Paléolithique supérieur et Mésolithique en Méditerranée : cadre culturel

The origin of the Upper Palaeolithic around the Mediterranean was the result of the local evolution, particularly in the Near East and in the Lower Nile basin, and of the migration from this zone to South-Eastern and Central Europe. The Initial Upper Palaeolithic in the Near East belt was the effect of local evolution from the industries based on Levallois concept to the industries which developed leptolithic blade technologies. This evolution is well registered in multi-layer sites in the Syro-Palestinian belt (Emirian/Ahmarian), which was the starting point of the diffusion of these “transitional” industries in South-Eastern and Central Europe. This diffusion could be identified with the migration of first anatomically Modern Humans. The Early Upper Palaeolithic in Europe — dated to the second half of the Interpleniglacial — was, at least partially, based on these “transitional” industries and manifested by the appearance of the Aurignacian, contrasted with local cultures such as the Uluzzian in Mediterranean Europe. During whole the Interpleniglacial Europe was separated from Northern Africa dominated by local evolution of Middle Palaeolithic (Middle Stone Age) cultures (mostly expressed by the Aterian), and by specific “transitional” industries on the southern Mediterranean coast (Early Dabbian) and in the Lower Nile basin. The Last Glacial Maximum and the corresponding sea level recession opened new possibilities of contacts between the Maghreb and the Iberian Peninsula in both directions (Aterian-Solutrean and Gravettian-Early Iberomaurusian), which are still difficult to be proved before new chronostratigraphic correlations are made. At the same time we register links between south-eastern Europe and western Anatolia; the real border between Near Eastern and European Mediterranean cultural zones was marked, in the Late Glacial, by the Taurus chain. During the Late Glacial the cultural separation between Europe and Africa was particularly marked. Only in the Aegean basin the first sea navigation facilitated contacts which become widespread as late as in the Early Holocene with neolithization trough maritime contacts.     

Témoins du froid. La faune dans l’art rupestre paléolithique de l’intérieur péninsulaire

It is our intention to analyse the environmental significance of the Palaeolithic artistic representations existing in the inner areas of the Iberian Peninsula. The fauna is used to create chronological and climatical criteria to affirm the condition of the castillan plateau during the last glaciation. In our opinion, it is dangerous to use the isolated animals in order to talk about coldness or heat situation because they reflect the cultural selection of their authors more than the ambiental reality. Neither the animals called thermometer nor the euritherm ones are solely represented in the tempered moments. Moreover, we have almost a no animal representation than artistic during the last finiglacial period in the peninsular interior. It means probably that the artistic representations are mainly cultural signs, which change for cultural reasons and not properly climatic ones within a general reality of glacial environment.     

On the establishment and range expansion of oriental weatherfish (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Misgurnus anguillicaudatus</Emphasis>) in NE Iberian Peninsula

Oriental weatherfish has become an invasive fish species in many temperate areas. In this work we report the presence of an established weatherfish population in northeastern Iberian Peninsula and describe, for the first time in Europe, a clear range expansion. The species was first located in the Ebro River Delta in 2001 and has since been detected in 31 UTM 1 × 1 km quadrates. The capture of over 1,000 weatherfish shows that its population is composed by both juvenile and adult individuals. Weatherfish occupies mostly the web of irrigation channels associated with rice culture, although it has also been detected in rice fields and in the Ebro River. The expansion of the species in the area seems to be limited by water conductivity. An additional location for the species in the Ter basin (some 300 km to the north) suggests that inter-basin expansion could be occurring. This new fish invasion reinforces the need to implement strict controls to the trade and culture of ornamental fish.     

First record of a population of the exotic mummichog Fundulus heteroclitus (L., 1766) in the Mediterranean Sea basin (Ebro River delta)

Until now, mummichog Fundulus heteroclitus have been recorded only from the estuaries of the southernmost river basins of the Iberian Peninsula (Guadiana and Guadalquivir Rivers). Data reported here indicate the first record of F. heteroclitus in the Ebro River delta (north-east Spain), and hence also the first citation for F. heteroclitus as an invasive species present in any estuary of the Mediterranean Sea basin.     

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.     

