Ekain: rib made into a bird... and other findings at Ekain

So good for Yaveh and Adam and all that junk of the Hebrew/Sumerian mythology, here is what you can really do with a rib, after eating the succulent meat around:



This is the most recent noticeable finding at the cave of Ekain (Gipuzkoa, Basque Country), which is World Heritage (per UNESCO) since 2008. It is worked on a bovid's rib and dated to c. 13,900 years ago (Magdalenian period).

The bird has appeared within a thin Middle Magdalenian layer that complements the much thicker Early and Late Magdalenian ones, already known from previous digs. Altuna explains that this layer is specially relevant because in this period the relations with Aquitaine were very intense, unlike in the other Magdalenian stages.

This piece indicates an important communication, not merely technological as with the use of flint but also cultural with artworks.

Crystals

Another notable finding of this year's excavation campaigns has been a large number of rock crystals in a small space (30 cm around), maybe once being part of a collar or, as the researchers suggest, being kept at a bag (for magical reasons?) What is clear in this case is that the people living at Ekain collected and brought together these natural beauties for aesthetic and maybe other related reasons.


Neolithic burial

Importantly, this campaign has also produced a Neolithic burial: a young child 6-7 years old with pottery fragments that have been dated to c. 5000 years ago. We can say we have seen the weeping at Ekain's entrance, declared Altuna on this finding. No Neolithic was known in this cave before.



Ekain

Ekain, looking to the Urola valley, was first excavated in 1969 by the now quasi-mythical archaeologist J. M. Barandiaran, the father of Basque Prehistory, and current lead researcher Jesús Altuna, producing a rich record of Magdalenian period specially, including some of the most beautiful mural galleries of the Pleistocene.


The name Ekain now means only June (the month) but shares the possible root *eka- with words like ekaitz (storm), ekandu (habit, custom, to get used, to become integrated) and ekarri (to bring). Another (or an extended variant) possible root *ek- is found in words like eki (the East, the Sun), ekin (to do persistently, to insist) and ekoitz (to produce). However it's likely that the phonetic distinction between /k/ and /g/ was still non-existent, so if we'd want to be comprehensive we should also consider words like egin (to do), egi (edge, limit, truth), egun (day) or egon (to be - in/at/on somewhere).

While Ekain is closed to the public, you can visit the high fidelity neocave Ekainberri (New Ekain), possibly the most complete one of its kind.

Sources: Diario Vasco, Pileta de Prehistoria (both in Spanish).

See also: Ekain at Leherensuge.

The strange case of the Glozel findings.

I just now have got to know about this confuse issue of never proven alleged archaeological forgery at Glozel, at the outskirts from Vichy, central France.

It looks quite intriguing.

And the death last month of the main actor, Emile Fradin, at the venerable age of 102 years, seems to have triggered renewed interest for the issue.

Emile Fradin

Via Archaeology in Europe, I found this article at The Age. The case for a barely literate peasant under 20 years of age to have forged all those artifacts looks extremely unbelievable, more so when he never made real money of them, rejecting all offers of purchase of his findings.

The findings, if real, would seem some sort of secret collection: they were organized in shelves and they include items from three different types and periods (per the analysis of F. Henri in 1972): engraved bones from 17-15,000 BP (early Magdalenian), pottery is from 5,000 years ago (Chalcolithic) and the written clay tablets are from some 2500 years ago (barely pre-Celtic).

The engraved bones certainly look Magdalenian-like.

The inscriptions remind, with some differences, the Iberian script. At least they are within the context of early Mediterranean scripts.

However why all these materials had been gathered together into a single mysterious collection appears to have no explanation than the site being the hoard of some early archaeologist of Antiquity or the Middle Ages (the Templars have been speculated about, as usual, but the lack of Christian iconography makes this unlikely in my opinion).

Sources:
- Tejiendo el mundo[es] (from where I borrowed the images)
- Musée de Glozet [fr]

Praileaitz will not get enough protection.

