Where to and What For?

Abstract

Although it may seem paradoxical, the mobility patterns of nomadic Paleolithic hunter-gatherer groups are usually discerned based on the study of a single, static site. By statistically analysing patterns of lithic procurement at the Gravettian camp of Ametzagaina (Basque Country), we attempt to interpret how different raw material types infl uenced mobility and technological preferences. In order to overcome the static view created by analyzing a single site, this study provides new methodological keys with which to approach this question. Because this site is located very near a critical corridor between France and the Iberian Peninsula at the western end of the Pyrenees, it contains lithic materials from both sides of the mountain chain. It is argued that these materials were used differently according to their original source location and their physical characteristics (e.g., quality, size, shape). This information is compared with data from other Gravettian sites across the same region and on both sides of the Western Pyrenees. T , catchment areas, and management of lithic raw materials can contribute greatly to an understanding of the mobility strategies of Paleolithic groups. Although many lithic resources may have been exchanged from group to group (Whallon 2006), such an important resource must, in most JOURNAL OF ANTHROPOLOGICAL RESEARCH

Stones in Motion: Cost units to understand flint procurement strategies during the Upper Palaeolithic in the south-western Pyrenees using GIS

“…1. It is a natural crossing area between the European continent and the Iberian Peninsula, where intense mobility of Upper Palaeolithic groups has already been noted (Arrizabalaga 2007;Arrizabalaga & Iriarte-Chiapusso 2010a;b;Arrizabalaga et al 2013;Arrizabalaga et al 2014).…”

“…From the beginning of the Upper Palaeolithic an intensive and systematic use of the three varieties of flint considered in this paper has been demonstrated (Tarriño 2006). On a broader scale, procurement frequently also included varieties located on the northern side of the Pyrenees (e.g., Tarriño 2011a;b;Arrizabalaga et al 2014). Extraordinarily certain types, coming from up to 300 kilometres away, have been identified (Corchón et al 2009).…”

Piecing together a new mosaic: Gravettian lithic resources and economic territories in the Western Pyrenees

“…In this sense, the lack of information alluded to above has been palliated through the study of levels that had not been considered in this aspect before, at the sites of Amalda, Usategi and Gatzarria, and important sites for which only preliminary data was available, like Bolinkoba (Tarriño and Aguirre 1997). These have been complemented by the assemblages from Ametzagaina, researched by the present authors a few years ago (Arrizabalaga et al 2014), and Aitzbitarte III, studied by Tarriño (2011), which have been restudied here by increasing the sample from each level considerably.…”

“…Furthermore, the relation between raw material data and typological, technological, typometric and use-wear information is allowing the determination of their management and use patterns (e.g. Rios-Garaizar 2012; Arrizabalaga et al 2014;García-Rojas 2014;Calvo 2019;Calvo et al 2019;Prieto et al 2020).…”

“…The second objective was to explore the economic organisation of the territory by the communities that inhabited in the Western Pyrenees during that long period. Although territoriality has been approached in this geographic and chronological framework through other archaeological evidence, it has rarely been based on the lithic resources (Barandiarán 1980;Foucher 2004;Arrizabalaga et al 2014;Simonet 2017).…”