La Philosophie Analytique ou les Promesses d’Une Pensée Technologique

This article focuses on the origins of analytical philosophy. It argues that the conditions under which it was thought out were similar to the conditions necessary for critical thinking - like the scientific inquiry that served as its model, analytical philosophy was based on the distinction between syntax and semantics. Resulting from logical analysis, this distinction was later essential to all systems of representation - works of art, human action, intellectual endeavours. This evolution reveals a major concern - the need for a technical tool for the critical mind.     

Book reviews—Comptes rendus

I canonici ai servizio dello Stato in Europa, secoli XIII‐XVI—Les chanoines au service de l'Etat en Europe du XIIIème au XVIème siècle

Recueil d'études sous la direction d'Hélène MILLET, avec la collaboration d'Elisabeth MORNET.

Istituto di studi rinascimentali, Ferrara, saggi, Modena (Franco Cosimo Panini editore), 1992, 290 pages (avec cartes, tableaux, graphiques). 80 000 lires.

Rodzina w Osiemnastowiecznej Warszawie (La famille à Varsovie au XVE?ème siècle)

Cezary KUKLO

Instytut Historii Filii Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego w Biatymstoku, Biatystok, 1991 (Institut d'Histoire, filiale de l'Université de Varsovie à Biatystok, Biatystok, 1991. 262 pages)

Collapse of a State: Honecker, Krenz, Modrow, and the end of the German Democratic Republic     

The Landes de Gascogne (southwest France): periglacial desert and cultural frontier during the Palaeolithic

During the last glacial period, a large part of the Aquitaine basin (southwest France) was a periglacial desert comprising coversands with low-relief dune fields surrounded by loess accumulations. OSL and radiocarbon dates show that the phase of maximum sand deposition coincides with Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 2. Peats and gleyic palaeosoils intercalated within the sands at some sites indicate that vegetation cover was able to develop locally during short events, possibly D–O interstadials, due to raised groundwater levels in interdunal depressions. Few Palaeolithic sites have been discovered in the coversand area in contrast to the peripheral loess region. Systematic survey along a future highway corridor demonstrates that this paucity of sites is not the result of insufficient survey nor deep site burial, but rather reflects an archaeological reality. This strongly suggests that the sand area was not attractive for hunter–gatherer populations due to its reduced levels of water resources, and available vegetation and animal biomass. The distribution of cultural markers such as art items and projectile points also shows that the coversand area probably acted as a barrier separating two different cultural sub-areas, one in the Pyrenees and Cantabria, the other in the Périgord. As a consequence, the commonly accepted view that southwest France, as a whole, served as a refugia during the cold and arid phases of the Pleistocene should be replaced by a more complex one that reflects the fact that a large part of the territory was almost unoccupied and that human populations were concentrated along alluvial valleys.     

Solifluction-induced modifications of archaeological levels: simulation based on experimental data from a modern periglacial slope and application to French Palaeolithic sites

The taphonomic study of Petit-Bost, Croix-de-Canard and Cantalouette II, three Palaeolithic sites that were recently discovered near Périgueux and Bergerac (Dordogne, France) in a colluvial context, has enlightened the difficulty of adequately appreciating the relative role of cultural and natural processes in site spatial patterning. Periglacial solifluction was thought to have played a significant role in site formation. Because the nature of the modifications induced by solifluction was still poorly understood, a simulation was made using data of soil movement recorded at La Mortice (French Southern Alps, 3100 m in elevation) in a modern periglacial environment. The results show that, for a knapping location, the first steps of deformation are typified both by a downslope translation of the location center and by an anisotropic diffusion of the artifacts. The knapping spot becomes elongated along the slope, with a dense relic concentration of artifacts in the upslope portion. This type of pattern has been obtained after 100–200 years of simulated displacement according to the climatic and soil conditions that characterise the La Mortice site. The ultimate stages of deformation show that the artifact distribution tends to homogenise on larger surfaces and resemble a random distribution. The ability of the simulated patterns to closely fit those observed in archaeological contexts is evaluated at three sites from Southwestern France. At Petit-Bost, the hypothesis of limited solifluction explains accurately the association of both cultural (artifact concentrations) and natural (artifact preferred orientation) features. At Croix-de-Canard, long-term solifluction can be proposed. By contrast, the simulated patterns do not describe the structures observed on the steeper slopes at Cantalouette II, where the knapping spot transforms into distinct solifluction lobes.     

Notices—notes de lecture

Inventing the barbarian. Greek self‐definition through tragedy, Edith HALL, Oxford, 1989, paperback 1991, 277 + xvi pages ISBN 0–19–314895‐X

Mithra et le mithriacisme, Robert TURCAN, Paris, Les Belles Lettres Histoire, 1993, 100 FF.

Les Exempla médiévaux. Introduction à la recherche suivie des tables critiques de l'Index exemplorum de Frederic C. Tubach, Jacques BERUOZ et Marie Anne POLO DE BEAUUEU éds, Carcassonne, 1993. Avant‐propos de Claude BREMOND, Jacques LE COFF. et Jean‐Claude SCHMITT

La Royauté sacrée dans le monde chrétien, Alain BOUREAU et Claudio Sergio INCERFLOM éds, Paris (Editions de l'Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales), 1992, 165 pages avec illustrations, 230 FF (collection “L'Histoire et ses représentations”, 3) ISBN 2–7132–0973–0

Court and Culture. Dutch Literature 1350–1450, Frits Pieter VAN'OOSTROM, University of California Press, Berkeley and Oxford, 1992, ISBN 0–520–06777–0

Het hof van Gelre. Cultuur ten tijde van de hertogen uit het Gulikse en Egmondse huis (1371–1473), Gerard NIJSTEN, Kok Agora, Kampen 1992. 503 p., ill, Zusammenfassung, ISBN 90–391–00578. fl.89,‐

Richelieu and his Age, Joseph BERG1N et Laurence BROCKUSS éds, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1992, xvii + 288 p.

Recent verleden. De geschiedenis van Nederland in de twintigste eeuw, J.J. WOLTJER, Amsterdam, Balans. 1992, 568 pp., fl. 59,50. ISBN 90–5018–152‐X.

Past and Present—Special ‘Europe’ Edition, No. 137. November 1992, edited by Joanna INNES and Paul SLACK.