Le gisement rupestre de Siega Verde, Salamanque: Une vision de synthèse

The Paleolithic shelter Art in the open air of Siega Verde, Salamanca, is the unitary group better endowed with paleolithic shelter manifestations in the bleakness of the whole Iberian Peninsula. Its study, consequence of more than 10 years of works on the land, has culminated with the recent publication of a complete monograph. In the following lines, we intend to synthesize the content of that, with special emphasis in the internal analysis of the representations and in their relationship with its cultural immediate environment, the Upper Paleolithic of the Castilian Plateau. The results of so long investigation process suppose a new interpretation way, not only of the own site, but also of the whole Paleolithic shelter phenomenon inside the Peninsula, and in a more general environment, of the graphic system of the European Upper Paleolithic.     

Les industries acheuléennes de la France septentrionale

The excavations of several open air sites in Northern France and, especially in the Somme basin, have given numerous data concerning the age and the environment of the human occupations for the period from MIS 12 to MIS 8. The quality of the raw material and the function of the different sites have a great effect on the composition of the lithic assemblages as it has been seen for the different sites located near the confluence of the Somme and Avre (Cagny-la Garenne, Cagny-l’Épinette, Ferme de l’Épinette, Gentelles). The characteristics of the lithic industries of Gouzeaucourt show the complexity of the transition from Lower to Middle Palaeolithic.     

La céramique néolithique chinoise : utilitaire et esthétique, introduction

Our knowledge of Chinese Prehistory, the Neolithic period in particular, has continued to grow over the last three decades, especially with the importance of the archeological heritage unearthed in the past ten years. Intensive research carried out on the very varied ways of life that took place during the period from 12,000 BP to 4,000 BP -a period whose limits are constantly being pushed back - can be situated within this problematic. These pluridisciplinary studies have led to a more precise knowledge of the environment of prehistoric man and of his social activities. The ceramic objects found in Neolithic tombs have proved to be of a great diversity. Their typology gives precious information on their daily life and throws light, for us in the modern world on the mentalities prevailing during this period.     

Chronologie de l’art Mégalithique ibérique : C et contextes archéologiques

From the beginning of our investigation we found the necessity of locating the Megalithic Iberian art in the chronology that came off of the well-known data in the peninsula at the end of the 1980s and of those that manifested the Atlantic long sequences. Then, we argue the dates obtained in the deposits of decorated dolmens to endorse the chronological similarity between architectures and decorations. To it, we could add decorations in the nonvisible area of some slabs that they even aimed a bigger antiquity. With that material, we organize our first chronological proposal for the Megalithic Iberian art, in which we assumed dates of fifth millennium lime BC for the oldest decorations, in consonance with the construction of the first megaliths. Moreover, it would be right so much in the supposedly classic areas as in the less favoured sectors for the investigation: the Interior, the South and the West of the Iberian peninsula. In successive works we are configuring a hypothesis on its development and chronology that offers more and more confirmations. The documentation of AMS dates on megalithic paintings, a unique case in the megalithic European art, comes to consolidate the chronology of the megalithic Iberian art. With all the data obtained in the last twenty years, we are arrived to the moment for establishing a sequence to adjust their times, to value complex situations in the decoration of the monuments and to confirm a long chronology that arrives practically as a residual way to Iron Age.     

Reproductive and demographic parameters in two Iberian wild boarSus scrofa populations

From 1990 to 2006, we studied the demographic, reproductive, and biometric characteristics of two Iberian wild boarSus scrofa (Linnaeus, 1758) populations in contrasting environments. In the Pyrenees (studied in 1990–1993), forest cover is high, hunting pressure is low, and the density of wild boar is high. In the Ebro Valley (studied in 1994–2006), there are few shelter areas for boars, hunting pressure is high, and density is very low. In the second semester of life and after two years of age, the sows in Ebro Valley were heavier than were those in the Pyrenees. Pregnancy during the first year of life was frequent in the Ebro Valley and rare in the Pyrenees. Litter sizes, ovulation rates, and intrauterine mortalities did not differ significantly between the two populations, but the foetal sex ratio in the Ebro Valley was skewed significantly towards males. Life expectancy was lower in the Ebro Valley (6 yr) than it was in the Pyrenees (10 yr). In the Ebro Valley 75% of the wild boar were >24 months old, whereas in the Pyrenees, the proportion was 59%. We suggest that shelter availability influenced the growth, productivity, hunting pressure, and life expectancy in the two Iberian populations of wild boar.     

