The Middle Palaeolithic from Belgium: Chronostratigraphy, territorial management and culture on a mosaic of contrasting environments

The Late Neandertal permanent lower left third premolar from Walou Cave (Trooz, Belgium) and its context

“…The Belgian Meuse Basin is of high interest when studying the MUPT as well as the replacement of Neandertals by early modern humans. Firstly, this small area has yielded dozens of archeological sites from this period (Di Modica et al, ; Flas, ). Secondly, it is rich in hominin remains.…”

“…From an archeological perspective, the most recent Middle Paleolithic occupations of the area date back to 40–38,000 BP (Di Modica, Toussaint, Abrams, & Pirson, ). The earliest reliable ages of the Belgian Aurignacian are around 33,500–32,000 BP (Flas, ).…”

Comparison of maxillary first molar occlusal outlines of Neandertals from the Meuse River Basin of Belgium using elliptical Fourier analysis

“…The taphonomic context of Engis 2 is poorly known owing to its discovery in the winter of 1829-1830, prior to the development of precise excavation techniques (Twiesselmann 1971;Semal et al 2013;Toussaint and Pirson 2006;Toussiant et al 2011). Radiocarbon dates of 26,830 ± 430 and 30,460 ± 210 years BP from the parietal bone are believed to be too recent, and do not accord with the artifact assemblage (Toussaint and Pirson 2006;Toussaint et al 2011;Di Modica et al 2016). Engis 2 includes a calvarium and an isolated maxillary fragment of a child aged 4-5 years (Tillier 1983;Toussaint and Pirson 2006;Williams 2013), and is associated with an unworn, probably unerupted, right maxillary permanent first molar ( Fig.…”

“…The MIS 3 deposits contained black pigments and the remains of burnt animal bones, but no Neandertal fossils have been discovered (Bonjean et al 2015). The Neandertal child from MIS 5, Scladina 1-4A, was dated using gamma-spectrometry to circa 127 kyr; although, using a chronostratigraphic framework and the Greenland Record as context, it is likely that the Scladina 1-4A Neandertal is either from MIS 5a circa 80 kyr or MIS 5b circa 87 kyr Di Modica et al 2016). Scladina 4A-4 is the right maxillary permanent first molar of Scladina 1-4A (Bonjean et al 2011;Toussaint 2014b) (Fig.…”

“…La Quina cave, where this artifact complex was originally described, has multiple beds containing a sequence of anthropogenic deposits from Middle to Upper Paleolithic levels (Debénath and Jelinek 1998) and includes the well-known La Quina 5 remains (Petite-Marie et al 1971). Middle Paleolithic peoples of the Meuse basin of Belgium and Southwest France both favored caves which were exploited seasonally by group members, although short-term encampments were also utilized to hunt, forage and procure locally available resources and raw lithic material (Daujeard et al 2016;Di Modica et al 2016). These two core areas may represent relatively stable populations with only episodic contact with groups from remote areas.…”