Upper Paleolithic (Other Keyword)
1-25 (28 Records)
This research argues for a refocus of the study of prehistoric social networks that involves contextualizing the inter-site links often interpreted as indicators of social interactions between different groups. It focuses on the social networks created during the 3 sub-periods of the Magdalenian in the Cantabrian and Dordogne regions, and visible through similarities of portable art representations. It uses Species Distribution Modeling and Maximum Classification Likelihood on faunal presence...
The Aurignacian lithic industry from Area E (2017)
Area E of Manot Cave, Western Galilee, is found at the top of the western talus, close to the apparent natural opening of the cave, which was blocked approximately 30 kya. The area appears to be the natural end of the living surfaces, with the main living area possibly being closer to the natural entrance. Area E is composed of two sedementological Units; Unit 1, which is composed of topsoil and Unit 2, which contains the archaeological layers. Unit 2 in area E is divided into nine...
A Census of Women in the Upper Paleolithic (2017)
Binary models of gender are often uncritically applied in paleoanthropology, even if the biological sex or gender identity of a specimen or representation is ambiguous. In the Upper Paleolithic, indicators ranging from simple bifurcating lines to overt representations of secondary sex characteristics may be used to identify an illustration, engraving, or piece of portable art as "male" or "female." These taxonomic rubrics are rarely stated explicitly. Still, the impression given by an overview...
Changing weapons in a mutable landscape: exploring the relationship between Upper Paleolithic weaponry variability and drastic environmental changes in Western Europe (2016)
Lithic industries from the European Late Pleistocene archaeological record are marked by the presence of one of the most numerous and diverse set of artifacts identified as projectile weaponry tips. Variability in the morphology and technology of these tools has long been used for organizing the Upper Paleolithic archaeological record into distinct cultural and chronological units – the so-called techno-complexes – validating a direct association between transformations in projectile technology...
Chronology of Ahmarian and Levantine Aurignacian occupations of Manot Cave, Israel (2015)
Recent excavations of Manot Cave, in the Western Galilee, Israel, have revealed abundant Upper Paleolithic finds, including modern human fossils, in situ hearths, shell beads, bone and stone tools, and faunal remains. The two major Early Upper Paleolithic traditions of the Levant—the Ahmarian and the Levantine Aurignacian—are well represented at Manot Cave. The Ahmarian is thought to have developed from local Initial Upper Paleolithic traditions, while the Levantine Aurignacian may represent a...
A comparative assessment of Upper Paleolithic lissoir (smoother) manufacture and use (2017)
Recent studies have brought focus to a category of bone tools previously thought to be restricted to modern humans. Excavations of layers dating to approximately 50 kya from two different sites in southwest France, Pech-de-l’Azé I and Abri Peyrony, have produced four nearly identical fragments of bone tools identified as lissoirs (a French term meaning "smoothers"). Lissoirs are specialized tools thought to have been used in hide preparation. Although this tool type has been defined in various...
A Comparison of "Scenes" in Parietal and Non-Parietal Upper Paleolithic Imagery: Formal Differences and Ontological Implications (2017)
Upper Paleolithic cave art is well-known for its skilled execution, specifically the use of shading, relief, and perspective to render life-like depictions of Pleistocene fauna. Cave art is equally well-known for a near absence of flora, humans, and scenes. In this regard, parietal imagery is distinct from "art mobilier," where these are more common. However, defining "scenes" as a graphic phenomenon can be problematic, and identifying them among superimposed and fragmented images more so....
An early Gravettian point cache from Vale Boi: implications for the arrival of Anatomically Modern Humans to southern Iberia (2016)
During the 2014 and 2015 field season, we have excavated a new loci with an early Gravettian horizon in the Rock Shelter area of the site of Vale Boi, Southern Portugal. The loci is marked by a unique cache composed of close to 20 artifacts, most of which are pristine backed points in non-local chert. Due to typological characteristics, that includes points identical to those found in Pego do Diabo cave near Lisbon, and to those found in Vale Boi dated to 32.5 ka cal BP, as well as to the...
Early Upper Paleolithic Horse Hunting on the East European Plain (2016)
Between 40,000 and 30,000 cal B.P., small herds of horses were hunted in Europe. Much of the evidence is derived from the central plain of Eastern Europe, including multiple sites at Kostenki-Borshchevo on the Middle Don River (Russia) and Mira on the Lower Dnepr River (southern Ukraine). These sites contain large bone beds analogous to the bison bone beds of the Great Plains, and the analysis of their depositional context and taphonomic characteristics yields information on how horse mare-bands...
