The Importance of Fish, Fowl and Small Mammals in the Paleolithic Diet of the Swabian Jura, Southwestern Germany

Conard, Nicholas J.; Kitagawa, Keiko; Krönneck, Petra; Böhme, Madelaine; Münzel, Susanne C.

doi:10.1007/978-94-007-6766-9_11

Cited by 25 publications

(52 citation statements)

References 31 publications

(39 reference statements)

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“…appeared in the fossil record in the Oligocene -middle Miocene (between 21.2-13.2 Ma) of Russia, in the Dshilindy locality at the Vitim plateau (Sytchevskaya, 1989). Remains of the extant Hucho hucho along with Salmo trutta are reported from the late Pleistocene (27.0-43.0 kya) of Hohle Fels near Schelklingen in Germany (Böhme, Ilg, 2003;Conard et al, 2013). Evolutionary history of the other species of the genus Hucho is still unknown (Holčik, 1982).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The First Appearance of Hucho (Salmonidae) in the Fossil Record of Eastern Europe

Kovalchuk¹

2015

Vestnik Zoologii

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Until now, fossil remains of Hucho Gunther, 1866 are known only from the Oligocene - middle Miocene strata of Baikal Russia, and from the late Pleistocene of Germany. New specimens, now identified as Hucho sp., come from the late Miocene of southern Ukraine. Numerous fragments of opercular bones and jaw teeth, morphologically similar to those in the extant genus Hucho, were found in Kubanka 2, Cherevychnoe 3, Tretya Krucha localities and dated by the late Sarmatian - early Maeotian (10-8 Ma). Th ese remains document the first appearance of huchen in geological past of Europe, filling in gap in distribution of this genus during the late Neogene, and throw light upon its biogeographical history.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The First Appearance of Hucho (Salmonidae) in the Fossil Record of Eastern Europe

Kovalchuk¹

2015

Vestnik Zoologii

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“…However, some researchers have linked the disappearance of Neanderthals at the end of Middle Paleolithic to diets which were, relative to those of Upper Paleolithic peoples, narrower (Richards et al, 2001;Hockett andHaws, 2003, 2009;O'Connell, 2006). This idea is supported by stable isotopic and fauna data (Stiner, 1999;Richards et al, 2001;Conard et al, 2011). In this view, Neanderthal subsistence was reliant on a more restricted range of staples than that of modern humans, giving them a competitive disadvantage against Upper Paleolithic peoples.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 88%

Dental calculus indicates widespread plant use within the stable Neanderthal dietary niche

Power

Salazar‐García

Rubini

et al. 2018

Journal of Human Evolution

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The ecology of Neanderthals is a pressing question in the study of hominin evolution. Diet appears to have played a prominent role in their adaptation to Eurasia. Based on isotope and zooarchaeological studies, Neanderthal diet has been reconstructed as heavily meat-based and generally similar across different environments. This image persists, despite recent studies suggesting more plant use and more variation. However, we have only a fragmentary picture of their dietary ecology, and how it may have varied among habitats, because we lack broad and environmentally representative information about their use of plants and other foods. To address the problem, we examined the plant microremains in Neanderthal dental calculus from five archaeological sites representing a variety of environments from the northern Balkans, and the western, central and eastern Mediterranean. The recovered microremains revealed the consumption of a variety of non-animal foods, including starchy plants. Using a modeling approach, we explored the relationships among microremains and environment, while controlling for chronology. In the process, we compared the effectiveness of various diversity metrics and their shortcomings for studying microbotanical remains, which are often morphologically redundant for identification. We developed Minimum Botanical Units as a new way of estimating how many plant types or parts are present in a microbotanical sample. In contrast to some previous work, we found no evidence that plant use is confined to the southern-most areas of Neanderthal distribution. Although interpreting the ecogeographic variation is limited by the incomplete preservation of dietary microremains, it is clear that plant exploitation was a widespread and deeply rooted Neanderthal subsistence strategy, even if they were predominately game hunters. Given the limited dietary variation across Neanderthal range in time and space in both plant and animal food exploitation, we argue that vegetal consumption was a feature of a generally static dietary niche.

