Umm el Tlel, une séquence du Paléolithique supérieur en Syrie centrale. Industries lithiques et chronologie culturelle

Abstract

Research undertaken in central Syria at the open-air site of Umm el Tlel opens new prospects for the study for the Upper Paleolithic in the Northern Levant. Since 1991, close to forty Upper Paleolithic archaeological levels were identified within a sequence extending from Lower Paleolithic to historical periods. The study of the Upper Paleolithic occupations, still preliminary, nevertheless raises questions concerning the place of the area in the settlement of the Levant during this period. On the basis of the typological and technological characters of the lithic industries, our first results lead us to distinguish four cultural sets. The most recent set is related to the Late Upper Paleolithic but cannot be more precisely qualified. The three other sets belong to the Early Upper Paleolithic. Two can be brought closer to the Levantine Aurignacian and the third fits in the Ahmarian. In a very novel way for the Levant, the sequence of Umm el Tlel shows an interstratification of Ahmarian and Aurignacian occupations. This introduces new factors regarding the settlement of the Northern Levant in the Early Upper Paleolithic and testifies to the establishment of these groups within the interior of the Levant, quite far away from the coastal strip.