The (now undemocratic) West Basque government has decreed that the Magdalenian site of Praileaitz will have only a minimal 65 meters perimeter of protection from the activities of the quarry, well below the 100 meters asked by the government of Gipuzkoa, not to mention the 500 m. that Jean Clottes demanded.

The explosions of the quarry can well damage the cave, that includes some Magdalenian art, and there is an unexplored gallery that will get no protection whatsoever.

Source: Gara.

R1b1b2 and R1b1b2a1 distinct STR diversity

I'm borrowing here the work of Aargiedude (again) because it's such a priceless addition that it really deserves to be paid some attention. If professional geneticists would be half as serious as this amateur, we'd know a lot more and a lot better about our the population history of humankind by now.

These two maps represent the haplotype diversity of R1b1b2a1 (ht15) and R1b1b2* (ht35) respectively:

Click to expand

Aargiedude's own observations at Dienekes' blog follow:

I've finished estimating ht15 and ht35 diversity, it's taken me 2 days to do this, and I think the results are amazing. The diversity clines of ht15 and ht35 are almost polar opposites. I think these results seriously call into question the conclusion of the Balaresque study, which is what prompted me to look into this. There's no surfing-on-an-expanding-wave phenomenon occuring with ht15. It has its lowest variance in the supposed origination point: Anatolia.

Instead, as Maju pointed out brilliantly, the study's tree diagram of their R1b1b2 haplotypes seems the result of 2 separate events, not a single wave diffusion. And he was absolutely right.

The diversity of ht35 doesn't form a gradually decreasing cline. It seems to be uniformly similar from Iran to west Iberia, or at least up to Italy, because there are issues with the validity of the North African and Iberian data (small sample size in one case and confusion with ht15 samples, in the other). Its cline seems to be more north-south than diagonally from southwest to northeast. East European countries have the same ht35 diversity as West Europe, with the special consideration of the west Iberian results.

Some technical details to keep in mind. Ht15 can be differentiated from ht35 by barely 2 markers: 393 and 461. Few studies test 461, so most of the samples I used were chosen on the basis of 393 alone. But about 3% of ht15 and 10% of ht35 have the "wrong" value, becoming confused with the other group. This usually doesn't matter, exceot in countries where there is an overwhelming ratio difference between the frequencies of both groups, such as in Iberia, France, Britain, Netherlands, Anatolia, and the Levant. In these extreme cases, I've included, where possible, 2 pair of results. The top pair uses samples predicted as narrowly as possible, by using both 393 and 461. The bottom pair is the standard prediction using just 393. The top pair should be more accurate, but they tend to lack in sample size, so then again, maybe not. Notice in the case of Iberia, that the less restrictive result changes drastically from the more restrictive result, and results in identical values to Iberia's ht15 diversity estimate, suggesting most of the samples are in fact ht15 samples that are being confused for ht35 because they had a mutation in 393 to the modal value of ht35 on that marker. Curiously, this didn't happen in France, where I was only able to use the less accurate method (393 alone), and yet the result is notably low and different from France's ht15 diversity. I'd seriously take North Africa's high ht35 result (0,30) with a military-issue teaspoon of salt, it's just 5 samples. On the other hand, it's notoriously high ht15 diversity (0,28) is pretty solid.

To recap, Baralesque and all geneticists are stuck in a time warp, they're back in 2003, thinking R1b is just R1b. What a waste, after going through all the effort of collecting and processing the samples, to not have had the sense to test for a few extra key mutations that define some major subdivisions of R1b1b2 and are well known for more than 5 years. The conclusions they reached would then have been very different.

The Balaresque paper was discussed at Leherensuge a few days ago.

R1b1b2a1: Neolithic or what?

I found at Dienekes the reference of a new paper on R1b1b2, focused on demonstrating (quite forcibly) that the lineage is Neolithic and not Paleolithic. Dienekes is, of course, happy that they chose to use his favorite (but rather disliked in the field) molecular clock methodology: the one based on the pedigree mutation rate, which make all haplogroups look extremely recent.

