Deux cas de façonnage dentaire rituel au Néolithique en Europe. Dolmen A1 de la nécropole de Chenon (Charente, France)

Abstract

Here is the case of a U-shaped type of single notch practiced on two lower incisors belonging to two individuals who had been deposited in the megalithic chamber of the A1 dolmen of the Neolithic necropolis of Chenon (Charente, France). ESEM surface analyses show that the two points of each tooth were achieved by percussion, occlusal from top to bottom and vestibular from front to back, followed by filing and polishing of the upper parts of the mesial and distal surfaces of the tooth and the basal part of the notch. These practices, carried out as soon as the Neolithic period on corpses that were probably in lying position, required a certain technical skill and the use of lithic tools such as a chisel, which should be sought during the excavation and identified at the time of the typological study of the collected tools. The reasons for this dental sharpening will probably remain unknown for a long time. A systematic non-exhaustive review of world literature published up to now reports this type of ritual modification, and this from prehistoric times to more recent times. Few cases have been studied in Western Europe.