ANALECTA PRAEHISTORICA LEIDENSIA

(1)

ANALECTA

PRAEHISTORICA

LEIDENSIA

(2)

(3)

(4)

(5)

ANALECTA

PRAEHISTORICA

LEIDENSIA

PUBLICATION OF THE FACULTY OF ARCHAEOLOGY

UNIVERSITY OF LEIDEN

HUNTERS OF THE GOLDEN AGE

THE MID UPPER PALAEOLITHIC OF EURASIA 30,000 - 20,000 BP

EDITED BY WIL ROEBROEKS, MARGHERITA MUSSI,

JIRI SVODOBA AND KELLY FENNEMA

(6)

This volume is dedicated to the memory of Joachim Hahn

Published in cooperation with the European Science Foundation Editorial supervision of this volume: W. Roebroeks

ISSN 0169-7447 ISBN 90-73368-16-2

Subscriptions to the series Analecta Praehistorica Leidcnsia and single volumes can be ordered exclusively at:

Faculty of Archaeology P.O. Box 9515

(7)

Yvette Taborin 10 Gravettian body ornaments in Western and

Central Europe

In the Aurignacian, the redundancy in the choice of forms, sea shells, animal teeth or formed ornaments in ivory, antler or hone, is a well-known aspect. The Gravettians reduced their choice and showed considerable variability between local groups. In the western part of France, Atlantic shells were used, while in the oriental part and also in Germany sonic mediterranean forms exist. The fossil species are present far from the sea. Fox canines and formed ornaments in ivory or soft stone are more frequent in Central Europe than in Western Europe. Except for the production of beads in scries, the gravettian people always kept the aurignacian symbolic ornaments but they diversified their fashioned ornaments in each region.

1. Introduction

The formal diversity and technical underpinnings of aurignacian personal ornaments are now well known. According to current knowledge, the Aurignacians were the first humans to develop a need for personal adornment, testifying to a cohesive society and an elaborate system of values subscribed to by all members of that society. The redundancy in the choice of forms, whether it be sea shells, animal teeth or formed ornaments in ivory, antler or bone, is astonishing. This highly selective appropriation of forms is evident from the beginning of the Aurignacian, with no period of incipiency or transition, and is a characteristic of human personal adornment up to the present.

But generations replaced each other and societies changed slowly. The power attributed to the first personal ornaments would not be forgotten, but ornaments came to express new and regionally diversifying values, and these new needs led to modifications in the choice and composition of personal ornaments.

1.1 CULTURAL VALUES OR TRIBAL FASHION? Choice, composition and manufacturing techniques are not the random result of individual taste. Rather, they are a fundamental means of communicating meaning to others. The key problem for researchers is to understand the importance of a change in species choice or qualities of formed ornaments. Is it the product of a profound evolutionary change or merely a change in local fashion?

The answer in each case depends on the distribution and quantity of new kinds of ornaments. But our knowledge is limited and an absence of certain objects does not necessarily constitute proof of their true absence. One of the difficulties inherent in the study of personal ornaments is that there is a large base of chosen forms and objects common to the entire Upper Palaeolithic and hence without precise cultural value. Moreover, increases in the overall quantity and in the diversity of forms of Upper Palaeolithic personal adornment are very uneven and their status as cultural markers can only be evaluated in relation to the lithic assemblages with which they are associated. It is indeed worth noting that

transformations in lithic industries and art/ornamental repertoires have different tempos and rhythms.

The only sound research approach is one which establishes differences through time with respect to a traditional 'fund' of ornaments, the basic source of which is the Aurignacian. When in turn these differences stabilise over several generations, they express a sufficiently stable and original corpus that can serve as a partial basis for defining a new culture. The approach then is to demonstrate a suite of consistent differences with respect to the preceding culture, even if the tradition emanating from this preceding culture is still alive and well.

Fortunately, new objects and forms of personal

ornamentation render it possible to identify ensembles that are more fine-grained than the overall cultural division. Often their production is heavily concentrated in a given region (territory) where a group has distanced itself from its cultural predecessors. Essentially, personal ornaments, the final purpose of which is the expression of values, inform us directly about the field of ideas within a group, with the same sensitivity as art but with fewer means of expression. This recognition allows us to ask questions of personal ornaments that relate more to the identification of groups than of cultures.

The long period falling roughly between 30,000 and 20,000 bp saw the transition from the last Aurignacians to the first Gravettians, and then a long-lasting gravettian period that was relatively homogeneous in its style of lithic

(10)

136 HUNTERS OF THE GOLDEN AGE

1 cm

Fig. 1. Mediterranean seashells: Cyclope neritea L.

quasi-contemporaneous groups evolving in different directions.

Two questions are obvious: first, how were ornamental traditions maintained, and second, what is the role of creativity? These two domains must be approached by the category of personal ornaments because their production is subject to different material parameters (availability of raw materials; technical difficulty) according to the type of object.