The Elusive Vasco-Cantabrian Middle Magdalenian: Reflections from Urtiaga Cave, Guipúzcoa, Spain (2017)
The Vasco-Cantabrian Middle Magdalenian (14.3-13.2 ka uncal. BP) remains intangible—known in the region from relatively few archaeological sites and principally defined on the basis of portable art items with Pyrenean origin. Recent research undertaken with collections from Urtiaga cave (Guipúzcoa, Spain) has included two radiocarbon assays of Level E that date to the Middle Magdalenian interval. This level lacks diagnostic portable art items, however, lithic and faunal analyses (conducted by...
Human occupation of Lapa do Picareiro (Portugal) during the Last Glacial Maximum (2016)
During the Last Glacial Maximum, abrupt climate changes created highly variable paleoenvironments inhabited by human populations across the Iberian Peninsula. Pollen and sedimentary analyses from deep-sea cores off Portugal provide records of regional-scale paleoenvironmental responses to the climate shifts that punctuated the LGM. Archaeological assemblages from caves and rockshelters offer a more local-scale understanding of human-environment interactions during this period. One site in...
The Importance of Short Duration Archaeological Sites for Contextualizing Forager Organization: An Argument from the Middle and Upper Paleolithic of central Portugal (2017)
The majority of Late Pleistocene archaeological sites in central Portugal resulted from short-term forager activities on the scale of days or weeks. This paper explores the analytical and theoretical significance of these small, ephemeral sites for understanding Middle and Upper Paleolithic organization of technology and settlement strategies. The interpretive context provided by short term site assemblages is essential for developing robust regional hypotheses of Paleolithic behavior, including...
In Search of Upper Paleolithic Sites in Alluvial Contexts in the Tsukh (Chikoi) Valley, Northern Mongolia (2015)
Mongolia, located at a key crossroads for human migration between central, eastern, and northern Asia, is important for understanding a number of current hotly debated archaeological topics, including the possible human exodus out of northern Eurasia at the Last Glacial Maximum (24,000-18,000 cal yr BP), the emergence of microblade technology as an adaptation to extremely cold and harsh environmental conditions, and the route and process of an initial modern human migration into high latitudes...
The influence of prey availability on ice age hunting strategies: Tracing Magdalenian reindeer migratory patterns using strontium isotope (87Sr/86Sr) analysis of reindeer teeth from Verberie (Oise, France). (2015)
The Magdalenian (18-11kya) marked a time of dramatic climate instability in western and central Europe, ushering in changes in the predation strategies of late Paleolithic groups who hunted migratory reindeer herds. For Magdalenian populations, a clear understanding of migratory patterns was crucial for survival, particularly when Epipleistocene climate fluctuations were causing previously unseen types of resource distribution. Here we present the results of strontium isotope (87Sr/86Sr)...
Late Wurm adaptive systems in Tohoku Japan: viewed from lithic use-wear analysis (2016)
The paper investigates lithic use-wear data from the viewpoint of human mobility patterns and functional inter-site variability. Microwear analysis based on controlled experiments was initiated in 1970s in Japan, and the method combined both high power and low power (that is, high magnification and low magnification) approach. Since then accumulated case studies focused on the Upper Paleolithic period of Northeastern Honshu Island of Japan (Tohoku District). Chronological sequences and...
The lithic industries from Area C: typo-technological characteristics (2017)
The lithic assemblages from Area C derive from a thick section composed reworked terra rossa soil of dark brown to reddish brown, loose clay to silty clay loam with abundant biogenic and anthropogenic materials subdivided into eight units. The depositional sequence of the units is in a chronological order as shown by radiocarbon and U-Th dates (Hershkovitz et al., 2015). A typotechnological analysis of the all units suggest a shift in industries though the sequence. Unit 2-3 are small...
New Research at Enval: A Middle Magdalenian Site in the Massif Central of France (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. We present new research at Enval, a Middle Magdalenian rock shelter site in the Massif Central of France. Lithic materials previously recovered indicate far ranging contacts in multiple directions. Artifacts from our 2018 excavations reflect intensive use of local raw materials, suggesting that use of allochthonous materials was not simply a response to...
