Human Remains from Maszycka Cave (woj. małopolskie / PL): the Treatment of Human Bodies in the Magdalenian (original) (raw)
Related papers
New information from Maszycka Cave and the Late Glacial recolonisation of Central Europe
Quaternary …, 2012
Maszycka cave is one of the most important Magdalenian sites in Central Europe. The assemblage is characterized by a considerable number of organic tools including points, navettes and a decorated perforated antler. The cave was related to the middle Magdalenian of western Europe and identified as one of the earliest Magdalenian sites of Central Europe. A series of four AMS-dates now assigns the site more precisely to the period 16,350 to 16,100 calBC (c. 15.000 BP). No other reliably dated Magdalenian sites of this early period of recolonisation of southern Central Europe are known and its clearest parallels to the west are the Grotte Grappin at Arlay in western France and perhaps the open air site Munzingen in southwestern Germany. After the first short episode of recolonisation, a more permanent Magdalenian expansion into Central Europe started hundreds of years later with sites such as Kesslerloch in northern Switzerland.
Eastern borders of the Magdalenian ‘à navettes’. Maszycka cave in Lesser Poland (Southern Poland)
L’essor du Magdalénien. Aspects culturels, symboliques et techniques des faciès à Navettes et à Lussac-Angles, 2017
Magdalenian ‘à navettes’ is the first trace of the Magdalenian presence on the territory of the eastern part of Central Europe, which is far ahead of the main phase of the Magdalenian settlement in these areas. It is represented by only one site — Maszycka Cave, located approximately 20 km north of Kraków, in Southern Poland, in the valley of the small river Prądnik. It is located on its left bank, about 65 m above the current floor of the valley. It is a small, bright, well-lit cave with a wide entrance and the main chamber. The entrance of the cave faces S – SW. The settlement included the main chamber at the entrance, the terrace and a small chamber located at the back of the cave. Maszycka Cave was researched by Godfryd Ossowski in 1883 then by S. K. Kozłowski in the years 1962 – 1966. The last field season was launched in 2013. The excavations were aimed at finding the old debris heaps that had been made in the course of Ossowski’s fieldworks. Particularly important is the fact that the assemblage from Maszycka Cave is quite complete. The only missing are the smallest artefacts which were not collected owing to the research methodology used in the 19th century. The entire assemblage consists of 292 lithic artefacts, 98 bone items and one pendant. Speaking of bone implements, reindeer antlers were mainly used for the production, rarely mammoth tusks and bones of horses and large ruminants. The most numerous are the different types of points (45 items), including different types of sagaies (36 items) mainly the forms with a single bevel base. As for the specific types, it is worth mentioning a series of eight navettes made from reindeer antlers, one item of bâton percé in a phallic shape and a richly carved rib. The navettes found in Maszycka Cave perfectly correspond to the forms known from the French sites, not only in terms of forms and treatment but considering their ornamentations. Stone inventory from the excavations carried out by G. Ossowski and S. K. Kozłowski consists of 292 artefacts (fig. 10), including 2 precores, 11 cores (fig. 11) and 59 tools typical for Magdalenian. The recent fieldworks, conducted in 2013, have led to the identification of old debris heaps. Considering two square meters of the surface, the researchers have found more than 200 small flakes and chips, including burned items as well as shells and their fragments, small fragments of animal bones and probably human bones. Most controversial are the finds of shells, whose relation to the settlement has not yet been confirmed. The vast majority of artefacts (about 95%) is made of local Jurassic flint located near Kraków. Only about 5% of the raw material came from further distance. These raw materials come from different areas (fig. 14). Imports of stone raw materials determine the possible range of exploited territory and may also be an important indication that allows us to reconstruct migration routes. While the presence of western provenance of raw materials is easy to explain, the imports of flint from the south and especially from the east and northeast constitute an important and interesting contribution to the study discussing the range