New Insight Into the Middle and Upper Paleolithic Settlement of the Central Balkans

Summary

This is an abstract from the "The Far-Reaching Influence of Steven L. Kuhn" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Over the last 15 years, the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade, in cooperation with the University of Arizona in Tucson, has conducted systematic survey and excavations of Paleolithic sites in eastern Serbia. This geographic region includes all the main corridors that connected Southwest Asia and Central Europe in the Pleistocene. A hotspot of diversity, the Balkans could have represented a glacial refugium for flora, fauna, and human communities throughout the Pleistocene glaciations. A very early appearance of Quina and Levallois technology was recorded at sites dated to MIS 9-6, while the sites dated in MIS 5-3 demonstrate that quartz industries of Quina type occur not only in Central Europe but also in the area south of the Sava and Danube. Proto-Aurignacian sites dated to the period before the Campanian Ignimbrite eruption were confirmed downstream of the Iron Gates, which supports the hypothesis of the role of the Danube corridor at the transition from the Middle to the Upper Paleolithic. An unexpectedly large concentration of Gravettian and Epigravettian sites was recorded in the area, indicating that the central Balkans were populated both before and at the beginning of the Last Glacial Maximum.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)   •
• The Far-Reaching Influence of Steven L. Kuhn

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 51288