Upper Paleolithic Research Articles

New Perspectives on the Behavioral Patterns of Early Modern Humans from the Japanese Islands

This paper presents archaeological research of the Early Upper Paleolithic in the Japanese Islands, introducing the findings of recent research there into early modern humans. The authors provide background to the natural environment of the Upper Paleolithic while offering an overview of research in the area. Five important research topics, related to behavioral modernity of early modern humans, will be described. Based on them, new information and perspectives about the behavioral patterns of early modern humans are discussed with a focus on the Mt. Ashitaka area.

Le façonnage unifacial sur galet en Asie du Sud-Est : l’Hoabinhien du Cambodge

The Hoabinhian represents an iconic pebble facies associated with the tropical forest regions of Southeast Asia, dating from the end of the Upper Pleistocene to the middle of the Holocene. In a region distinguished by the existence of multiple human populations, it emerges and then vanishes when only modern humans remain. This technical phenomenon is defined by the crafting of weighty, thick tools from pebbles, including unifaces, choppers, chopping tools, and splits, with bifacial pieces appearing less frequently. Notably absent from this last Paleolithic hunter-gatherer-forager toolkit are armatures, projectiles, or arrowheads. Therefore, in Southeast Asia, there seems to be a lack of technical evolution in lithic industries and no archaeological evidence of hunting projectiles from 40,000 to 4000 BP. This positions the Hoabinhian pebble tools as a part of the broader question concerning human adaptation, specifically technical behavior, forest subsistence, and life in the tropics. Compared to the contemporary Upper Palaeolithic in the West, these pebble industries might seem to exhibit technical-temporal inertia without significant change, or even a cognitive regression. However, without invoking any eco-geographical determinism, we find ourselves examining a unique and radical technical choice that originated in the forest, representing a dialogue between technology and the tropical environment. The Hoabinhian case is a phenomenon that signifies a balance between the mineral world and a specific plant, namely bamboo. The archaeological invisibility of lithic material (like pointed weapons and armatures) is logically offset by plant material, sometimes siliceous like bamboo. The Hoabinhian technique represents a novel complexity and modernity that only modern Homo sapiens has managed to invent. The persistence of this technical phenomenon in a humid tropical context, associated with perishable materials, contrasts sharply with the conventional prehistoric narrative of the Western world. By using examples taken from Hoabinhian material uncovered during recent excavations in the Laang Spean cave in Cambodia by the MEAE's “Mission Préhistorique Franco-Cambodgienne”, we aim to illustrate the originality and diversity of lithic reduction sequences on pebbles. We will also propose functional hypotheses for these pebbles using a structural approach based on 3D modeling.

Infectious diseases may have arrested the southward advance of microblades in Upper Palaeolithic East Asia.

An unsolved archaeological puzzle of the East Asian Upper Palaeolithic is why the southward expansion of an innovative lithic technology represented by microblades stalled at the Qinling-Huaihe Line. It has been suggested that the southward migration of foragers with microblades stopped there, which is consistent with ancient DNA studies showing that populations to the north and south of this line had differentiated genetically by 19 000 years ago. Many infectious pathogens are believed to have been associated with hominins since the Palaeolithic, and zoonotic pathogens in particular are prevalent at lower latitudes, which may have produced a disease barrier. We propose a mathematical model to argue that mortality due to infectious diseases may have arrested the wave-of-advance of the technologically advantaged foragers from the north.

Astronism and the Astronic Religious Tradition

A new religion was founded in 2013 that goes by the name of Astronism while its community of followers are known as Astronists. This article gives a rigorous account of the eschatology, soteriology and worldview of this new space religion while contextualizing its emergence as part of a broader Astronic religious tradition. This proposed tradition may itself possess prehistoric roots in the Upper Palaeolithic in the earliest human observations of the night sky. Human beings in turn came to establish a relationship with celestial phenomena, one of both spiritual and secular utility that has since produced systems of astrotheism and astrology. In the contemporary, the projection of the Astronist theory of history onto the Astronic tradition has meant that Astronism’s salvific doctrine of transcension is established as a grand narrative and universal ethic that unites the Astronic tradition. In essence, this article considers how Astronism, as a new religious movement, is working to revive astronomical religion, albeit in ways relevant in an age of space exploration and appropriate to modern scientific knowledge about humanity’s true place in the universe.

