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This study presents, firstly, the Nideck surface deposit of rhyolite exploited during the Middle Palaeolithic, its lithology, its outcrop and its stratigraphical context, and then the core reduction pattern and the tools of the lithic artefacts collected. The prehistoric deposit is located on a hillslope. Two areas were defined: an excavation on a subhorizontal bench (Series A) and a survey in the fan- talus (Series B) below the test trench. The stratigraphy is never more than I m high: it shows a humus level and a disturbed one. The substratum consists of a rhyolite plate. Artefacts were found in both stratigraphie levels, they are all knapped from white rhyolite blocks, except one from a red rhyolite block. The morphology of the blocks, more than the raw material quality, has dictated constraints during knapping. Butt preparation is exceptional, and there is little core shaping. The Series A industry shows above all Discoid core reduction with occasional peripheral convexity shaping. A few opportunistic blades are sometimes produced. Side-scrapers are the more numerous tools (about 45%), with no predominating pattern. There are also notches, end-scrapers and partially retouched flakes. Blanks are very variable, with however a preference for thick large ones. The Series В industry also shows lots of Discoid cores, with three patterns imposed by the morphology of the knapped blocks. A blade-specific production appears on some long cores. Both procedures can exist on the same core. More than half the corpus of tools is composed of denticulates and notches. Among scrapers (23% of tools), we find a double angle convergent scraper (" rechtwinkliger Schabe "), and also three end-scrapers using the tranchet technique. Two characteristics found in Nideck industries have parallels all along the Rhine valley: they are the blade production and the double angle convergent scraper. Predominating in the north part of this area, blade production seems to be less important from the Bruche valley up to the north of the Jura mountains. These data help to give a date between the Eemian and the Last Glacial, or isotopic phases 5 and 6, or the Rocourt phase and Period 1 of the Rhenish chronology. The Vosges mountains run along the west side of the Alsace plain. In the southern Vosges, the Bruche valley crosses a big volcano-sedimentary and volcanic complex from the Devono-Dinantian to the Permian age. This axis draws the boundary between the granitic Hercynian and the sandstone Vosges. The Nideck Dale is situated in this geological complex strongly characterised by volcanic activity. The Permian volcanic formations from Nideck are red or white fluidal texture rhyolites, compact and rich in silica. They consist of a quartz and fibrous feldspar microcrystals background including enallogenetic dark purplish-blue inclusions, detritus of rocks and devitrification basin forms with fibroradiated crystallised spherulites. These rocks are involved informations including ignimbrite, tuff, vitreous tuff and volcanic breccia, less siliceous, more heterogeneous and softer: rhyolites are the only type to have been exploited. The rhyolite front appears as little beds 1 or 2 m high and about 10 m wide. It is fissured in prismatic and rhombic blocks with flat sides and acute angles.
This study presents, firstly, the Nideck surface deposit of rhyolite exploited during the Middle Palaeolithic, its lithology, its outcrop and its stratigraphical context, and then the core reduction pattern and the tools of the lithic artefacts collected. The prehistoric deposit is located on a hillslope. Two areas were defined: an excavation on a subhorizontal bench (Series A) and a survey in the fan- talus (Series B) below the test trench. The stratigraphy is never more than I m high: it shows a humus level and a disturbed one. The substratum consists of a rhyolite plate. Artefacts were found in both stratigraphie levels, they are all knapped from white rhyolite blocks, except one from a red rhyolite block. The morphology of the blocks, more than the raw material quality, has dictated constraints during knapping. Butt preparation is exceptional, and there is little core shaping. The Series A industry shows above all Discoid core reduction with occasional peripheral convexity shaping. A few opportunistic blades are sometimes produced. Side-scrapers are the more numerous tools (about 45%), with no predominating pattern. There are also notches, end-scrapers and partially retouched flakes. Blanks are very variable, with however a preference for thick large ones. The Series В industry also shows lots of Discoid cores, with three patterns imposed by the morphology of the knapped blocks. A blade-specific production appears on some long cores. Both procedures can exist on the same core. More than half the corpus of tools is composed of denticulates and notches. Among scrapers (23% of tools), we find a double angle convergent scraper (" rechtwinkliger Schabe "), and also three end-scrapers using the tranchet technique. Two characteristics found in Nideck industries have parallels all along the Rhine valley: they are the blade production and the double angle convergent scraper. Predominating in the north part of this area, blade production seems to be less important from the Bruche valley up to the north of the Jura mountains. These data help to give a date between the Eemian and the Last Glacial, or isotopic phases 5 and 6, or the Rocourt phase and Period 1 of the Rhenish chronology. The Vosges mountains run along the west side of the Alsace plain. In the southern Vosges, the Bruche valley crosses a big volcano-sedimentary and volcanic complex from the Devono-Dinantian to the Permian age. This axis draws the boundary between the granitic Hercynian and the sandstone Vosges. The Nideck Dale is situated in this geological complex strongly characterised by volcanic activity. The Permian volcanic formations from Nideck are red or white fluidal texture rhyolites, compact and rich in silica. They consist of a quartz and fibrous feldspar microcrystals background including enallogenetic dark purplish-blue inclusions, detritus of rocks and devitrification basin forms with fibroradiated crystallised spherulites. These rocks are involved informations including ignimbrite, tuff, vitreous tuff and volcanic breccia, less siliceous, more heterogeneous and softer: rhyolites are the only type to have been exploited. The rhyolite front appears as little beds 1 or 2 m high and about 10 m wide. It is fissured in prismatic and rhombic blocks with flat sides and acute angles.
