Neandertal subsistence at the Late Mousterian site of Abri Peyrony, France

Summary

Beginning in 2009, the late Middle Paleolithic site of Abri Peyrony (also Haut de Combe-Capelle, as part of the Combe-Capelle sites, Dordogne, France) was reopened. Three seasons of fieldwork yielded rich lithic and faunal assemblages, as well as pieces of manganese dioxide, bone tools, and much needed information about the site’s formation and antiquity. The site yielded only Mousterian levels. Level L-3A is attributed to the Mousterian of Acheulian Tradition (MTA). The remaining levels, including the underlying level L-3B, demonstrate similarities in blank production but are not MTA. Thus, the Abri Peyrony faunal assemblage provides an opportunity to study the relationship between changes in lithic technology and subsistence through a detailed zooarchaeological analysis of a highly-resolved faunal assemblage (well-preserved, finds >2.5 cm were individually provenienced and analyzed, all materials from 5 mm screens were analyzed, coding all identifiable material and recording burning on all pieces). Species diversity is high in L-3A (n=381), despite its smaller sample size. The fauna from L-3B is dominated by reindeer (n=1355), suggesting that changes in technology coincided with changes in local environments. The impact on prey selection and carcass processing is investigated.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage