L'industrie lithique du Paléolithique dans la région de Jungwon en Corée

Prehistoric people have been often lived in the Jungwon region during the Paleolithic. It is a reference for development of the Paleolithic cultures in Korea. During the lower Paleolithic, pebble tool culture has been developed: tools were made with local raw materials and direct percussion and anvil technique were utilized. Debitage and raw material of the middle Paleolithic did not make a great difference to the lower Paleolithic. Otherwise, tool size became small and the number of flake tools increased. The crucial changes occurred during the upper Paleolithic. Technique, acquisition of raw material and tool kits were thoroughly innovated. All of these changes would reveal that the upper Paleolithic people have carried out more various activities, that earlier periods and their social structure would be more complex than other ones'.     

L'analogie et la représentation de l'art primitif à la fin du XIX siècle

In this paper, we will examine the foundations of Western representation of Paleolithic art at the end of the nineteenth century. Taking the period of 1864-1902 into account, we will prove the leading role of analogy between “modern primitive societies” and “prehistoric societies” in the very definition of “primitive art”. According to us, the representation of the “primitive artist” at that time was largely based in comparison between art which came from modern primitive societies living in Africa, Australia or America, and prehistoric art which was authenticated at about 1865. Through this examination, we will show the way in which analogy functions as a main category in the construction of scientific knowledge.     

L'hominidé du Pléistocène supérieur en Corée

Since the middle of 1970s, one rock-shelter, six caves and one open archaeological site have yielded several hominid fossils. Among them, fossils from Yonggok, Mandal, Sangsi and Hungsu cave sites are useful to reconstruct the general shape of the Upper Pleistocene Hominids in Korea. The main study of this paper is to focus on the reconstruction of the general shape of the upper Pleistocene hominids, and to examine the cause of cranial changes from the late upper Paleolithic to Mesolithic period in Korea. Biomechanical principles are also applied to reconstruct the social activity of the upper Paleolithic man in Korea. In addition, it is assumed that main proponent of Paleolithic cultures in Korea might be Homo sapiens rather than any other species. Based on the anatomical characteristics of skull, the axillary border of the scapular and the midshaft of the femur, general appearance of Homo sapiens during the Pleistocene in Korea could be reconstructed.     

La faune préhistorique de la région de Jungwon en Corée et la relation entre l'Homme et l'Animal

The Jungwon region, developed under the calcites deposit, contains 6 caves and 1 rock-shelter where we can find many animal bones. During the middle Pleistocene, some warm animals lived here and the number of species was increased in the course of the upper Pleistocene. In the upper Pleistocene, the young and old deer have been hunted as the main prey and they have been transported into the occupation area of prehistoric people. The cut-marks on the bones and the existence of bone tools reveal us their mode of subsistence.     

Le site Paléolithique de Suyanggae, Corée

The Suyanggae site is an open-air site in central part of South Korea. This site was discovered in 1980 and seven excavations have been carried out from 1983 to 1996. As a result, many stone artefacts were unearthed and 49 stone tool workshops were known. This site contains 5 cultural layers and the most important one is the Upper Paleolithic layer. This layer is dated to be 16,400 ~ 18,630 BP by ¹⁴C dating. It shows a massive blade production and microblade technique. It is one of the crucial sites for understanding the Upper Paleolithic of Korea.     

Reconstitution de la végétation et du paléoclimat à partir de charbons de bois prélevés sur les sites du Paléolithique dans la région de Jungwon en Corée

Hundreds samples of the charcoals and waterlogged woods excavated from three late Paleolithic sites (Suyanggae, Gunang-gul and Sorori) in the Jungwon Region in Korea were analyzed to reconstruct the vegetation and paleoclimate in the region. Analyzed charcoal samples from the Suyanggae site show that the climate was cold in the lower part and it became more warm and dry in the upper part. From the Gunang-gul site, only Picea spp. was identified, indicating cool climates. From the Sorori site, two species were found; Alnus spp. (95%) and Ulmus spp. (5%). No conifers were discovered. The species composition indicates that the climate condition of central Korean peninsula around 8,800 BP was little cooler and wetter condition.     

Paléogéographie des chasseurs de l’Europe du Paléolithique supérieur : répartition et spécialisation des sites

During the Upper Paleolithic, Europe was occupied by human populations mainly living from hunting of big terrestrial mammals. A repartition of fauna and of archeological sites was done with a database: a repartition of Upper Paleolithic sites in central and western Europe. This study shows that the european space was structured following several factors; climate, environment, cynegetic behaviours… We observe a partition of Europe with a mediterranean area with mainly deer, and ibex and an atlantic area with reindeer. Equally, most of the occupations are localized in the “aquitano-cantabric horn” around the Gulf of Gascony. The occupation of Europe undergone a pulsation with a retreat of occupations toward the west and the south during the glacial maximum, then a colonization of North Europe during the Tardiglacial climatic amelioration.     

Conception et exécution de bases de données intégrées pour l'analyse des rapports spatiotemporels des artefacts du Paléolithique

The archaeologists excavate the historic site and analyze data from the excavation site. Therefore, they study about the past affairs and circumstances unknown to the world. These data are composed of stones, plants, bones and geological features, which are stored in separate files according to the fields of study. It is important to mention that this information become the first step toward the solution of some hypothesis in Archaeology. Therefore, we need the system that can not only support integrated environment to find clues of the past, but also manage existing artifact data systematically and grasp relationships among the data. In this paper, we modeled the time, which is used in archaeology and geology, and built an entity relationship database to store Paleolithic data excavated in Jungwon region site of the Republic of Korea as one resource, which seem to give a base for integrated research and relationships in archaeology. In addition, we developed the Graphic User Interface that allows various users to connect to the established system through the web.     

L’étude des conditions d’habitabilité des établissements préhistoriques : à propos des amas coquilliers mésolithiques de la région cantabrique occidentale (Nord de l’Espagne)

We show the methodology we followed in order to reliably estimate a factor that, to our judgement, is fundamental for the assessment of the characteristics of a prehistoric settlement: the conditions of exposure to the sun. This methodology is applied to the study of Mesolithic shell middens in the North of Spain, with the aim to introduce a new kind of information in the debate about the meaning of shell middens. Throughout this century, different ways to understand the behaviour these remains conceal have been proposed. Our thesis with regard to it, presented in this paper, is based on the observation of a series of variables, among which we can find the exposure to the sun the settlements undergo. We therefore show in the last part of the paper, how to join the information from the proposed analysis with the other data subsequent from the study of other variables such as the environmental conditions prevailing during the period of formation of the sites; the situation of the settlements; the location of the remains in the caves; the entity of the occupations; and the energy spent on the transportation of the aquatic resources from the coast towards the places where their rests are found nowadays. In short, we propound a methodology for the study of one of the variables that falls upon the habitability of a prehistoric settlement and we point out the contribution that the incorporation of an analysis of this kind means for the research of Mesolithic shell middens in the North of Spain.     

老龙洞史前遗址初步研究

本文记述了老龙洞史前遗址研究初步成果．在对石、骨、角制品的一般性质论述基础上,指出这一组合具有自身的一些特点,并有着文化上的广泛联系;依遗物和哺乳动物化石对其年代也作了初步讨论。初步研究结果表明,它是中国西南地区,特别是云南近年来发现的一处重要的包括旧石器时代晚期文化层在内的史前洞穴遗址,为研究中国南方旧石器时代晚期文化类型的多样性提供了一个重要的地点和一批有意义的文化遗物。     

Stress physiologique et état de santé des plus anciens Hommes anatomiquement modernes du sud-est de l’Europe (données dentaires,couche 6-1, Buran-Kaya III,Crimée)

Buran-Kaya III site, in Crimea, provides an exceptional stratigraphic sequence, extending from Middle Paleolithic to Neolithic. Among the archaeological layers allocated to the Gravettian (sensu lato), more than 170 anthropological remains have been discovered in the layer 6-1. They represent the oldest Upper Paleolithic modern humans from Eastern Europe in a well-documented archaeological context. The aim of this article, based on dental remains and enamel dental hypoplasias in particular, is to evaluate the health of the modern humans, which lived more than 32,000 years BP ago in Crimea. This study puts into the light the low frequency of hypoplasias (occurring in the two youngest individuals). This article complete the rare studies concerning the presence of this physiological stress during the Early Upper Paleolithic and confirm the scarcity of enamel dental hypoplasias and dental pathologies, such as caries, at this period.     

Les Cervidae (Mammalia, Artiodactyla) du Pléistocène supérieur-Holocène ancien de la région du Parc National Serra da Capivara (Piauí, Brésil)

The Upper Pleistocene/Lower Holocene fossil-bearing sites of the Serra da Capivara National Park Region have yielded three cervid species: Mazama gouazoubira, M. americana and Blastocerus dichotomus, all currently living in South America, the two first in the region. A grand total of more than one hundred remains demonstrates the presence of Mazama gouazoubira in seven sites, mainly the Toca das Moendas, the Toca do Serrote do Artur, the Toca da Cima dos Pilão. This small species shows, since the Upper Pleistocene, a conspicuous tendency to reduce the average dimensions of its teeth and long bones. From the taller M. americana, only a dozen of remains were found in four sites, mainly the Sitio do Meio. In all of these it is sympatric with M. gouazoubira. It differs from this last one by its cheek teeth and its limb bones size and proportions. The oldest site where the species is known is Tarija (Bolivia, Middle Pleistocene) and it does not show any significant changes in size and proportions between recent and fossil samples. Sixteen remains of the large B. dichotomus were found in five sites, mainly the Toca das Moendas and the Toca da Barra do Antonião. The species is a rare fossil, but is frequently figured in the rock art painting of the region, where it is presently unknown.     

Os fossiles humains des grottes Muierii et Cioclovina, Roumanie

This paper presents the cultural and archaeological context of the human fossil bones from Muierii Cave, dated by us to the age of 30 150 ± 800 ¹⁴C years BP (Before Present) or 34 810 ± 927 cal years BP (calibrated years Before Present), and from Cioclovina Cave, dated to the age of 29 000 ± 700 ¹⁴C years BP or 33 540 ± 832 cal years BP, in the Southern Carpathians. These are among the most ancient dated human fossil remains from Central and South-Eastern Europe and are described in conjunction with other sites with Mousterian assemblages of the recent Neanderthal population, and sites with Aurignacian assemblage of early modern humans, from Romanian region, for the interval of time 34,000-26,000, the transitional period from the Middle Paleolithic to the Upper Paleolithic.     

L’industrie du site néandertalien de la grotte de Vindija (Croatie) : une révision des matières premières lithiques

The new analysis of the Middle Paleolithic industry from the cave Vindija (Croatia), showed a necessity of revision of the previous obtained data especially considering the use and origin of the raw materials (Kurtanjek and Marci, 1990). The results presented in this study pointed out some new aspects of interpretation. First, the significance of quartz in the Middle Paleolithic was underestimated. At the same time it is obvious that the major change in the use of the raw material was at the beginning of the Upper Paleolithic and of the Epigravettian, especially in the use of chert. The second change is registered in the use of chert between Middle and Upper Paleolithic: the chalky nodules of chert are more frequent in the Upper Paleolithic then the river pebbles used in the production of Middle Paleolithic artefacts. Still, the origin of this new raw material is at the moment unknown.     

La variabilité graphique du Molí del Salt (Vimbodí, Catalogne, Espagne) et l'art mobilier de la fin du Paléolithique supérieur à l'est de la Péninsule Ibérique

The Upper Paleolithic of Catalonia has been so far characterized by a very weak presence of artistic representations. This scarcity was especially surprising if we take into account the huge number of discoveries from other zones of the Iberian Peninsula (Valencia, the Cantabrian region). In this paper we present four objects of portable art found at the Molí del Salt site (Vimbodí, Conca de Barberà, Tarragona). Below a mesolithic layer, dated to 8 ka BP, there is an Upper Magdalenian sequence with several dates between 10.8 and 12.5 ka BP. These magdalenian levels have yielded four plaques of schist with engravings, including several animal figurines and one human representations. Once the objects are described, we will place them in the context of the portable art from the Late Upper Paleolithic of Mediterranean Spain. From these data, the chronocultural successions based on the Upper Magdalenian-Microlaminar Epipaleolithic distinction will be discussed.     

L’art bourgeois de la fin du XIX siècle face à l’art mobilier Paléolithique

On the occasion of the centenary of the Emile Cartailhac’s « Mea culpa d’un sceptique”, we want to reflect on one of the main questions of our discipline: Why has so-called « cave art” only been accepted as Paleolithic art in 1902, whereas the so-called « mobiliary art” had been accepted as Paleolithic art at the beginning of 1860s? In this paper, we want to suggest a definition of the conception of primitive art during the last third of the 19th century in order to understand: (A) Why Paleolithic paintings in the walls of some caves (Niaux, Chabot, Altamira) were not accepted as Paleolithic art between 1860 and 1902. (B) Given that what we now call mobiliary art is the same artistic phenomenon that prehistorians of the late 19th century thought of as primitive art, this article allows us to suggest a genealogy of mobiliary art. This genealogy will enable us to show that this concept not only defines a wide variety of forms, from engraving stones to carving in antler or ivory, but hides a multiplicity of meanings and connotations which originated in the period between 1860 and 1900.     

