Paleolithic Occupations at Riparo Bombrini (Liguria, Italy): Understanding the Spatial Organization of Neanderthals and Homo sapiens

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Hunter-Gatherer Archaeology of Liguria: Recent Research and Insights" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The site of Riparo Bombrini (Liguria, Italy) offers a unique setting to compare the spatial organization of Neanderthal and Homo sapiens occupations in a single archaeological site. The disappearance of Neanderthals is one of the greatest debates in prehistory since the period of their decline corresponds to the arrival of Homo sapiens in Europe. It is often assumed that fundamental differences distinguish the two populations, and the ability to structure space within the sites they occupied into distinct activity areas is often invoked as a key distinctive trait of our species. However, this behavior has never been assessed for both groups at a single site, making direct comparisons impossible so far. This project aimed to objectively evaluate the degree of spatial organization in the earliest Protoaurignacian levels (A1-A2, associated with Homo sapiens) as well as the latest Mousterian levels (MS1-MS2, associated with Neanderthals) at Riparo Bombrini in order to establish whether these alleged fundamental differences between the two species do exist. Combining GIS and quantitative methods allowed the study of the spatial distribution of artifacts and features in these levels, showing that Neanderthals indeed organized their living spaces like Homo sapiens, suggesting “behavioral modernity” is not limited to our species.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Hunter-Gatherer Archaeology of Liguria: Recent Research and Insights   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 35990.0