较小程度的文化变化的更长时期方面发挥了重要作用。我们再次证明，在整个晚冰期和全新世早期，种群规模和密度仍然相当低。我们认为，如此低的人口密度在塑造可能发生的文化丧失事件以及可能发生的仅相对较小程度的文化变化的更长时期方面发挥了重要作用。我们再次证明，在整个晚冰期和全新世早期，种群规模和密度仍然相当低。我们认为，如此低的人口密度在塑造可能发生的文化丧失事件以及可能发生的仅相对较小程度的文化变化的更长时期方面发挥了重要作用。

本文是主题问题“史前人口学的跨学科方法”的一部分。