Obsidian Access and Territoriality at the Upper Paleolithic Shimaki Site, Hokkaido, Japan (2015)
Although Hokkaido Japan boasts a rich concentration of obsidian resources, studies focusing on its role within Paleolithic hunter-gatherer subsistence and territorial systems are in their infancy as high-quality geochemical analysis is just emerging. Combining XRF geochemical obsidian sourcing analysis coupled with qualitative and quantitative data on individual artifacts, we are able to conduct fine-grained exploration of tool stone procurement, consumption, and use of an entire artifact...
Passage through a Palimpsest: Lower Magdalenian Lithic Manufacture and Maintenance Patterns in El Mirón Cave, Cantabria, Spain (2016)
El Mirón cave, a major Upper Paleolithic residential site in Cantabria, Spain, has been the subject of long-term excavations led in part by Lawrence Straus. This presentation focuses on Level 17, a significant Lower Magdalenian deposit excavated in the cave’s outer vestibule. Level 17, which is a total of 33cm thick, was divided into 13 sublevels that were created using correlations made between depth measurements taken during the excavation in each square meter of the 9.5 square meter area....
Photogrammetry at Lapa de Picareiro: 3D modeling of a Middle and Upper Paleolithic Cave Site (2016)
Archaeology as a practice is destructive thus once a site is excavated it is gone forever. Accurate and precise recording of spatial data is critical to preserving information. Higher resolution data collection may lead to better spatial analysis of the site. This endeavor improves with the continuing development of technology and methods of recording spatial data. Photogrammetry is a technology that has allowed researchers to accurately record spatial data on excavation, stratigraphy, features,...
Preliminary Results from the New Excavation at the Upper Paleolithic Site of Shuidonggou Locality 2, Ningxia (China) (2017)
Shuidonggou, a site complex containing multiple Upper Paleolithic localities in Ningxia Province, China, is one of a few archaeological examples in North China that contain artifacts of a blade technology similar to those of the Initial Upper Paleolithic (IUP) in Mongolia and Siberia 30–40 ka. At Locality 2, the occurrence of two blade cores in the lower layers dated to ~34–41 ka; and has led the lithic industry of the locality to be separated into those of the so-called IUP and others of the...
Red ochre at Hohle Fels, Germany: The use of pigment and space at an Upper Paleolithic cave site (2017)
Some of the most informative artifacts regarding early symbolic behaviors in Europe come from Hohle Fels Cave, Germany. Hohle Fels (HF) boasts a detailed Upper Paleolithic sequence, and an extensive array of ochre artifacts. In this project, we systematically investigate the ochre assemblage at HF by quantity, type and modification, and proximity to other archaeological features. The ochre assemblage includes painted limestone pieces, faunal elements, fossils, and potential grindstones with...
The role of artifact surface scatters from the Western Morava Valley, Serbia in understanding human population movements during the Early Upper Paleolithic (2016)
There is strong evidence for the spread of anatomically modern humans (AMH) 45,000 to 35,000 years ago in Europe using two major migration routes: a northern one along the Danube River, and a southern one leading through Bulgaria and Greece. Despite being situated between these routes and near some of the earliest AMH sites in Europe, most of Serbia and the Central Balkans seem to lack evidence of these occupations. Part of the reason for this absence of evidence may be due to limited research...
The Stratigraphy of Area E, Manot Cave (2017)
Area E is located close to the upper end of the main talus, at the NW side of the cave. It is built of sediments which originated outside the cave, mainly the local Terra-Rossa soil that was washed into the cave with rainwater, mixed with limestone rocks, some of them originating in the cave itself from decaying and falling roof and wall parts. Two main sedimentary units were observed so far: Unit 1 – Colluvium made of soil with limestone rocks in varying sizes. This colluvium contains very...
Symbolic behavior at the end of the Paleolithic: a view from Cantabrian region rock art (2017)
In the field of graphic activity, the recent Magdalenian (14,500-11,500 BP) is characterized by a homogenizing process along a vast territory in southwestern Europe. It also represents the most splendorous rock art period and, at its end, figurative graphic activity suddenly disappears from Europe for millennia. A representative assemblage of recent Cantabrian Magdalenian rock art sites has been studied. The results of this research led to the discovery of several unpublished figures and...