Synthesizing Results from the 2017–2022 Excavations at Crvena Stijena

Summary

This is an abstract from the "The Late Middle Paleolithic in the Western Balkans: Results from Recent Excavations at Crvena Stijena, Montenegro" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The excavations at Crvena Stijena from 2017–2022 have had two main objectives. The first is to test the Sandgathe/Dibble hypothesis that Neanderthals did not have the ability to make fire; rather, they were dependent on natural occurrences of fire. The testable implication of this hypothesis, stemming from the published debate, is that evidence for fire should be negatively correlated with rigor of climate. Our second objective has been to understand, in a general way, the nature of the Neanderthal occupation throughout the Middle Paleolithic sequence. Here we synthesize the preliminary results of the ongoing multidisciplinary research project designed to achieve these objectives. Evidence for fire stems from calculated frequencies of charcoal, burnt lithics, and burnt fauna. Climate is inferred from detailed environmental studies of macrobotanical remains, macro- and microfauna, and molecular biomarkers. Neanderthal cultural behavior at the site is reconstructed through detailed analyses of modes of subsistence, raw material procurement, and technology (lithic and pyrotechnological). Importantly, these analyses are contextualized within a rigorous geo- and microarchaeological program that tracks site formation processes through micromorphology and mineralogical analyses.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• The Late Middle Paleolithic in the Western Balkans: Results from Recent Excavations at Crvena Stijena, Montenegro   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 36744.0