Revisiting European Upper Paleolithic Raw Material Transfers: The Demise of the Cultural Ecological Paradigm?

Abstract

In this chapter, the author revisits, updates, and modifies an earlier study. Building on very current data pointing to the existence of raw material transfers over far longer distances than previously recorded for the Upper Paleolithic of Western Europe, in globally less exacting environments than those acknowledged for Eastern Central Europe, the chapter investigates the relevance of the cultural ecological paradigm for addressing issues relating to man's dealings with space on a macro-regional scale. Additionally, behavioral and cognitive implications for Paleolithic transitions are explored. While the recently collected data lead to toning down synchronic differences between western and eastern macro-regions, they reinforce previously stated diachronic differences between the Middle and Upper Paleolithic. Transfers greater than 100 km remain exceptional in the European Middle Paleolithic, suggesting differences of a socio-economic nature. Moreover, the recorded long-distance occurrences remain associated with a strategy of provisioning individuals, even when continuity in mobility patterns can be argued for the same region. Nevertheless, the fact that Middle Paleolithic people did not provision places with raw materials from afar need not necessarily be indicative of specific cognitive capacities, as opposed to those of Upper Paleolithic people.Lithic Materials and Paleolithic Societies Edited by Brian Adams and Brooke S. Blades

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