Les principales étapes de l’occupation humaine en bordure de l’Himalaya occidentale

Lithic industries attest that Western Himalayas, Hindu Kush and Pamir as well as the sub-Himalayan belt that is the Siwalik range, were inhabited during the prehistoric times. However, in thin transition zone between plains and high mountains, distinction is to be kept between low-middle altitude regions and high altitude regions (above 2000 m). In the former regions, the first human occupation tenuously appears around 2 Ma. In the Middle Pleistocene, the Lower Palaeolithic industries belong to two technological facies, the Acheulian and the Early Soanian. In the North-Western Siwaliks, the Soanian occurs in plenty on the river terraces, which were all built after 0.4 Ma, and the Acheulian appears between 0.5 and 0.7 Ma. The Middle Palaeolithic is still rich in cobble tools and therefore named Late Soanian. The Upper Palaeolithic is missing, perhaps due to climatic factors and the Neolithic is characterised by polished axes/adzes, but actually many of the cobble tools usually considered as Early Soanian may well belong to the cobble tool technical tradition common in South-East Asia during the Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene. In the north of the mountain range, the entire Palaeolithic sequence yielded by the loess in Southern Tajikistan is characterised, right from the late Lower Pleistocene, by lithic industries mainly compose of flakes, sometimes with cobble tools. In the high altitude zones, prehistoric sites are unknown before the Holocene and therefore they are contemporaneous with the Neolithic but some technological facies display particular features. The question is to know whether the originality of the industries, observed at different periods of time, is linked to techno-cultural adaptations to particular environments or to the isolation of the mountain populations.     

Genetic introgression on freshwater fish populations caused by restocking programmes

The brown trout (Salmo trutta L.) is one of the best studied native salmonids of Europe. Genetic studies on this species suggest that a large proportion of the evolutionary diversity corresponds to southern European countries, including the Iberian Peninsula, where this study is focused. Stocking activities employing non-indigenous hatchery specimens together with the destruction and fragmentation of natural habitats are major factors causing a decrease of native brown trout populations, mostly in the Mediterranean basins of the Iberian Peninsula. The main aim of the present work is to examine the genetic structure of the brown trout populations of the East Cantabrian region, studying the consequences of the restocking activities with foreign hatchery brown trout specimens into the wild trout populations. We have based our study on the Polymerase Chain Reaction and Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism technique conducted on a mitochondrial fragment of 2700 base pairs and on the lactate dehydrogenase locus of the nuclear DNA. Our results show higher introgression rates in the Ebro (Mediterranean) basin than in the Cantabrian rivers. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

First record of the Asiatic cyprinid Pseudorasbora parva in the Iberian Peninsula

Pseudorasbora parva is recorded for the first time in the Iberian Peninsula. Its presence in the River Ebro delta is probably due to involuntary introduction.     

Nouveautés sur la séquence du Pléistocène final et l’Holocène initial dans le versant méditerranéen de la péninsule Ibérique à travers l’industrie lithique

This paper explores the cultural sequence for the period 12,500–9000 BP in the Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula. According to the traditional division by Fortea, this period starts with the end of the Upper Magdalenian, followed by two facies: the Microlaminar Epipalaeolithic and the Geometric Epipalaeolithic (Filador type), (related to Sauveterrian facies). The data collected in recent years suggest a change or amendment to this previous proposal, which now would be divided into four phases: Final Upper Magdalenian, Early Epimagdalenian, Recent Epimagdalenian and Microlaminar Sauveterroid. This paper discusses each of these periods examining the evolution of the stone tools and concluding that in the Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula the Magdalenian tradition continues with little changes until the advent of the Mesolithic.     

L’industrie en calcaire du site Paléolithique d’Isernia la Pineta : un modèle interprétatif de stratégie comportementale

The studies and the researches carried out in the last years on the Palaeolithic site of Isernia La Pineta have brought to consider in new way the activities realized by the human group that lived the basin of Isernia during the Middle Pleistocene offering an important key of interpretation of the behavioural strategies of the prehistoric man. The analysis of the exploitation of the raw material has confirmed the presence on the site of two different lithotypes: flint and limestone; the lithological dichotomy is related to the functional dichotomy of the raw material that seems to have conditioned the activities of the human group in different areas of the site. The necessity to deepen the study on the limestone has derived from the evidence brought to light in the last excavation campaigns of a remarkable concentration of the flaked limestone pebbles and the flake scars in some areas of the explored archeosurfaces, particularly on the 3a and on the overlooking layers. The present study has the purpose to explain the characteristics of the limestone finds both in reference to the raw material and to its state of preservation both to the technotypological evidences and its spatial distribution with the purpose to better understand the modalities of the exploitation of the raw material. The information collected until today have permitted to obtain a precise knowledge of the environmental context and the territorial resources exploited by the human group showing an opportunistic capability to find the most advantageous behavioural solution for the necessities of subsistence.     

