Dibble H.L., Berna F., Goldberg P., McPherron S.P., Mentzer S., Niven L., Richter D., Sandgathe D., Théry-Parisot I., Turq A. (2009) "A Preliminary Report on Pech de l'Azé IV, Layer 8 (Middle Paleolithic, France)" (original) (raw)
Related papers
The association of Neandertal occupations with fire has been reported for several European late Middle Paleolithic sites. Renewed excavations at the French site of Roc de Marsal (Dordogne) have exposed a series of well-preserved fire features associated with artifact-rich Neandertal occupations. This paper provides detailed descriptions of the combustion sediments and associated archaeological assemblages, using field observations and laboratory methods, including soil micromorphology, FTIR, and GIS techniques. From an integrity point of view, the available data demonstrate the excellent preservation of the hearths at Roc de Marsal, which display minimal or no post-depositional movement. However, our results suggest that it is often impossible to access the level of contemporaneity between different combustion events, the absence of association between burned objects and the hearths, and that it is often very difficult to distinguish distinct fire events based solely on macroscopic observations. These problems have significant implications for how such features are excavated and analyzed.
Evidence for Neandertal Use of Fire at Roc de Marsal (France)
Journal of Archaeological Science
The association of Neandertal occupations with fire has been reported for several European late Middle Paleolithic sites. Renewed excavations at the French site of Roc de Marsal (Dordogne) have exposed a series of well-preserved fire features associated with artifact-rich Neandertal occupations. This paper provides detailed descriptions of the combustion sediments and associated archaeological assemblages, using field observations and laboratory methods, including soil micromorphology, FTIR, and GIS techniques. From an integrity point of view, the available data demonstrate the excellent preservation of the hearths at Roc de Marsal, which display minimal or no post-depositional movement. However, our results suggest that it is often impossible to access the level of contemporaneity between different combustion events, the absence of association between burned objects and the hearths, and that it is often very difficult to distinguish distinct fire events based solely on macroscopic observations. These problems have significant implications for how such features are excavated and analyzed.
Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, 2008
The Pêcheurs cave is a unique example of a Middle Palaeolithic site with three kinds of accumulations: (1) ibex that died in a natural trap, (2) carnivores that died within the cavity, and, (3) a series of short-term occupations by humans who left a few artifacts and a hearth area. Biological patterns of ibex remains (skeletal parts, age) show a homogeneous structure, related to natural death inside the cave. The Chassezac valley is narrow and sinuous, bordered by steep cliffs occupied by well-adapted hoofed-species (Caprinae). Moreover, Les Pêcheurs is a shallow cave, pit-like, and in its deepest part (Sector 4) provided both man and animals with shelter. The presence of a fire place (in the middle of the sequence of Sector 4) firmly indicates the presence of an in situ occupation by a small group of hominids. According to the stratigraphical patterns and the analysis of the lithic assemblages, artifacts do not seem to have been introduced into sediments. The lithic assemblages (technically homogeneous) indicate that small mobile human groups inhabited a cave that offered, by virtue of its morphology, a natural shelter against the cold winds blowing in the Chassezac valley and the plateaus of the south-eastern borders of the Massif Central Mountains. The exploitation of biotopes such as this rocky area constitutes a specific case of human subsistence behavior and settlement strategy. The deepest layer is characterized by a lithic assemblage mostly made of local raw material (quartz) implying a low investment in lithic production. Few flakes made from non-local flints attest to the mobility of the human occupants who moved across these areas and perhaps found in the valleys, short-term refuge.
Quaternary International, 2014
New excavations at the Abri du Maras, located in the southeast of France, have yielded Middle Palaeolithic assemblages with evidence of rock shelter occupations in a cold climatic context contemporaneous with MIS 4. Few MIS 4 sites are known in this part of France and especially in this state of preservation. The paper is focused on one sedimentological layer divided into two archaeological levels (sub-levels 4.1 and 4.2). Our goal was to examine the Middle Palaeolithic lithic assemblage of these two levels by interdisciplinary approaches (technology, origin of flint and functional analysis of stone tools) in order to identify the technical strategies and the land-use patterns in a specific environmental context. The two occupations do not show differences in behaviours. The technical strategies applied to flint and other stones indicate a fragmentation of the reduction processes in a local and semi-local perimeter around the site. The main core technology is Levallois, generally on flint cortical cores on flakes. Flint flakes, blades and points are the main components of the series and the technological aims of the debitage. Due to the small size of the flakes used for flaking, large flint flakes, blades (Levallois or cortical) and Levallois points were produced elsewhere, to the north and south of the site (up to 20e30 km) according to the geological study, and then brought to the shelter. Flakes in other lithic materials (quartz, quartzite) were also knapped elsewhere before being transported to the shelter. Some of the large flint flakes, but also nodules and fragments of slabs, were then used for onsite flaking. Flake-tools are very rare. Evidence of impact fractures and TCSA/TCSPs values of the corpus of unretouched Levallois points suggest that some points, brought or prepared on the site, could have been used as projectile tips. The lithics attest to management of local and semi-local stones in a perimeter of 30 km around the site (possibly more due to some unidentified flint) and an anticipation of domestic needs in relation to reindeer hunting, the predominant activity. Imported artefacts and artefacts made on the site were used for the same diversity of activities and materials (butchery, plant and woodworking). The technological strategies and the type of management differ slightly from those from cave assemblages in the same area located in valleys and on low plateaux near the Rhône corridor, possibly due to the type of the site, a vast shelter. Data from the Abri du Maras are compared to data from the other Middle Palaeolithic sites of the region and the role of the topographic aspect of the site on the type of occupations is discussed.
Thermoluminescence dating of heated flint artefacts from the Middle Palaeolithic sequence of Chez-Pinaud Jonzac (France) places an assemblage of Quina type Mousterian into MIS 4, while the overlying assemblage of Denticulate Mousterian which is followed by two layers with Mousterian of Acheulean Tradition are all assigned to MIS 3. TL dating is used to verify the mixed nature of deposits from which diagnostic Middle as well as Upper Palaeolithic tools were recovered. The TL ages are significantly different for samples from this layer and broadly agree with the archaeological attributions. While the study is generally limited by the low number of heated samples available, a correlation with a generalized chronostratigraphic sequence is possible by including proxy data from the faunal remains associated with the lithic assemblages in question. The Quina Mousterian in southwestern France, therefore, can be placed by chronometric dating methods in MIS 4 to MIS 3.
Pyrotechnology must be seen as one of the most important technological developments in human prehistory. Once developed it eventually came to serve a wide range of applications, but when this actually occurred is not well understood. Fire is well known at a number of Middle Palaeolithic sites in Western Europe, and the Neandertals of this region clearly made use of it at some times and at some sites. Recent excavations at two generally contemporaneous Middle Palaeolithic sites in the Dordogne region of France, Pech de l’Azé IV and Roc de Marsal, have provided significant data on Neandertal use of fire. Both sites have revealed a number of extremely well preserved and delineated fire features at the base of their sequences. The goals of this paper are to describe and contrast the combustion features from these two sites using both field observations and laboratory data that employ micromorphological and FTIR techniques. Pyrotechnological differences can be seen, representing differences in Neandertal fire use and, potentially, site use.