Phylogenetic Analysis by Molecular Sequence of Various Human Interleukins

Due to the importance of interleukins in the immune response, cell differentiation, and their potential use to treat autoimmune diseases and tumors, we decided to perform in this article a phylogenetic classification through the molecular sequence of several interleukins.
 Aims: To make a general description of the most probable evolutionary history of the interleukins’ lineage by building a phylogenetic tree using statistical models.
 Methodology: The molecular sequences of 16 human interleukins were downloaded from the UNIPROT website in FASTA format. With the free software MEGA11, using a maximum likelihood statistical model, the phylogenetic tree was built; subsequently, the constants were incorporated in the model to calibrate the time tree marker.
 Results: Our results show that the first interleukins of Homo sapiens sapiens were outlined in the Upper Paleolithic. The evolutionary history of 8 interleukins probably occurred in the Mesolithic period. In the Neolithic, already with the discovery of agriculture, 6 Interleukins were developed.
 Conclusions: Our results show that the appearance of different IL’s throughout the history of humanity, from the Paleolithic to the Mesolithic, coincides with climatic changes, variations in diet and / or lifestyle of humankind. In addition, some archaeological findings could be relevant to understanding how human evolution influenced the development of IL's, such as the genetic exchange between Homo sapiens and Homo neanderthalensis.

Bone weathering in an Atlantic environment: preliminary results of the Global Weathering Project in Spain

Weathering constitutes one of the most investigated taphonomic processes for understanding the formation of archaeological and palaeontological assemblages. Despite being studied for decades through numerous monitoring experiments, no homogeneous methodology exists to compare the results obtained in different regions and climates. Here, we present the protocols and the preliminary results of an experimental research started four years ago in a coastal and inland location within the Cantabrian Region (northern Spain) to assess the influence of the weathering process in an Atlantic climate. This experiment allows evaluation of the preservation of faunal assemblages in regional open-air sites throughout the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic. We conduct this experiment within the Global Weathering Project of the International Council for Archaeozoologists (ICAZ), an international network of archaeozoologists and taphonomists who coordinates the same experiment worldwide. The experiment planned to last 18 years consists on recording the weathering stages suffered on the cow ribs disposed on the surface of a fenced enclosure under the protection of a cage, separated from the soil by a neutral inorganic substrate and close to a weather station where the temperature, humidity, rainfall, wind and sun exposure values are daily recorded.

What can microshells tell us? A case-study from the Palaeolithic site of Riparo Bombrini (Balzi Rossi, NW Italy)

The exploitation of marine molluscs during the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic is a topic that has been extensively investigated over the last few years, shedding light on human adaptation in coastal environments. However, such studies mainly focus on the role of marine molluscs in the subsistence practices of the hunter-fisher-gatherers of the Mediterranean Basin.Although small, non-dietary gastropods found in archaeological deposits have the potential to provide important clues regarding past human activities, their role is still little investigated. This research explores the question of whether taphonomy could be useful for the interpretation of these less conspicuous “incidental” shell remains found in archaeomalacological assemblages.In this paper we present the results of a taphonomic study carried out on a total of 314 Bittium shells recovered in the Mousterian and Protoaurignacian levels of Riparo Bombrini, a collapsed rockshelter in the Balzi Rossi Palaeolithic site complex (NW Italy). How did these small, non-dietary gastropods come to be deposited? Are they an unintentional by-product of certain harvesting techniques, or the result of a deliberate gathering? Or, could natural factors be responsible for their presence at the site? To answer these questions, different types of taphonomic processes were considered. Comparing the Bombrini archaeomalacological remains and modern shells accumulated on beaches leads us to propose that the most likely cause of their presence at the site is a correlation between Bittium shells and small sea pebbles, rather than the accidental transport of these shells with algae and seagrasses that could have been brought back to the site.

Inferring the territoriality of Upper Palaeolithic hunter-gatherer’s groups settled at Cueva del Gato 2 (Épila, Zaragoza)

In recent decades, the development of different analytical procedures applied to the study of archaeological lithic remains has allowed us to approach the territoriality of past societies. The application of geochemical tools has improved the study of lithic raw materials, allowing direct connections between archaeological samples and specific geological formations. In a similar way, the incorporation of GIS tools to the study of past mobility and territoriality has allowed to define which could have been the most probable routes used by past groups to stock up on rocks. In this paper, we present the results obtained after the geochemical study by Laser Ablation Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) of lithic cherts found at Upper Palaeolithic human occupations at Cueva del Gato 2 (Épila, Zaragoza, Spain) as well as the least cost path routes obtained after GIS analyses. The Cueva del Gato 2 archaeological site is a large cave placed in the first foothills of the Iberian System, close to the Middle Ebro Basin, in Eastern Iberia. The archaeological work has revealed a long sequence of occupation with archaeological levels from the Bronze Age, the Ancient Neolithic and the Upper Palaeolithic. In this paper, we have focused on the study of level II, which has been dated in the range 21,000–23,000 cal BP. Results have demonstrated that past human groups from the Last Glacial Maximum knew and frequented the Sierra de Lanaja – Montes de Castejón lacustrine chert sources, outcropping in the Middle Ebro Basin.