Réflexions sur les débuts de la guerre au Néolithique en Europe occidentale

The emergence of war during prehistoric times is a recurrent subject that has often been treated in archaeological literature. The present publication, in the light of a synthetic analysis of traces of violent death observed in Neolithic graves in France and completed by new data information obtained from excavations in Germany, in Austria and in Iberian Peninsula, raises the issue of emergence of a real climate of collective violence in the first farmer communities in Europe. From that moment on, violence ascent during Neolithic times can be reported to several factors: factual causes in relation to disputes over territorial boundaries, economic motivations to permit forcible seizure of wealth or valuable objects by incursions, raids and razzias, and to finish social reasons because victorious conflicts are a demonstration of strength of one community against another and they confirm the prestige of the group or the chief. However, the recognized or established examples of violent death and slaughter remain very few in the end within the first farmer and peasant communities in western Europe. They don’t justify the hypothesis of armed disputes on a large scale. We cannot speak of “war”. Actually, this collective violence is the early beginning of real war in this definition, that is to say an aggressiveness organized, managed, socialized and used for the group at the expense of a neighbouring group, referred to other implications. War is established notably by specific armaments adapted to hand-to-hand fight and to collective fight. Moreover, a society dedicated or consecrated to war includes a military caste or a military aristocracy. Once again, the appearance of a warlike elite is not discernable before the beginnings of the Bronze Age.     

Ostracodes du Cénomanien supérieur et du Turonien de la zone sous-pyrénéenne orientale (Corbières méridionales, SE France). Systématique, biostratigraphie, paléoécologie et paléobiogéographie

Thirty-four species of ostracodes are collected in the platform series of the Southern Corbières; two biostratigraphical assemblages, with 13 and 29 species, are respectively recognized in Cenomanian and Upper Turonian; palaeoecology is specified. At that time, the ostracode sub-province of South-West France, established on Southern Corbières, Aquitaine, Touraine-Poitou-Charentes region and Provence, is connected with Eastern and Northern regions and countries: Sub-alpines ranges, Paris Basin, Great Britain, Switzerland and Bohemia, and with the Iberian Peninsula, sub-province of North-Central Spain and Western Portuguese Basin. The crossing of the Tethys and the Atlantic Ocean is realized, in Turonian, by some rare species.     

Les éléments de parure au Paléolithique supérieur en Belgique

Considering that body ornaments are, through the choice of the elements, good cultural markers, along with the transitional geographical position of Belgium in the Palaeolithic, an up-to-date study of the body ornaments has been undertaken to catch the diffusion and contact phenomenon next to the influences in the lithic industries between regions. Despite the fact that the observations made take cultural value once they are considered in a broader frame than the actual political boarders of the country, cultural and chronological tendencies in terms of “fashions” within the Belgian material have nevertheless confirmed their informational potential.     

The phylogeographical history of the Iberian steppe plant Ferula loscosii (Apiaceae): a test of the abundant-centre hypothesis

The geology and climate of the western Mediterranean area were strongly modified during the Late Tertiary and the Quaternary. These geological and climatic events are thought to have induced changes in the population histories of plants in the Iberian Peninsula. However, fine-scale genetic spatial architecture across western Mediterranean steppe plant refugia has rarely been investigated. A population genetic analysis of amplified fragment length polymorphism variation was conducted on present-day, relict populations of Ferula loscosii (Apiaceae). This species exhibits high individual/population numbers in the middle Ebro river valley and, according to the hypothesis of an abundant-centre distribution, these northern populations might represent a long-standing/ancestral distribution centre. However, our results suggest that the decimated southern and central Iberian populations are more variable and structured than the northeastern ones, representing the likely vestiges of an ancestral distribution centre of the species. Phylogeographical analysis suggests that F. loscosii likely originated in southern Spain and then migrated towards the central and northeastern ranges, further supporting a Late Miocene southern-bound Mediterranean migratory way for its oriental steppe ancestors. In addition, different glacial-induced conditions affected the southern and northern steppe Iberian refugia during the Quaternary. The contrasting genetic homogeneity of the Ebro valley range populations compared to the southern Iberian ones possibly reflects more severe bottlenecks and subsequent genetic drift experienced by populations of the northern Iberia refugium during the Pleistocene, followed by successful postglacial expansion from only a few founder plants.