The Cioarei-Borosteni Cave (Carpathian Mountains, Romania): Middle Palaeolithic finds and technological analysis of the lithic assemblages

Abstract

The authors provide the first report of a Middle Palaeolithic assemblage from Romania. The data suggest short-lived occupation and intriguing evidence of the use of ochre.

The invisible frontier. A multiple species model for the origin of behavioral modernity

“…Evidence of systematic use of pigment by Neandertals has recently been reported from the Cioarei cave in Romania, where eight subcircular ochre containers made of stalagmite fragments, associated with fifty-five ochre fragments, were found in a Mousterian layer older than 50,000 BP. 86 In sum, while the widespread occurrence of pigments at Upper Pleistocene Middle Stone Age sites is an important phenomenon that, following the discovery of Blombos engravings, probably reflects the growing role of symbolic activities in these communities, evidence from European Middle Paleolithic sites gives no reason to believe that Neandertals were not using pigments in compara- ble activities. The chronological attribution of the older pigments from Africa (Kapthurin, Twin Rivers) and their association with Lupemban stone tools seem to indicate that the use of pigments originated with Homo heidelbergensis or archaic Homo sapiens.…”

A geode painted with ochre by the Neanderthal man

“…Cioarei Cave from Boroş teni, Peş tiş ani commune, Gorj County, is the most important Mousterian settlement in Romania as regards the complex interdisciplinary research conducted over more than 20 years (Cârciumaru, 2000;Cârciumaru et al, 2000Cârciumaru et al, , 2002. The cave was carved in a limestone spur of Barremian-Aptian age which descends from the Vâlcan Mountains, part of the southern Carpathians, located at an absolute altitude of 350 m and a relative altitude of approximately 30 m in relation to the Bistricioara river flowing nearby.…”

“…All possible couloirs and siphons, which had existed in the active period of the cave were clogged or closed by thick crusts of calcite before the deposit sedimentation. In the approximately 5-m-thick deposit of Cioarei Cave, was discovered the oldest Romanian Mousterian, assigned to the last interglacial and first half of the Würm glacial stage, represented mainly by lithic tools made of a great variety of local raw material sources (Cârciumaru, 2000;Cârciumaru et al, 2000Cârciumaru et al, , 2002. Of the entire cave deposit, the Mousterian was identified in layers A-J, but high densities of materials were recorded in five layers: E, F, G, H and J. C-14 dating provided ages ranging between 51.900 + 5.300/-3.200 BP (GrN 15048) and 37.750 ± 950 BP (GrN 13005).…”

“…Direct material evidence regarding the use of ochre for painting was provided by the discovery of ochre preparation containers in the Mousterian layers, dated more than 50.000 years, in Cioarei Cave from Boroş teni, Romania (Cârciumaru et al, 2002;Cârciumaru et al, 2012;Cârciumaru and Ţ ut¸uianu-Cârciumaru, 2009). They are direct material evidence of mixing the pigments in order to use it for painting various surfaces ( Figs.…”

¿Es el lenguaje (complejo) el resultado de una transferencia genética entre neandertales y humanos modernos?

“…Además, los propios defensores de que los neandertales utilizaron pigmentos reconocen que su uso era mucho menos selectivo que entre los HAM (d 'Errico 2003). Incluso han llegado a cuestionar que la presencia de restos de manganeso en los yacimientos musterienses europeos implique per se un comportamiento simbólico (d 'Errico et al 2003), puesto que los pigmentos podrían haberse dedicado a otras funciones, como el tratamiento de pieles animales (Cârciumaru et al 2002). A su vez, la confección y empleo de ornamentos perforados son muy recientes en el tiempo: en general, su aparición coincide con el final del Musteriense (d 'Errico 2003).…”