THREE TYPES OF INDUSTRY IN THE STONE AGE OF GOBUSTAN

In the east of the Republic of Azerbaijan, in Gobustan district, there are numerous Stone Age sites with preserved culture-bearing deposits. Interest in the richest rock art sites concentrated there overshadowed studying the stone inventory of the region’s earliest sites relegating them to the background. In this work, the author proposes a general systematization of the materials of the Gobustan Stone Age. The paper contains detailed typological lists of key sites; suggests the criteria for dividing the material into three cultural and chronological groups; and substantiates a new view on the chronology and local peculiarities of these groups that is different from previously held ones in many respects. For the sites of the Upper Palaeolithic of Gobustan, an estimated age is proposed corresponding to the period prior to maximum of the Würm glaciation (i.e., no later than approximately 25–20 thousand years ago). The lower date of the Mesolithic layers correlates roughly with the end of the Allerød and the Younger Dryas (approximately 14–12 thousand years ago). The emergence of the local Neolithic is attributed approximately to the early 6th millennium BC.

Engraved images of the Shulgan-Tash (Kapova) cave, Bashkortostan, South Ural

The cave of Shulgan-Tash (Kapova) with wall drawings of the Upper Paleolithic is located in the mountain course of the River Belaya in the Southern Urals, nearby the village of Gadelgareevo, Burzyansky district of the Republic of Bashkortostan. In the process of more than 50 years of studying the cave sanctuary, the search for engraved images has been carried out. Two compositions with engraved images were discovered in 2008. Com-position No. 1 is located in the Main Gallery, 100 m from the entrance, in a niche on the western wall at a height of about 2 m above the floor level. It consists of the elements located on two levels. At the lower level, a number of elements are confined to the natural fracture and a chain of caverns. Parallel to the horizontal crack, five lines were drawn. The lines connect to a quadrangular shape filled with vertical and horizontal lines. Behind it, the crack merges into a chain of caverns. The upper tier consists of four oval artificial recesses. The fourth groove is located under the engraved anthropomorphic figure, between the legs. This indicates that this is a vulva-shaped symbol. The grooves are connected by deeply incised lines to the quadrangular figure and caverns of the lower tier. Lines also run from the chain of the caverns downwards. Thus, these groups of artificial and natural elements were combined into a single composition. Composition No. 2 is located in the Dome Hall, 150 m from the entrance, above the Chapel of Skulls in the western wall, nearby the colorful wall images in the shape of splashes. It was made on a 16 cm × 14 cm rock surface leveled and cleaned of calcite deposits. The composition consists of three pictorial ele-ments made in three different ways. The first element is represented by two parallel arcuate bands of comb lines of 4 cm wide and about 30 cm long made with a serrated stone tool of 4 cm wide in the soft mondmilch. Under them, with finger impressions in the mondmilch, a circle of about 6 cm in diameter was made of round dimples; rows of en-graved straight lines and zigzags were applied to the right of the circle. At present, the composition is held together by calcite incrustation and has completely hardened. The use of stone tools to create the engravings and grooves, the calcite crust inside the engraved lines, the use of the natural forms of the wall relief in the pictorial ensemble, the similarity of the quadrangular figure with the quadrangular symbols painted with ochre in the same cave, and the presence of a vulva-shaped symbol — all this indicates the Upper Paleolithic Age of these compositions.

Symbolic innovation at the onset of the Upper Paleolithic in Eurasia shown by the personal ornaments from Tolbor-21 (Mongolia)

Figurative depictions in art first occur ca. 50,000 years ago in Europe, Africa, and Southeast Asia. Considered by most as an advanced form of symbolic behavior, they are restricted to our species. Here, we report a piece of ornament interpreted as a phallus-like representation. It was found in a 42,000 ca.-year-old Upper Paleolithic archaeological layer at the open-air archaeological site of Tolbor-21, in Mongolia. Mineralogical, microscopic, and rugosimetric analyses points toward the allochthonous origin of the pendant and a complex functional history. Three-dimensional phallic pendants are unknown in the Paleolithic record, and this discovery predates the earliest known sexed anthropomorphic representation. It attests that hunter-gatherer communities used sex anatomical attributes as symbols at a very early stage of their dispersal in the region. The pendant was produced during a period that overlaps with age estimates for early introgression events between Homo sapiens and Denisovans, and in a region where such encounters are plausible.