of expansion regarding the earliest groups of the Magdalenian population in Central Europe. These raw materials indicate the territories which were exploited, or at least they were within the range of interests of the Magdalenian group from Maszycka Cave. In the case of Volhynian flint, which outcrops are located in areas never occupied by Magdalenian population, we do not know whether its presence is the evidence of physical presence of a hunting group from Maszycka cave in the areas far east, or if it is a result of any relationship with the Eastern Gravettian community penetrating the areas located west from their territories. Specific finds from Maszycka Cave are human remains. Z. Kapica, the researcher who studied the bones, has identified 16 individuals, including women and children. According to J. Orschiedt the discussed group is not so numerous, but the presence of women and children was confirmed. Some of the bones indicated the performance of intentional human actions. A series of 14C dates obtained from animal bones, human bones and bone products allowed us to establish fairly accurate the Magdalenian settlement within a period of about 15,000 uncalibrated years BP (i.e. 19,000 – 18,000 cal BP). Thus it is possible to conclude that the materials of Maszycka Cave are not younger than the Magdalenian settlement ‘à navettes’ in France, but they fit well within the time period which was establish by the existence of facies ‘à navettes’. The episode of the settlement recorded in Maszycka Cave cannot be treated as a survival of this tradition in the East at the time when it had already disappeared in the original areas, or as a result of shifts in its later (final?) period of settlement. Date comparison also indicates that the expansion of the Magdalenian population towards east must have been relatively fast. Maszycka Cave is the only such an early, undoubtedly Magdalenian site in the eastern part of Central Europe, while lying on the eastern border of the areas occupied by Magdalenian ever (Połtowicz-Bobak, 2013). Regarding the Magdalenian settlement that took these territories on a regular basis there is approximately (over?) 1,000 years break (Bobak et al., 2013). As for the other sites belonging to Magdalenian ‘à navettes’, the Maszycka Cave is far more than 1,000 km in a straight line (fig. 16), but chronologically it fits perfectly in the period of facies functioning within the areas of France. Continuous and structured settlement as for the east areas of Central Europe by the Late Magdalenian population will take place about 1000 years later.
Journal of Paleolithic Archaeology, 2022
The well-known Late Upper Palaeolithic cave site of Maszycka (southern Poland), excavated in the end of the nineteenth century as well as in the 1960s, furnished a collection of 89 osseous artefacts manufactured from cervid antler, mammoth ivory, and mammal long bone. The great majority are finished tools, mostly projectile points, while raw material blocks, pre-forms, and production waste are represented by only a few pieces. Based on the presence of the characteristic double-split antler tools, distinct projectile morphologies, and recurring ornaments, the assemblage from Maszycka can be assigned to the early Middle Magdalenian facies à navettes which dates to around 19-17.5 ka cal. BP. Compared to the western European sites, which also belong to this facies, Maszycka is characterised by a high proportion of ivory tools, reflecting the abundance of this favourable raw material in eastern central Europe, as well as an unusually high proportion of decorated tools, which may relate to an increased need for symbolic communication within the small and geographically isolated Magdalenian group. Both the remarkable typo-technological similarities of the bone industry from Maszycka to contemporary assemblages in France and the gap in the central European archaeological record between 22 and 19 ka cal. BP speak in favour of a direct immigration of Magdalenian hunter-gatherers from western Europe immediately after the end of the Last Glacial Maximum. Their relations to the bearers of the Epigravettian adjacent to the east and south remain to date poorly understood.
Anthropological and Archaeological Sciences, 2021
H. Reade, S. Grimm, P. Neruda, Z. Nerudová, M. Robličková, J. Tripp, K. Sayle, R. Kearney, P. Schauer, K. Douka, T. F. G. Higham, R. Stevens, Magdalenian and Epimagdalenian chronology and palaeoenvironments at Kůlna Cave, Moravia, Czech Republic. Anthropological and Archaeological Sciences 13, 2021, 4.
