On Neanderthal subsistence strategies and land use: A regional focus on the Rhone Valley area in southeastern France

This study of Middle Palaeolithic assemblages from the Rhone Valley, in the South-East of France, increases our understanding of Neanderthal subsistence strategies and modes of territorial organisation by comparing a wide corpus of human occupations in limited chronological and geographical frameworks. The Neanderthal occupation modes may be examined using sites located in a reduced area, linking medium-altitude territories (Massif Central and the Alpine foothills) to the Rhone corridor. Through the combined analysis of the occupation levels of ten sites, all dated to between Marine Isotopic Stage (MIS) 7 and the beginning of MIS 3, we identify three types of occupation durations: (1) type 1 as long-term residential camps, (2) type 2 as short-term regular hunting camps and (3) type 3 as brief stopover camps. We discuss this variability of habitat types according to various parameters: site age, technical behaviour, environmental conditions, and site localisation and occupation seasons. The aim is to discern the underlying motivations behind Neanderthal group mobility. One of the main features of the Rhone Valley area is the great homogeneity of behaviours reflected within the sequences. This homogeneity, linked to the variability of the site occupations, supports the hypothesis of Neanderthal groups anticipating their land use requirements, and furthermore suggests that another type of circulating model was used in this area.     

Pigments from the Middle Palaeolithic levels of Es-Skhul (Mount Carmel,Israel)

Discovery of pigments at Middle Palaeolithic sites is of interest in the context of the ongoing debate about the tempo and mode of the emergence of modern human behaviour. Here we analyse four previously undescribed fragments of pigmental material from Es-Skhul shelter, layer B, Israel, McCown excavations, identified at the Department of Palaeontology, Natural History Museum, London. One of them is still partially embedded in the hard breccia characteristic of this layer. Inspection of breccia fragments from layer B has led to the identification of small pieces of red and orange pigmental material still enclosed in large clasts, further corroborating the attribution of the larger pieces analysed in this study to layer B. The four objects are studied using optical microscopy, Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), Energy Dispersive X-ray (EDX), X-ray micro-diffraction (μ-XRD), Particle-Induced X-Ray Emission Spectrometry (PIXE), and Proton-Induced Gamma-ray Emission (PIGE). The specimens display various hues of yellow, orange, red, and one of them presents a gradual variation of shade from yellow to dark orange. SEM/EDX analysis identifies two specimens (Skhul 1 and 2) as being composed of iron-rich calcium phosphate, the third (Skhul 3) of potassium-rich clay with titanium-rich iron oxide inclusions, and the fourth (Skhul 4) of pure iron oxide crystals. TEM/EDX and μ-XRD analysis demonstrate that three pieces (Skhul 1, 2 and 4) were heated to at least 300 °C, a process that has partially or completely dehydrated goethite into haematite and changed their pristine yellow colour into orange or red. Skhul 3 shows no sign of heating, suggesting that its haematite content has a geological origin. The different mineral composition of the pieces suggests that they must come from a variety of sources. This implies that the associated collection strategies included the selection of materials that differed not only with respect to colour but also with respect to other physical and chemical properties. Although no formal proof exists that these lumps of pigmental material were deliberately heated, results obtained are consistent with this explanation.     

“Some in Rags and Some in Jags and Some in Silken Gowns”: Textiles from Iceland’s Early Modern Period

The Danish trade monopoly of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries resulted in the implementation of strict regulations and controls on textile production, the introduction of weaving workshops equipped with new horizontal looms, and a deliberate attempt to phase out the production of homespun cloth on the warp-weighted loom. What was the fate of homespun cloth in this era of introduced industrialization in Iceland? Archaeological textile collections from Iceland??s early modern period are abundant though understudied. This paper reports current research on these collections and suggests that homespun cloth did not die out in the late medieval period, but that it continued into the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, declining slowly thereafter. Moreover, homespun cloth of the early modern period evolved into something that was structurally different than its earlier medieval version, possibly in response to increased climatic fluctuations during the Little Ice Age.     

Gazetteer of small‐scale monuments in prehistoric Hadramawt,Yemen: a radiocarbon chronology from the RASA‐AHSD Project research 1996–2008

This paper provides a new, interpretive gazetteer and chronology of Hadramawt’s highland monuments based on results from archaeological survey and test excavations by the RASA‐AHSD (Roots of Agriculture in southern Arabia‐Arabian Human Social Dynamics) Project. With the exception of a few incidental sightings and an unpublished pipeline survey, the prehistoric record of southern Yemen’s highland plateau has been largely unknown. There are few settlements, so that understanding human landscape history must begin with the numerous small‐scale stone monuments left by mobile people. With examples representing monuments from the fifth, fourth, third and first millennia BC, the corpus of small excavations and radiocarbon dates reported here provides the first guide to the monument types of South Arabian highlands. Monument building began under more moist conditions and appears to have commemorated animal sacrifices long before commemorating mortuary rites and interment. There appears to be a temporal break of 1000 years before the widespread and varied practices of Bronze Age tomb construction, which lasted through the third millennium BC. After another break in monument construction, tombs were reused in the first millennium BC, sometimes with successive ritual visits. The data presented offer new material for the interpretation of the lives and activities of prehistoric pastoralists throughout the Holocene.     

Ancient Egyptian Pottery from the Subsurface Floodplain of the Saqqara–Memphis Area: Its Mineralogical and Geochemical Implications*

Potsherds recovered from the Saqqara–Memphis floodplain in Egypt, dated according to their typology and radiocarbon dating of the included sediments, are analysed geochemically and mineralogically to identify source materials and fabrication characteristics. Pottery layers were identified and potsherds were recovered from several settlement levels. Sherd typology was used to identify sherds from four periods (the Old and New Kingdoms, and from the Late Period to the Ptolemaic). The Pharaonic pieces were found at depths of between 8 and 12 m and the later material was between 6 and 3 m. Chemical analyses of the potsherds revealed three main source materials: local Nile silt, marl clay and mixed Nile silt–marl. Two marl clay types were recognized: marl clay from Upper Cretaceous marine sediment and another one from Late Pliocene deltaic sediments. The mineralogical composition of the pottery samples shows that the estimated firing temperature was about 850–900°C. No consistent differences in sherd mineralogy and geochemistry were found according to pottery types, so that the ancient Egyptian potters used essentially the same materials throughout the Pharaonic period. However, this initial study has revealed the existence of extensive pottery‐rich occupation sites buried within the Nile floodplain deposits between Memphis and Saqqara.