Patricia Balaresque et al. A Predominantly Neolithic Origin for European Paternal Haplogroups. PLoS Biology 2010. Open access. I'm provding a link to PubMed Central because at the time of writing this the original link remained broken.

I am not really happy: the pedigree rate can't be used for ages older than 5000 years (and all dates reported in this paper are clearly older) and, anyhow, the highly hypothetical molecular clock methodologies are anything but helpful when they become the main theme of a "research" paper.

I am not happy either because instead of using the already known SNP-based phylogeny of the haplogroup, they choose to treat the whole haplogroup as a single amorphous clade, when it is clearly structured. This isn't very helpful either.

Finally I am not happy either because they treat (again) the process of Neolithic spread in Europe as a single phenomenon, when it is in fact a complex array of various cultures, notably two different main vectors: one via the Morava-Danube and another via the Mediterranean coast. Both with origins not in Anatolia directly but in the Balcans. They ignore all these archaeological facts rather insultingly.

However for those who like to dig in the raw data, instead of just jumping to the too often biased and misleading conclusions, the paper still has some interest.

Notably I found figure 3 (haplotype structure) quite interesting. Here you have it with a crucial annotation for better understanding:

Click to expand

The crucial annotation is of course marking (with a dark red line) what is not part of R1b1b2a1, which is, as you can see a single branch of the star-like structure, but, unlike the others, is clearly not part of the fundamentally European haplogroup R1b1b2a1. Part of it is at the root of R1b1b2 and R1b1b2a but the rest of sub-branches must be derived, representing a distinct process centered in Turkey and nearby areas.

I dwelt on this matter in a previous post, so I'm not going to go all over it again here. Just for a quick reference a copy of the graph I posted then, showing major haplotypes and their relation with the various layers of the haplogroup:

Click to expand. Based on Alonso-2005.
DYS are 19-390-391-392-393.

As you can easily see most of the Turkish diversity belongs to the R1b1b2(xR1b1b2a1) part of the haplogroup structure. And sure I don't doubt that Anatolia or somewhere nearby is at the ultimate origin of R1b1b2. But there is a sharp distinction between that and what we find in Europe, which almost exclusively belongs to R1b1b2a1, a very specific sublineage.

And a sublineage that is very much ramified in a star-like structure, implying rapid demic expansion. When? That is not really the crucial issue as I see it. "Where?" should be the first question and a question that no paper has yet dealt with from the viewpoint of R1b1b2a1 on its own right.

In the past the lack of knowledge of the structure of the haplogroup may have served as excuse but not anymore. In fact any self-respecting geneticist should look at that SNP-based structure before dealing with STR-based haplotypes and take good notice of the distinctions.

And, if not, why not to include R1b1b1 (Central Asian) or even R1b1a (Italy and Africa mostly) and other R1b*? It is an arbitrary choice, poorly justified.

But, well, what do we get from this data set after we scrap off the extreme bias? For those who enjoy dealing with haplotypes in detail there is a long list in the supplementary material, which duly processed may provide very useful information.

I have not the time nor the resources to do that, so I have done something much simpler but also very informative: count the haplotypes by region as defined in figure 3 (above). Sadly France (incl. Basques), Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, England (incl. Cornwall) and Ireland are all dumped together in the category "other" ("West Europe" hereafter). Unlike the authors I do make the important distinction of what is R1b1b2a1 and what is not.

Follows the number of haplotypes by region and phylogenetic category (manual count so subject to minor error maybe):

R1b1b2(xR1b1b2a1):

• Turkey: 37
• West Europe: 20
• Iberia: 8
• Balcans: 2
• Italy: none

R1b1b2a1:

• West Europe: 198
• Iberia: 90
• Turkey: 13
• Italy: 11
• Balcans: 6

What does this say? That even between perfectly comparable regions such as Turkey, Italy and Iberia, the highest diversity for R1b1b2a1 is in the West. If you look again at figure 3 you'll notice that most Turkish haplotypes of this clade are derived from European ones, what implies back-migration after the formation and spread of R1b1b2a1, which must have happened in Western or Central Europe.

