Life and Death of the Pleistocene Child: Children’s Burials in Gravettian Europe

Summary

The Gravettian (ca. 28,000-21,000 BP), has been referred to as the "Golden Age" of the European Upper Paleolithic. Innovations in technology, increased sedentism and the development of larger regional centers, the oldest known ceramics, some of the earliest evidence for loom-woven textiles, and the emergence of so-called "Venus" figurines all characteristic of this period. The Gravettian is also well known for its often spectacular single, double and triple burials of sub-adults including infants. This paper brings together data from sub-adult burials in Germany, Portugal, Italy, Russia, and the Czech Republic and highlights regional similarities and differences in burial location, body placement and engagement between interred individuals, known pathologies, associated artifacts and evidence of ritual. In the context of the increasing social and technological complexity of this period, inferences are made concerning the lived lives of sub-adults in the late European Pleistocene.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 18734