Magdalenian Settlement in Poland in the Light of Recent Research
The Magdalenian technocomplex is one of the best known and best described taxonomical units of the European Palaeolithic. The sites belonging to this cultural complex were already the subject of interest during the earliest period of Palaeolithic research due to the abundance and variety of the archaeological sources. G. Ossowski initiated research on the Magdalenian sites in Poland, working at the most famous Palaeolithic site in the Maszycka Cave at the end of the 19 th century (Kozłowski et al. 1995). In the first half of the 20 th century, a Magdalenian presence was recognized in Upper Silesia (Cyprzanów, Śmicz, Bliszczyce?: Kozłowski 1964). Some limited Magdalenian finds were discovered in Little Poland, including part of the finds from the Okiennik Cave, which is known mainly for the rich Middle Palaeolithic inventory (Kozłowski / Kozłowski 1977), or the sites in caves near Krakow (Dr. Majer’s Cave, Na Łopiankach Cave: Kozłowski 1960). The artefacts from the Puchacza Skała in Krakow-Czestochowa Jurassic Upland (The Jura) unearthed at the turn of the century (Kowalski et al. 1965) were also described as Magdalenian. For many years the bone harpoon from Przemyśl found during World War II was the only trace of the easternmost Magdalenian settlement (Kozłowski 1977). The development of research into the Magdalenian in Poland was continued after World War II. In the 1950s and 1960s, archaeological work was carried out at sites in Grzybowa Góra (Schild 1965) and Mały Antoniów (Sawicki 1960) and again in the Maszycka Cave (Kozłowski et al. 1995), among others. In the 1970s the long-term excavations at the site in Brzoskwinia commenced (Sobczyk 1993). The first Magdalenian site in the Carpathians was discovered in Sromowce Wyżne-Kąty in the Pieniny (Kozłowski 1987). Many more sites were discovered and surveyed from the 1980s onward. At the turn of the 21 st century very important Magdalenian remains were recognized in different parts of southern Poland, mainly in Silesia (sites in Dzierżysław: Połtowicz 2000; Ginter et al. 2002; 2005; Sowin: Furmanek / Rapiński 2003, Broniszowice: Krawczyk / Płonka / Wiśniewski 2004) and in south-eastern Poland (Klementowice-Kolonia, Hłomcza, Wilczyce, Uście Gorlickie, Grodzisko Dolne: Połtowicz 2006 with further references). Sites with small inventories were also discovered in caves in the Krakow-Czestochowa Jurassic Upland (Cyrek 1999). The above-mentioned findings and the state of research provide the basis to propose a new synthesis and characterization of the Magdalenian Poland.
Cave funeral practices during the Roman and Migration Periods in the Cracow Upland, southern Poland
Although caves have been used for funerary purposes almost since the dawn of time, there is very little evidence of such use in Central European Barbaricum. This paper presents newly obtained results from the Cracow Upland (southern Poland) concerning multiple skeletal remains that apparently share a similar third-fifth centuries AD chronology, corresponding to the Late Roman and Early Migration Periods. Multiple analyses have been performed to supplement archaeological data, including radiocarbon dating, osteoarchaeological analysis, ancient DNA research and isotopic analysis. The complex picture points towards unusual burial practices, which generally spanned from the third to the fifth centuries AD and involved a broad demographic, with no indication of selection based on an individual's biological profile. Isotopic analysis has also indicated the individuals' heterogeneity with regard to diet and local versus nonlocal origin. The results point towards the previously unrecognized unique role of caves in the Przeworsk culture, then present in southern Poland.
Frontiers of the Lower Palaeolithic expansion in Europe: Tunel Wielki Cave (Poland)
Scientific Reports
Peopling of Central Europe by Middle Pleistocene hominids is highly debatable, mainly due to the relatively harsh climatic and environmental conditions that require cultural and anatomical adjustments. At least several archaeological sites certify human occupation in the region dated back to MIS 13-11, but they represent open-air settlements. Based on the new fieldwork conducted in Tunel Wielki Cave, we can date the human occupation traces in the cave to MIS 14-12. Bipolar-on-anvil knapping technique prevails in the lithic assemblage, made exclusively in flint. The obtained results have given ground for studying the frontiers of human oikumene and the required cultural adaptive abilities.