Nouvelles découvertes d'art rupestre au Mato Grosso (Cidade de Pedra, Rondonópolis, Brésil)

Since 1983, Professor Agueda Vilhena-Vialou is conducting in Mato Grosso (Brazil) the French-brasilian archeological mission Fossil men and their paleo-environments in the Paraná basin. Its goal is the study of the first prehistoric settlements of Latin America's heart, in their economic, social, cultural and symbolic dimensions. Thanks to the complementary and comparative analysis of the habitats, the regional settlements and the rock art, our research targets a more precise definition of territories and cultures proper of the prehistoric human groups from the South of the actual Mato Grosso state. The study of rock art, the most revealing aspect of symbolic behaviours, is one of the strongest programs inside our multidisciplinary team. Today, thanks to systematic prospections led along the Rio Vermelho (between Pantanal swamp at West and Rondonópolis city at East), a hundred rock art sites (walls, shelters and caves), decorated with signs, animals and humans, have been discovered, and, for the most of them, studied. These figures are painted, engraved and more rarely sculpted. Along those pages, the author is presenting the preliminary analysis of ten new rock art sites, recently identified in a cliff on the right bank of the Vermelho River. He starts a comparative study with the sites of the Cidade de Pedra and of close micro basin, from the left bank of the River. This research is showing the symbolic identities, both common and specific, proper to different territories of this major rock art region of Brazil, which is divided in several areas and micro territories, shared but autonomous.     

Hommes et environnements au Paléolithique supérieur en Ukraine continentale et en Crimée : introduction

Research, conducted under the ANR project “Mammouths”, on “the end of the mammoth steppe: Man/Environment relationship during late Pleniglacial in Eastern Europe”, is the subject of several contributions, a part of them is published in this volume, under the heading “Humans and environments during Upper Paleolithic in mainland Ukraine and Crimea”, in the French journal L’anthropologie.     

Évolution des caractères technologiques et typologiques des industries lithiques dans la stratigraphie de la Caune de l'Arago

The thick Quaternary deposits of the Caune de l’Arago (Pyrénées-Orientales, France) are dated to between 690 000 and 90 000 years old. At least fifteen different archeostratigraphical units have been identified within these deposits, each corresponding to distinct prehistoric occupations. Numerous stone tools made from several different rock types, have been discovered in each unit. The tools present specific characteristics concerning the choice of raw materials, the typology, and the technology used to produce them. Morpho-technological study of the different components of the assemblage contributes to a better understanding of the debitage methods used for their production. Each raw material is considered individually in order to ascertain its origin in the environment, its typological role and the technology applied during its exploitation. Defining production systems leads to the characterisation of the assemblages from each unit. When compared, they reveal common elements, as well as differences, suggesting evolutionary trends. Some observations are also made concerning the extent to which changing uses of the site may have influenced the general morphology of each assemblage, therefore taking into account exterior factors. Analysis of this rich stone tool assemblage helps to situate the Caune de l’Arago industry within the larger evolutionary context of the Lower Paleolithic in Mediterranean Europe.     

Stratégies techniques dans le Paléolithique Moyen du sud-est des Pyrénées

In this article, the lithic reduction systems from Middle Paleolithic levels at Roca dels Bous and Tragó are presented. These two sites are located in the South-eastern Pyrenees in Catalunya (Spain) and yield Mousterian levels which are attributed to MIS 3 and MIS 5. At the two studied sites, there is coexistence between expedient knapping systems and more complex techniques such as the Levallois method. Furthermore, cores are heavily exhausted, showing a pattern that cannot be explained by the absence or scarcity of raw material. This technical pattern can be traced across several Mousterian assemblages in the South-eastern Pyrenees, suggesting technocognitive continuity in the Middle Palaeolithic during the Upper Pleistocene, in which changes in lithic reduction patterns are not evident. In this paper, the implications of such observations are contextualized within the general discussion on the behaviour of the South-eastern Pyrenees Neanderthals.