The collection of archaeological artifacts from the Upper Paleolithic site of Sungir, stored in the State Vladimir and Suzdal Museum: the history of acquisition and scientific study

The article is an analytical review of a museum collection of archaeological materials from the excavations of the Sungir site, which is one of the most famous sites of the Upper Paleolithic. The collection is stored in the State Vladimir and Suzdal Museum and is one of the most important parts of the museum funds. It’s distinguished by a high degree of study and is actively used in the main areas of the museum activity. The history of replenishment and the structure of the collection correspond to the dynamics of changes in the understanding of the site place in the Upper Paleolithic of the Russian Plain. The objects of the collection have long remained in the focus of attention of researchers, and they still retain the prospect of further study. The materials of the collection are mainly represented by stone tools, items made of bone and horn and by a set of inventory from burials. Since mostly only few artifacts from burials and anthropological materials were of interest to the scientific community, the scientific processing of the collection is carried out unevenly. The article describes the main categories of funeral inventory and gives overview of the current state of the collection. From a museum point of view, the collection fully complies with all regulatory requirements for the accounting and storage of items. The materials of the Sungir site have not only purely scientific, but also public significance, which allows them to be used in permanent exhibitions and other museum projects. A detailed analysis of the collection from the point of museum specifics makes it possible to simplify the work of archaeologists-researchers and emphasize its potential for further study.

Reconstructing Middle and Upper Paleolithic human mobility in Portuguese Estremadura through laser ablation strontium isotope analysis

Understanding mobility and landscape use is important in reconstructing subsistence behavior, range, and group size, and it may contribute to our understanding of phenomena such as the dynamics of biological and cultural interactions between distinct populations of Upper Pleistocene humans. However, studies using traditional strontium isotope analysis are generally limited to identifying locations of childhood residence or nonlocal individuals and lack the sampling resolution to detect movement over short timescales. Here, using an optimized methodology, we present highly spatially resolved 87Sr/86Sr measurements made by laser ablation multicollector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry along the growth axis of the enamel of two marine isotope stage 5b, Middle Paleolithic Neanderthal teeth (Gruta da Oliveira), a Tardiglacial, Late Magdalenian human tooth (Galeria da Cisterna), and associated contemporaneous fauna from the Almonda karst system, Torres Novas, Portugal. Strontium isotope mapping of the region shows extreme variation in 87Sr/86Sr, with values ranging from 0.7080 to 0.7160 over a distance of c. 50km, allowing short-distance (and arguably short-duration) movement to be detected. We find that the early Middle Paleolithic individuals roamed across a subsistence territory of approximately 600km2, while the Late Magdalenian individual parsimoniously fits a pattern of limited, probably seasonal movement along the right bank of the 20-km-long Almonda River valley, between mouth and spring, exploiting a smaller territory of approximately 300km2. We argue that the differences in territory size are due to an increase in population density during the Late Upper Paleolithic.

Natural products from reconstructed bacterial genomes of the Middle and Upper Paleolithic.

Major advances over the past decade in the field of ancient DNA are providing access to past paleogenomic diversity, but the diverse functions and biosynthetic capabilities of this growing paleome remain largely elusive. We investigated the dental calculus of 12 Neanderthals and 52 anatomically modern humans ranging from 100,000 years ago to the present and reconstructed 459 bacterial metagenome-assembled genomes. We identified a biosynthetic gene cluster shared by seven Middle and Upper Paleolithic individuals that allows for the heterologous production of a class of previously unknown metabolites that we name "paleofurans." This paleobiotechnological approach demonstrates that viable biosynthetic machinery can be produced from the preserved genetic material of ancient organisms, allowing access to natural products from the Pleistocene and providing a promising area for natural product exploration.

The three waves: Rethinking the structure of the first Upper Paleolithic in Western Eurasia.