When did this happen? I am not sure but I have some things clear:

The structure of R1b1b2 does not correspond at all with what one would expect from a demic spread from the Balcans (not Anatolia directly) through two clearly distinct pathways, one to the Danube and Central Europe and the other through Italy to SE France and Iberia. Neither the Balcans nor Italy look particularly central nor we see two differentiated founder effects but only one.

Also the distribution of R1b1b2a1 in a cline that is, as the authors of this paper shamelessly admit, totally the inverse of what one could expect of a demic spread from SE Europe.

The structure of R1b1b2a1 in fact strongly suggests a spread from somewhere in the region described as "Other" and or Iberia, i.e. in Magdalenian Europe. This is in full agreement with the generally accepted theory that R1b1b2a1 spread from the Franco Cantabrian region after the Last Glacial Maximum, along with Magdalenian culture. It could have other explanations (Epipaleolithic flows, older Upper Paleolithic cultural dispersals like Gravettian or Aurignacian) but it just cannot fit within a Neolithic frame. No way!

How did it back-migrate to Anatolia? Possibly with the people who carried the rock art fashion to southern Turkey (Beldibi), which may have an offshoot also at Egypt, where some R1b1b2 is also found, as well as related haplogroup R1b1a. The exact process is still somewhat uncertain anyhow.

Sadly enough the authors have missed an opportunity to analyze the regional structure of this haplogroup in Europe. Hopefully someone else will eventually do it, helping to clarify the matter. The raw data is anyhow there for whoever wants to do it.


Update: a much more realistic geographic analysis of the diversity at the two different phylogenetic levels (by Aargiedude) can be found at this new post.

Santimamiñe: new data

Just a brief note while I gather more information.

Pileta en Blogger informs that the cave of Santimamiñe (Biscay, Basque Country) has seen further research, that have uncovered new Magdalenian harpoons and other materials. Interestingly it seems that mitochondrial DNA analysis of ancient dwellers are in course.

The entry includes a video from EiTB (Western Basque public TV) in Spanish language, that at the moment I have no idea how to embed here.

My paternal family comes from that area and a visit to the cave when I was a kid (now it's closed except for few guided visits) no doubt triggered my fascination for everything Paleolithic, so I am always interested in this site in particular, which includes one of the most extensive habitation sequences of Europe: from Chatelperronian to the Iron Age.

Major archaeology news from Britain and Ireland

Via Archaeology in Europe, a most interesting blog I only recently discovered.


Megalithic "cathedral" discovered in Orkney.

Apparently part of the huge complex, possibly of religious relevance, found in Orkney (including the Ring of Brodgar and the Stones of Stennes) a huge building of 82x65 feet (approx. 26x21 meters), dated to c. 3000 BCE, has been unearthed at Orkney at the Ness of Brodgar site. The walls, some 16 ft thick (5 m) stand still to up one meter and must have been much higher in the past.

The building includes a cross-shaped "sanctum", including stone furniture, a surrounding paved outer passage, and an unusual menhir or standing stone split by a hole with an hour-glass shape.

In the same area a large wall, dubbed "the Great Wall of Brodgar", was discovered last year. The whole site is thought as huge religious complex of some sort.

Read more at News.Scotsman.

For more complete information on the archaeological research, Toos, points me to Orknejar.

Precisely I was discussing this matter a few weeks ago with my apartment mate. My question was basically: what the heck was doing such a huge temple in such a remote place? For him the religious and maybe astronomical reasons were enough, while I feel the need to find a more materialist explanation such as cod fisheries (sometimes claimed to be the culprit of Megalithic expansion) or even strategic reasons (would control the northern sea route). Naturally both explanations are not contradictory.


