The earliest Baltic amber in Western Europe Murillo Barroso, María de las Mercedes Martín Cólliga, Araceli Martinón Torres, Marcos This study has been supported by the R&D Project 'Metal y Ámbar II: Circulación de bronce y ámbar en el Sureste peninsular durante la Edad del Bronce' (PID2019-108289GB-I00/AEI/10.13039/501100011033) and the R&D Project ‘Social and Exchange Networks in the Argaric Society’ (PID2022-137494NB-I00/AEI/10.13039/501100011033) funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation. The contribution of M.M.T. was supported by funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant agreement No. 101021480, Project REVERSEACTION). We want to thank D. Pérez L’Huiller for editing Fig. , and M. Vilar Welter for editing Fig. . We are also grateful to J.F. Gibaja Bao, M.E. Subirà and M. Fontanals-Colls, who kindly shared the AMS radiocarbon dates funded by their respective projects. Date CF-X30-C4-134 was obtained in the framework of the R&D Project ‘Aproximación a las primeras comunidades neolíticas del NE peninsular a través de sus prácticas funerarias’ (HAR2011-23149) funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, IP: J. Gibaja and M.E. Subirà. Date CF-S19-C4R-56 was obtained in the framework of the R&D Project ‘NEOMEDIS: Neolithic Mediterranean diet through stable Isotope analysis’, funded in the framework of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship (ID: 792130), IP: M. Fontanals. The online version contains supplementary material available at https://doi. org/10.1038/s41598-023-41293-0 The occurrence of Baltic amber through Europe has traditionally been associated to the spread of the Bell Beaker culture during the 3rd millennium BC. In Iberia, this phenomenon is particularly noticeable in the southern half. Here we present an amber bead recovered in a Late Neolithic funerary cave (3634–3363 cal BC) from northeastern Iberia where more than 12 individuals had been buried. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy results of four samples revealed their complete resemblance with Baltic succinite reference spectra. Despite being a single bead, this finding provides the earliest evidence for the arrival of Baltic amber to the Mediterranean and Western Europe, before the Bell Beaker phenomenon and more than a millennium earlier than traditionally thought. This finding has implications for our understanding of early exchange networks of exotic materials, and their associated social structures. 2023-10-09T10:16:13Z 2023-10-09T10:16:13Z 2023-08-31 journal article Murillo-Barroso, M., Cólliga, A.M. & Martinón-Torres, M. The earliest Baltic amber in Western Europe. Sci Rep 13, 14250 (2023). [https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-41293-0] https://hdl.handle.net/10481/84915 10.1038/s41598-023-41293-0 eng info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/101021480 info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/792130 info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/HAR2011-23149 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ open access Atribución 4.0 Internacional Springer Nature