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“…Three of them we would like to discuss in more detail in this section and compare them with our obtained results. The first hypothesis is that Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans occupied the caves only during certain times or seasons [20,34,38,70,89]. Due to this discontinuous occupation behavior, many caves were alternately inhabited by humans and cave bears [35][36][37].…”

Section: Seasonality Targeted Fox Hunting and Natural Death In Cavesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Especially small predators such as foxes could be one of these cases, considering the ability that both Arctic and red foxes (Vulpes lagopus and Vulpes vulpes) have to exploit the leftovers of other predators, including humans [8][9][10][11][12][13][14]. It is interesting to note that fox remains are often found in archaeological sites of the Late Pleistocene all over Europe [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22]. To test the hypothesis that fox diet could have been influenced by subsidies from prehistoric hunter-gatherers, we used stable isotopic tracking of bone collagen in Middle and Upper Palaeolithic fossil bones from the Swabian Jura (southwestern Germany), documenting the replacement of Neanderthals (Middle Palaeolithic) by modern humans (Upper Palaeolithic).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The early Upper Palaeolithic is represented by the Aurignacian, dated from 42,000 to 34,000 cal BP [28][29][30][31] and the Gravettian, dated from 34,000 to 30,000 cal BP [28,32,33] in the Swabian Jura. Most of the pre-LGM sites (periods preceding the last glacial maximum) in the Swabian Jura are dominated by faunal remains of cave bear and ungulates [20,[34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41]. The relative abundance of skeletal remains of different species does not necessarily reflect the intensity of faunal exploitation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Fox dietary ecology as a tracer of human impact on Pleistocene ecosystems

et al. 2020

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Nowadays, opportunistic small predators, such as foxes (Vulpes vulpes and Vulpes lagopus), are well known to be very adaptable to human modified ecosystems. However, the timing of the start of this phenomenon in terms of human impact on ecosystems and of the implications for foxes has hardly been studied. We hypothesize that foxes can be used as an indicator of past human impact on ecosystems, as a reflection of population densities and consequently to track back the influence of humans on the Pleistocene environment. To test this hypothesis, we used stable isotope analysis (δ 13 C, δ 15 N) of bone collagen extracted from faunal remains from several archaeological sites located in the Swabian Jura (southwest Germany) and covering a time range over three important cultural periods, namely the Middle Palaeolithic (older than 42,000 years ago) attributed to Neanderthals, and the early Upper Palaeolithic periods Aurignacian and Gravettian (42,000 to 30,000 years ago) attributed to modern humans. We then ran Bayesian statistic systems (SIBER, mixSIAR) to reconstruct the trophic niches and diets of Pleistocene foxes. We observed that during the Middle Palaeolithic period, when Neanderthals sparsely populated the Swabian Jura, the niches occupied by foxes suggest a natural trophic behavior. In contrast, during the early Upper Palaeolithic periods, a new trophic fox niche appeared, characterized by a restricted diet on reindeer. This trophic niche could be due to the consumption of human subsidies related to a higher human population density and the resulting higher impact on the Pleistocene environment by modern humans compared to Neanderthals. Furthermore, our study suggests that, a synanthropic commensal behavior of foxes started already in the Aurignacian, around 42,000 years ago.

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The Importance of Fish, Fowl and Small Mammals in the Paleolithic Diet of the Swabian Jura, Southwestern Germany

Cited by 25 publications

References 31 publications

The First Appearance of Hucho (Salmonidae) in the Fossil Record of Eastern Europe

The First Appearance of Hucho (Salmonidae) in the Fossil Record of Eastern Europe

Dental calculus indicates widespread plant use within the stable Neanderthal dietary niche

Fox dietary ecology as a tracer of human impact on Pleistocene ecosystems

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