Other news are:

• Oldest British Neolithic home, 9000 years old, found at the Isle of Man. Read more at Daily Mail.
• Oldest Scottish settlements at Biggar, from 14,000 years ago, throughtly digged thanks to massive volunteer assistance. Read more at Hamilton Advertiser.
• Neolithic (Chalcolithic by pan-European standards) settlement at Derry is 5000 years old. Read more at Derry Journal.

An update: as this post goes about British Neolithic archaeology, it's worth noting that there has been yet another discovery, this one in London: a timber platform pathway apparently used by the locals to cross a peat bog at the Thames has been dated to almost 6000 years ago. A similar structure dating to c. 5000 years ago was already known. Read more at Science Daily.
.

The oldest map of Western Europe

The oldest map of Western Europe has 13,660 years (C14) and represents the area of Arraitz in Northern Navarre.

It was engraved in a rock block by people of Magdalenian culture and has now been deciphered as such map, representing the local streams, mountains and some circles that probably represent areas which became swamps seasonally.

The rock map, a drawing of it and an interpretation with legend in German

The cave in which it was found is Abauntz Lamizulo, literally the hole of the lamias (mythological bird-footed nymphs) of Abauntz. It is rather to the south of the Magdalenian exploited area what may mean they used it seasonally or even just some good years, hence the importance of keeping a record of the geography, I guess.

The map also shows an engraved female deer and a deer head. Another block has an engraved horse head. These two blocks, property now of the Museum of Navarre, have bee temporarily ceded to the University of Zaragoza for their study.

In all Europe there are only two older known maps: these were found in Moravia engraved in bone.

The cave of Abauntz Lamizulo was surely a strategical location for Magdalenian hunter-gatherers. It discretly dominates the canyon under it, which the animals that lived in the rich valley of Zaldazain, like the now extinct aurochs, had to cross necessarily.

Sources: Gara, Pileta de Prehistoria.
Research paper: P. Utrilla et al., A palaeolithic map from 13,660 calBP: engraved stone blocks from the Late Magdalenian in Abauntz Cave (Navarra, Spain). Journal of Human Evolution, 2009 (paywall).
.

Magdalenian artifacts found in Scotland

Flint tools have been discovered near Biggar, South Lanarkshire, Scotland. They are very similar to the ones used in the Netherlands and Northern Germany c. 14-12,000 years ago, in the Magdalenian period. This suggests that their users could have originated in that area and crossed through what is now the North Sea, then above sea level (Doggerland).

If the datation could be confirmed, it would mean pushing back the earliest known inhabitation of Scotland by humans more than 3000 years. Before this finding the oldest known human settlements in the country were dated to c. 8500 BP, in the Epipaleolithic period.

Source: BBC.
.

Around the Web: European UP people and dogs

Magdalenian Faces.- Tim at remote central, makes a nice review of the Magdalenian portraits of La Marche and other sites, their history and their striking modernity.

Aurignacian dogs.- Several blogs touch this issue recently: I found it first at Anthropology.net but Dienekes and John Hawks also adress the matter of ancient domestic dogs. It seems that Aurignacian people already had dogs and that these were alredy somewhat different from their wild ancestors (wolves).

In relation with these issues, I'd thank if anybody could provide some nice info on the forgotten issue of Magdalenian domestic (?) horses. Anticipated thanks.

Two genes cause baldness among Caucasoids

There's a lot of talk about founder effects for blond hair, blue eyes or lactose tolerance... but what about baldness? Actually that is also largely in the genes: an X chromosome gene was already known and now another alelle in chromosme 20 has been discovered. These two are much more common apparently among Caucasoids (or Western Eurasians) than among other populations, causing that one male out of seven (14%) has severe problems of baldness.

The research paper by J.B. Richards et al. has been published in Nature (behind paywall) and mentioned in Science Daily.

What I wonder is, in the field of population genetics, who were the founders of these dynasties of bald people. They were pretty succesful founding parents certainly, in spite of their aesthetic disadvantage (certainly not any major adaptative problem, specially if you know of hats).