The Neronian is a lithic tradition recognized in the Middle Rhône Valley of Mediterranean France now directly linked to Homo sapiens and securely dated to 54,000 years ago (ka), pushing back the arrival of modern humans in Europe by 10 ka. This incursion of modern humans into Neandertal territory and the relationships evoked between the Neronian and the Levantine Initial Upper Paleolithic (IUP) question the validity of concepts that define the first H. sapiens migrations and the very nature of the first Upper Paleolithic in western Eurasia. Direct comparative analyses between lithic technology from Grotte Mandrin and East Mediterranean archeological sequences, especially Ksar Akil, suggest that the three key phases of the earliest Levantine Upper Paleolithic have very precise technical and chronological counterparts in Western Europe, recognized from the Rhône Valley to Franco-Cantabria. These trans-Mediterranean technical connections suggest three distinct waves of H. sapiens expansion into Europe between 55-42 ka. These elements support an original thesis on the origin, structure, and evolution of the first moments of the Upper Paleolithic in Europe tracing parallel archaeological changes in the East Mediterranean region and Europe.

The Beginning of the Early Upper Paleolithic in Poland

Research on the timing of Homo sapiens dispersals in Central Europe is pivotal for understanding the behavioral trajectories of human adaptation to low biomass environments and cold climates. Previous studies on the Early Upper Paleolithic of Poland described a different scenario from the European panorama characterized by the local development of a laminar/lamellar technology from the foregoing Middle Paleolithic and the coexistence of different Aurignacian variants after 35 ka BP. In this paper, we examine this technical diversity by reassessing and revising the chronological and technological information of the key Aurignacian sites in Poland. Our study reveals that the distinctive techno-typological features of the different Aurignacian types are most likely the result of the mixing of artifacts from different chronologies. In our view, Poland was visited intermittently by Homo sapiens since the Early Aurignacian. The deterioration of the climatic conditions during the second half of MIS 3 converted the Polish territories into a satellite area of the Aurignacian settlement system.

Innovative Technological Practices and their Role in the Emergence of Initial Upper Paleolithic Technologies: A View from Boker Tachtit

Innovative Technological Practices and their Role in the Emergence of Initial Upper Paleolithic Technologies: A View from Boker Tachtit

Otson Tsokhio and Zuun Shovkh: the Initial Upper Palaeolithic in Eastern Mongolia

Otson Tsokhio and Zuun Shovkh: the Initial Upper Palaeolithic in Eastern Mongolia

The Epigravettian Site of Yudinovo, Russia: Mammoth Bone Structures as Ritualised Middens

ABSTRACT We present here the results of a study of woolly mammoth remains from Yudinovo (Bryansk oblast, Russia) and argue for a revised interpretation of Late Upper Palaeolithic mammoth bone structures in Eastern Europe. Five distinct mammoth bone accumulations have been identified in the main (lower) archaeological layer of Yudinovo, dated to ca. 14.9–14.5 14C kya BP (ca. 18.2–17.6 kya cal BP). Taphonomic and zooarchaeological analyses have shown that the mammoth remains found at Yudinovo derive from the butchery of animal carcasses, supporting the hypothesis of mammoth hunting during the Upper Palaeolithic. Our analyses indicate that hunting of both adult and young mammoths took place. Yudinovo was occupied at intervals during both the cold and warm periods of the year, and evidence for various activities is found at the site. The most recently excavated mammoth bone structure was built from a large number of bones, and had a circular or oval form, 4–9.5 m in diameter. The mammoth bone structures have traditionally been interpreted as the remains of dwellings, but we interpret them instead as ritualised middens. Such middens were probably an important part of the socio-symbolic systems of the Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers who built them.

Upper Paleolithic of the Yenisey: New Discoveries, Old Debates

This paper integrates the results of studies relating to the Upper Paleolithic of the Yenisey, collating traditional ideas with fi ndings made in the latest decades. Excavations on the Upper and Middle Yenisey are being carried out by several research teams. Sites representing the hitherto little known Early Upper Paleolithic (Yasnoye I, Afontova Gora II-Sklon) have been discovered, but so far the fi ndings do not suffi ce for their cultural attribution. The key site for that period in the region remains Malaya Syia, for which a series of new dates ranging between 34–29 ka has been generated. Traditions revealed there continued at a later site, Sabanikha. The Middle Upper Paleolithic is characterized by the prevalence of various blade industries, which in most cases cannot be separated into clear-cut groups resembling archaeological cultures. Certain industries are archaic, with Mousterian-like lithic assemblages and elaborate bone and tusk processing (Kurtak IV). During the later phase of the Pleistocene, along with cultures such as the Afontova and Kokorevo, blade industries survived, continuing traditions of the preceding stage (Golubaya I, Maltat, Konzhul). A peculiar variant of the Upper Paleolithic has been identifi ed, combining features of both cultures and a series of foliated bifaces (Kuibyshevo II). Discussions are ongoing around the effect of various factors on the cultural differentiation, including the relationship between the Afontova and Kokorevo cultures.