La grande majorité de la documentation archéozoologique publiée pour le Chasséen méridional, c’est-à-dire les interprétations en termes d’économie animale, de pratiques pastorales et de choix culturels, s’appuie sur les assemblages fauniques mis au jour dans les grottes et abris, les sites de plein air étant mal connus. C’est donc une image tronquée que l’on avait jusque-là des systèmes techniques d’exploitation des animaux caractérisant ce complexe culturel. L’étude archéozoologique complète de trois grands sites de terrasse de la moyenne vallée du Rhône et celle, en cours, d’un quatrième établissement en Languedoc occidental, occupés lors des phases récentes du Chasséen, permettent ainsi de compléter nos connaissances sur ce complexe culturel. Ce travail contribue tout d’abord à atténuer l’image d’un complexe Chasséen scindé en deux ensembles du point de vue des systèmes techniques d’exploitation des animaux. Il montre que les bovinés jouaient un rôle important dans l’économie animale méridionale. D’autres similitudes entre Chasséen septentrional et méridional sont mises en évidence, que ce soit dans le choix de bovinés de forte stature ou dans les finalités d’élevage des troupeaux de bovins. Ce travail confirme également l’existence d’une partition fonctionnelle au sein des sites méridionaux, le Chasséen s’appuyant sur différents types d’occupations (en grotte et abri, de plein air et d’ampleur variable) aux fonctionnalités distinctes et dans certains cas complémentaires. Cette partition est mise en évidence à partir des choix d’approvisionnement carné, du mode de constitution des troupeaux de bovinés et des modalités de gestion des caprinés et des bovins.
Excavations carried out by INRAP at the Colmar site in 2008 revealed the presence of 75 circular pits identified as storage pits. No layers of waste suggesting possible nearby domestic activity were found. A total of 19 of the structures contained human remains among which there were 13 primary burial sites and 11 secondary burial sites. The ceramic items collected and a series of radiocarbon dates prove that the site dates back to the Late Neolithic and can be more precisely linked to the Munzingen culture, which covered an area from the south of Upper Alsace to the Wetterau region in Germany. Most of the bodies were in a contracted position, described as “ regular” or “ conventional”, that made it possible to identify a majority of real tombs. One pit shows three layers of inhumation, the lower containing an adult in the regular position and a child in a non-regular position. The two bodies were in close contact. This type of asymmetric burial, relatively common in the recent Upper Rhine Neolithic, seems to represent ritual killings of “ escorts” during the burial of an important person. There is some evidence that post-decompositional manipulations occurred on human corpses as well as on animal carcasses found nearby. Five whole or partial animal burials (suidae and cervidae) and the legs of two roe deer were discovered. They were either isolated or in the same pits as the human bodies, but always separated from these by a layer of sediment. The practice of laying whole animals in circular pits seems to follow the same pattern as that of human burials and it is likely that both practices are a part of the same symbolic system. Studies of the Colmar pits provide several important clues to help understand the numerous aspects linked to the ritual burials in circular pits. In the present state of our knowledge, we favour the hypothesis of ritual offerings, involving animals of various kinds, from whole carcasses to isolated parts. These offerings were never clearly associated with a given individual, but may have been devoted to all the persons buried on the site or to supernatural entities. 56 copper beads making up two “ necklaces” were found near a body lying on its stomach. A number of counterparts to these objects also existed in the Cortaillod culture where they have been found three times in structured deposits. Laboratory research carried out on eight of the Colmar beads shows that they are made of arsenical copper known as Mondsee copper. This copper, which probably comes from the north-eastern Alps, played a major part in the expansion of early prehistoric metallurgy. Given the locations of the discoveries and the origin of the raw material, one can assume that the cylindrical beads characteristic of the 4th millennium were produced in the Cortaillod area from copper bars imported via the Pfyn and/ or the Mondsee cultures. They were perhaps a basis of exchange rather than ornaments. The Colmar site may have been a small necropolis, but also an area devoted to ritual practices involving animal and perhaps even human offerings. The latter hypothesis is suggested by the association – very unlikely in a strictly funerary setting – of bodies in non-regular positions and the presence of prestige items. Individuals buried in a regular position invariably lack grave goods and no prestige items are found in conventional burials.
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