An interesting note is that Magdalenian people already depicted some of them as bald. This is something I had not thought about before but one of the series of Magdalenian portraits from La Marche is clearly missing hair:

Image taken from BBC, found thanks to Tim.
Was he the founding father of bald people?

Ekain 'neocave' inaugurated

Western Basque and Gipuzkoan authorities inaugurated yesterday the replica of Ekain cave, at Zestoa (Gipuzkoa).

The artificial cave, named Ekainberri ('New Ekain') will allow visitors to enjoy one of the most fascinating Upper Paleolithic sites in Europe, including of course its unique mural art, described by Leroi-Gourham as the most perfect horse composition of Quaternary art.

After the opening of the replica of Santimamiñe last year, Ekain is the second Basque Paleolithic cave to open such neocave for visitors. Both sites, together with less-known Altxerri cave, are nominated to become World Heritage sites by UNESCO.

Ekainberri will be open to the public since tomorrow and the entrance will cost 5 euros (4 for retired people and minors).

Source: Gara.

For further info check this previous post.

Some good news for Basque Paleolithic art

First, three Basque caves have been nominated to become Wolrd Heritage sites via UNESCO. They will be (almost naturally, I think), Santimamiñe and Ekain, plus a maybe arguable choice: Altxerri. The nomination of these caves is part of larger plan to include many Franco-Cantabrian sites in that list, but this time at least, only those in the Spanish side of the border.

Second, the artificial copy of Ekain, the neocave, will finally open in September. Then we will be again able to watch those beautiful horses, even if in their 21st century version.

Ekain, in western Gipuzkoa, has yielded some remains of the Chatelperronian but its fame comes from the Magdalenian period, including paintings like the ones above. The total list of figures in Ekain is over the hundred items.

Santimamiñe, in mid-eastern Biscay, has instead a very complete record of all the Upper Paleolithic and afterwards until as late as the Iron Age. It has a small hidden paintings room, with bisons surrounding a horse, plus other figures in different places totalling some 50 items. I had the inspiring fortune of visiting this cave when I was a child but nowadays it is closed and has been carefully restored after many decades of being open, suffering in consequence.

Instead, a 3D replica has been opened recently in the hermit on top of the same hill, where one can also appreciate from a privileged view the beautiful landscape these people (and my own ancesors later as well) lived in (of course the coastline is not the same one as in Paleolithic times).

Finally Altxerri, in coastal central Gipuzkoa is a less known cave, as it is closed not just to the public but also quite restricted to researchers, due to its unstability. The dates for this cave are of the late Magdalenian and the dominant figure is the bison.

Location of the five sites of Paleolithic art of the Western Basque Country

Source: Gara and the Basque Government sites linked in-text (specially for the images).

Praileaitz, Paleolithic art in danger

I have been writting in Archaeo Forums on this issue. Please take a look.

Briefly: the cave of Praileaitz is a very original Paleolithic (probably Magdalenian) site in the Western Basque Country (Deba, Gipuzkoa), where unusual portable art and some abstract mural art has been found. It is believed that some sort of witch or shaman lived there and has been therefore nicknamed "the Shaman's Cave".

Unusual large bead that has been suggested to be an abstract "Venus"

The cave (as well as other caves in the same hill, some of which of archaeological value) are in extreme danger because of the activities of a quarry. The autonomous government has issued a very limited protection decree that only forbids quarry activities in 50 m. around the cave and explossions in 100 m. Enviromentalists, expert prehistorians and other sensible people have asked repeatedly to expand this protection area or even forbid the quarry completely. But, on mere economic grounds, the government has been extremely reluctant to act in this sense.

Cave entrance

The mural art is placed on very delicate geological formations that vibrations could destroy or damage easily. The very enviroment of the cave has already been severely damaged by the activities of the quarry and another prehistoric cave in the same hill was totally destroyed decades ago by it (only an emergency dig was allowed then).

