The Upper Paleolithic Period

1. The Upper Paleolithic Period 40,000 to  10,000 ya

2. The Upper Paleolithic • By 28 kya Neanderthals gone. • Humans expand into most of the world. • Art appears and spreads. • Numerous technological innovations occur. • Domestication of the Dog

3. Summary of Chronology • Basal Paleolithic • 2.5 to 1.8 mya • Time of Homo habilis • Olduwan tools • Lower Paleolithic • 1.8 m to 250 kya • Time of Homo erectus • Acheulean hand axes • Middle Paleolithic • 250 to 40 kya • Time of H. neanderthalensis • Mousterian tools The Upper Paleolithic 40 to 10 kya Chatelperronian Aurignacian Gravettian Solutrean Magdalenian

4. Tool Industries • These are tool complexes that are associated and are useful time markers for the UP. • Chatelperronian = intermediate Mousterian to Aurignacian • Aurignacian 36 – 22 kya. Earliest “blade industry.” • Gravettian 33 – 22 kya. Thinner, more finely made blades than Aurignacian. • Solutrean 22 – 18 kya. Extremely refined blade technology. • Magdalenian 18 – 10 kya. Final UP blade industry. ART.

5. Two important definitions • Blades = flakes that are at least twice as long as they are wide. • Composite tools = ones formed from multiple materials. • E.g., a spear has a stone point, wooden shaft, bone fore-shaft, sinew hafting, and resins.

6. Mousterian Technology (Middle Paleolithic)

7. Making blades during the Upper Paleolithic Period. Composite tools during the Upper Paleolithic Period.

8. Aurignacian Tools: 40 to 30 kya in Europe www.hf.uio.no/iakk/ roger/lithic

9. Aurignacian Tools 40 to 30 kya Early Upper Paleolithic Europe www.hf.uio.no/iakk/ roger/lithic

11. Other Features of the Aurignacian • Diverse, efficient, flexible tool kit. • Beads & Jewelry made from mammal bones & teeth. • Bone needles & awls suggesting tailored clothing. • Portable art of engraved bone and ivory • Southern Germany: Vogelherd Cave & Hohlenstein Stadel. • Grotte du Renne, France.

14. Tool Industries • These are tool complexes that are associated and are useful time markers for the UP. • Chatelperronian = intermediate Mousterian to Aurignacian • Aurignacian 36 – 22 kya. Earliest “blade industry.” • Gravettian 33 – 22 kya. Thinner, more finely made blades than Aurignacian. • Solutrean 22 – 18 kya. Extremely refined blade technology. • Magdalenian 18 – 10 kya. Final UP blade industry. ART.

15. Gravettian Tools 30 to 20 kya Mid Upper Paleolithic Europe www.hf.uio.no/iakk/ roger/lithic

16. Two Important Gravettian Sites • Dolni Vestonice 27 kya (Czech Republic) • Complex campsite. • Kostenki 27 kya (Russia). • Nine pit houses • Hearths in centers of huts • Storage pits cut into permafrost

17. Dolni Vestonice

18. Dolni Vestonice

19. Kostenki

20. Bone-framed house

21. Implications of Sites • People becoming a bit more sedentary • Diet, however, still hunting & gathering • Find large herbivore remains • Small mammals remains • Some fish bones

22. Solutrean Tools: 22 to 18 kya in Europe www.hf.uio.no/iakk/ roger/lithic

24. The Dog • Domestication = an organism relying on humans for survival & reproduction. • Dogs come from wolves, which are pack animals. • Dogs have abilities that humans don’t have.

25. The Venus Figurines • Portable art that appeared during the Upper Paleolithic period. • Female figures carved from soft stone or mammoth bone. • Thought to symbolize fertility.

26. Venus of Willendorf, Austria Venus of Gagarino, Ukraine

28. Implication of Figurines • Suggest communication and interaction over long distances. • Suggest symbolic thinking.

29. Cave Painting • Painters used charcoal & red ochre • Lascaux: (France) emphasis on animal paintings; human renderings are simple. • Altamira: (Spain) use of natural features of the cave to enhance animal art. • Chauvet Cave: (discovered 1994).

30. Chauvet Cave 33 – 20 kya • Large cave galleries • Compositional groupings of herbivores & predators. • Find rare species not depicted in other caves: rhino, lion, long-eared owl, & hyena. • Appear to be stylistically unified (same culture).

31. Lascaux 34 – 12 kya

32. Chauvet Cave, France 33 - 20 kya

33. The Magdalenian • 20 – 10 kya. • Stone/bone tool industry becomes more diverse. • Microlithic blades. • New weapons (e.g., harpoon). • Large scale climate change occurred (deglaciation). • Sites were occupied for longer than during Gravettian (more sedentary). • Important sites: Madeliene Rockshelter, Laugerie Haute • People lived there for entire seasons, not year round.

34. Magdalenian Tools 20 to 10 kya Late Upper Paleolithic

35. Mezhirich, Russia Magdalenian

36. Summary of Upper Paleolithic • Diet became gradually more diverse • People became gradually less mobile • Artwork proliferates • Climate warms, deglaciation during Magdalenian • Sets the stage for more regionalization and diversification during the Mesolithic

37. The Mesolithic The transition from foraging to farming

39. The Mesolithic • Starts at roughly 10 kya in many areas • Ends when agriculture is firmly established • The last ice age is definitely over • Climate becoming gradually warmer • Diet continues to change • Patterns of the Mesolithic are widespread

40. Diet is diverse • Find all kinds of fishing equipment • Ground-stone tools • Diverse projectile weapons from many materials • Some cultivation is apparent • Cultigens are plants that are cultivated but this does not equal domestication.

41. Widespread • This diet pattern can be seen from England to Japan • There are 35,000 Mesolithic sites along the coast of Japan • Let’s discuss one site, Nittano (Japan) • Constantly occupied from 6 to 5 kya

42. Nittano • There were roughly 4 to 8 pithouses at any one time (they were often rebuilt) • These houses had stone-lined hearths • It is thought that people settled here year-round • Intensification of architecture is important

44. Broad Spectrum Revolution • BSR refers to the way people adapted around 15 kya in the Middle East & 12 kya in Europe. During the Mesolithic, many plants & animals were hunted, gathered, collected, caught, & fished. • Farming and life as we know it grows out of the BSR.

45. BSR & Mesolithic • Star Carr (England) • Vedbaek (Denmark) • Nittano (Japan) • Elands Bay (South Africa) • Mount Sandel (Ireland) • It really is broad!