Some of the mural art

Today it has been known that prehistoric art expert Jean Clottes has asked for a protection area of 500 m.

Magdalenians did eat sea mammals.

M.P. Richards et al, Isotope evidence for the intensive use of marine foods by Late Upper Palaeolithic humans. Journal of Human Evolution, 2005 (pay per view).

Abstract

We report here on direct evidence for the intensive consumption of marine foods by anatomically modern humans at approximately 12,000 years ago. We undertook isotopic analysis of bone collagen from three humans, dating to the late Palaeolithic, from the site of Kendrick's Cave in North Wales, UK. The isotopic measurements of their bone collagen indicated that ca. 30% of their dietary protein was from marine sources, which we interpret as likely being high trophic level marine organisms such as marine mammals. This indicates that towards the end of the Pleistocene modern humans were pursuing a hunting strategy that incorporated both marine and terrestrial mammals. This is the first occurrence of the intensive use of marine resources, specifically marine mammals, that becomes even more pronounced in the subsequent Mesolithic period.

Not exactly breaking news but unknown for me to date. It relates and seems to confirm what I already commented in Magdalenian and Inuit harpoons a month ago: they were used for seal hunting or whaling, just as Inuits did until very recently.

Magdalenian and Inuit harpoons

This post has been largely inspired by A. Steenhuyse, of Anthrosite blog. Some days ago, I posted on his most intriguing mention that some Magdalenian artifacts of Isturitze cave (Low Navarre, Basque Country) were made of whale bones and that these bones were best quality to create tools that would bear impacts.

Then I wondered wether this could mean active whaling, like Inuits used to do with nothing but stone age tools. And this issue got me intrigued enough as to ask Alexandre about its likehood. And while he doesn't have a defined opinion, he has given me a most valuable piece of info that I would have probably never realized on my own: certain inuit harpoons are VERY similar to the magdalenians ones (the composite ones with detachable parts).

Bingo! Sure that there is not yet enough evidence in form of seal or whale remains but if the Isturitze ones have been in a museum for so long without anybody noticing that they were whale bones, it's possible that many others have equally remained unnoticed elsewhere. Also most coastal sites are now underwater anyhow. But the big question is, what could be those Magdalenian harpoons used for if not for seal (and inccidentally whale) hunting? They don't seem ideal for land hunting, for what spears or arrows (and traps) would be more effective, they wouldn't be of much use for fishing, as they knew of fishing hooks since the Solutrean period. What else could be the overabundant Magdalenian detachable harpoons be for?

Certainly the Bay of Biscay could well be full of seals in Ice Age, when it was the northernmost portion of European waters without permanent ice. And whales have been aboundant until historical times.

Magdalenian harpoons.

Early Inuit harpoon

More modern Inuit harpoons, showing the lines.

Something to think about, really.

-------------------

Update: Magdalenians did eat sea mammals apparently.

European Paleolithic geography

So where is Isturitz, what is Magdalenian, what the heck are you talking about?

Ok, let's recapitulate:

1. A week ago, I commented on Aurignacian origins. Aurignacian culture is believed to be the first manifestation of Homo sapiens (we and our ancestors) and it's known to have penetrated pretty fast in most of Europe, displacing the former inhabitants, the Neanderthals. I also posted a map by A. Mellars:



Aurignacians began experimenting with rudimentary art and eventually also colonized, even if sparsely, the Mediterranean shores of the Iberian peninsula.

2. Haven't yet posted on it, I think, but the next thing to happen, many thousand years later was the developement or arrival of Gravettian culture. Gravettian technology shows some correlation with Neanderthal-made Chatelperronian but it's also true that similar technologies were in use among West Asians and possibly other peoples. Earlier, when Paleolithic research was concentrated in France, it was thought that Chatelperronian and Gravettian were two phases of the same cuture (Perigordian) but this is not sustained anymore and now it's believed that Gravettian culture evolved in Central-Eastern Europe or even arrived from outside the continent (though there's lack of evidence for this yet). It is likely that the Crô-Magnon type, strictu sensu, is associated with this culture.

Gravettian is also a pan-European culture and replaced Aurignacian everywhere, even if in many places it looks intrusive (older techniques remain). In fact it reached further than Aurignacian, incorportaing Eastern Europe and even penetrating into the Caucasus and Zagros areas (West Asia) and with connections as far east as the Altai. With Gravettian art became something much more common. Some of the most fascinating examples are the venus figurines, like the one of Lespuges:

3. In Western Europe, Gravettian didn't last long alone. A new techno-culture appeared locally, the Solutrean and replaced Gravettian rather fast, specially in the Franco-Cantabrian region. Instead, in Mediterranean Iberia, Gravettian showed to be strong enough and survived in a hybrid form with Solutrean (Iberian Gravetto-Solutrean), that is probably at the origin of North-African Ibero-Maurusian culture later on.

Solutrean was therefore primarily a culture of the Franco-Cantabrian region:

The Franco-Cantabrian region
(red dots are main sites of Paleolithic art, light green are areas that were over sea level in the past, white shows glacial areas).

Gravettian also survived in Italy and Eastern Europe. Central Europe is believed by many to have been too cold to be inhabited, at least densely, in this time, as the Solutrean phase is coincident with the Last Glacial Maximum, some 20,000 years ago. Another area that was affected by this episode was the Zagros region of West Asia, where human inhabitation probably became impossible or very hazardous then.

Solutrean peoples were very advanced for their time, knowing the needle, the fishing hook and maybe even the bow and arrow. They also advanced quite a bit in art expression.

4. After some milennia, Solutrean evolved into Magdalenian locally in the Franco-Cantabrian region. While many sites with transitional industries are known, there are some questions still to answer because the Magdalenian is surprisingly similar to old Aurignacian, even if much more refined. Since c. 13,000 BP, as the greatest cold went away, Magdalenian expanded into Central Europe. It also shows signs of late expansion into Mediterranean Iberia but with a very marked Gravetization anyhow (Parpalloan) and lacking the characteristic bone tools of this industry elsewhere.

Magdalenian is, of course, best known for its magnificient mural art, though these peoples also made potable art, like their predecessors.

Horse from Lascaux cave (Franco-Cantabrian region)

And here is where the Isturitz findings fit in: Magdalenian, Franco-Cantabrian, bone tools... whale bone tools! Makes sense, right?

Where is Isturitz? Quick graphic answer:

Is that better? Hope so.

Another interesting map is this one of European Paleolithic art:

Red: mural art. Green: portable art.
Cyan thick lines: glacial maximum: areas under ice. Blue lines: ancient coastline.

It helps getting an idea of where did humans dwelt in the Upper Paleolithic. Yet the Mediterranean, even if not so dedicated to art as other areas, also had some population density probably.

Basque whaling... much older than thought.

A. Steenhuyse mentions at Anthrosite that it's been discovered that among the many Magdalenian materials of Isturitz cave (Lower Navarre) there's a bunch of whale-bone tools. It is no new finding as such but just a correct identification among old ones.

Apparently whale bones are of better quality for tools subject to impact. It is probable that they don't represent active whaling but rather were collected from beached animals but it still means that the people of Isturitz, some 50-60 km inland, were in contact with the people of the coast. and/or travelled that far to forage themselves. This is pretty obvious, specially for hunter-gatherer peoples, but still...

It's not totally impossible though that there could be active whaling anyhow. If stone-age Inuits did it, why not Basques?

Anyhow, it reminds me of the people that object to the indirect evidence of Basque whaling in the 7th century. They say that a huge shipping of whale oil to a monastery near Paris is not evidence enough of active whaling, while the ones in favor (most historians) say that the monks would not have made such a huge order from such a distant place, would not they know that the providers were reliable.

A curious historical fact is that, seemingly, medieval Basques did not like whale meat and they sold it to the French and Castilians instead. They whaled apparently only because of the blubber - and the money, of course.