2. Shell ornaments: 30,000 to 20,000 bp Of all personal ornaments, those of shell are most dependent on local availability, the presence of contemporary marine shorelines or fossil outcrops. In my opinion, in rare cases these long-distance movements attest to inter-tribal relations founded on needs other than for shells. The continued existence of the aurignacian tradition in shell ornaments and of the role of innovation can only be appreciated region by region. 2.1 REGIONS CLOSE TO MARINE SHORELINES

What is it that changes over the course of millennia? Firstly, the surface temperature of the ocean, which cools later than that of the continents, and the oceans' salinity which increases with the expansion of the continental ice sheets. The marine shorelines retreat, slightly in the Mediterranean and greatly on the Atlantic coast. There is no indication of significant modifications in the composition of the malacofauna. The traditional species selected by the first Aurignacians are still present. However, around 20,000 bp

the most cold-sensitive Mediterranean species, such as Homalopoma sanguineus and Cypraea sp., migrated to more southerly zones, which explains their rarity in the ornaments of that period.

The choice of certain species in which to invest meaning originates in aurignacian groups in the Mediterranean zone. From the most archaic Aurignacian, we find the same perforated species at Ksar-'Aqil in the Near East, at La Cala and Fumane in Italy, at Tournal in France, and at Romani in Spain: Homalopoma sanguineus L., Trivia europea Mtg., Columbella rustica L., and Cypraea sp. are often associated with Cyclope neritea L. in aurignacian ornamental

assemblages. These species maintain their symbolic

importance until the end of the Upper Palaeolithic and some, like Trivia, Cypraea and Columbella rustica, were still sought after by post-glacial peoples (Taborin 1993a, 1997).

The best example of a relationship between Upper Palaeolithic men and the sea comes from the Ligurian culture in Italy, for instance in certain levels of the Grimaldi caves (Mussi 1995). It is the only example demonstrating a development in shell ornaments in coastal populations. It is of course possible that many archaeological sites located on other coastal lines have existed, especially on the Atlantic plateau. With the rise of the sea level, those sites disappeared and thus became inaccessible.

As well as keeping ancestral traditions of shell ornaments, the palaeolithic Ligurian groups gave a special and important role to a classic species of shell: the little Cyclope neritea, which the Aurignacians had already imbued with a symbolic sense, becomes dominant in corporal ornaments. Caps, necklaces and bracelets were composed of hundreds of Cyclope neritea which were sewn or threaded.

Consequently, one can wonder if the abundance and the easy access to the sources of one shell species is a factor of modification of symbolic sense. A similar case is known from Central Europe where gravettian people, located near a fossil shell level, gathered and used many of these for corporal ornaments. And in Sungir', where there was no access to shells, ivory beads were used and arranged in the manner of Western Eurpean shell ornaments.

Following Roland Barthes' ideas (1967), the meaning of an object (in French: 'le signifiant') is less important than the symbolic sense (in French: 'le signifié'). It is therefore legitimate to think that the same symbolic sense can apply to different types of ornaments. However, in the case of Ligurian ornaments, the proliferation of one shell species can lead one to think that it may express a variety of symbolic senses.

(11)

137 > M i II TAI« IRIN (IRAVH'ITIAN BODY ORNAMENTS along the impressive accumulation of Cyclope neriteae.

Some ivory beads are interesting because their claviform shape is inspired by red deer vestigial canines or Cypraea. The most beautiful examples come from the Arene Candide young man (Giacobini and Malerba 1995). He was wearing four claviform pendants, one near his head, one on his left wrist, and the others near both his knees. Two of the most accomplished beads are very close in shape and decoration to the niagdalenian ivory beads of La Marche. This is the best example of continuity and universality of symbolic thought. Despite the rarity of this type of small pendant in the European Upper Palaeolithic, one can see that they were always appreciated.

Thus one can see small changes in the symbolic sense of Ligurian ornaments when compared to the traditional aurignacian one. None of the ornamental objects is new, not even the small ivory or bone pendants. What defines and identifies the Ligurian group for the author is the intensive use of Cyclope neritea. This original choice is certainly a good way to define a unity of thought in a local palaeolithic group (Mussi 1992).

The Gravettians-lnitial Epigravettians of the rest of Italy do not seem to have had the same commitment to Cyclope neritea, nor in fact, to shell ornaments in general (except the woman from Ostuni 1; Coppola and Vacca 1995). We thus note in Barma Grande and Arene Candide a type of orna-mentation in the ancestral tradition, but with modifications that can be interpreted as local fashion, rather than any kind of cultural evolution.

In the French Atlantic zone, perigordian groups had access to shells from both ocean shorelines and fossil outcrops in the Aquitaine basin. It is possible that the distance of 200-300 km for the Périgord-Lot cluster made provisioning more difficult. This is however not the case for Isturitz, where the Atlantic shoreline component is abundant. The species chosen for ornamentation are predominantly gastropods and dentalia living on the contemporary Atlantic coast. Diversity is very restrained. From most to least abundant: Littorina obtusata L., Dentalium sp., Nucella lapillus L., Hinia reticulata L. and Littorina littorea L. These five forms constitute the base but there are other infrequent species, some from the Mediterranean such as Cyclope neritea, Sphaeronassa mutabilis L., Cypraea sp.. Semicassis saburon Bru., and others just as infrequent that come from the Miocene outcrops of the Aquitaine basin, such as Turritella terebralis Link., Mitraria salomensis Mayer, Tympanotonos margaritaceus Brocchi (Taborin 1993b).

The Perigordians of the Atlantic region thus maintained relations with the Mediterranean in an episodic way, but they primarily exploited the Atlantic coast where they selected a small number of species. To get to and from the contempo-rary beaches, they crossed the Miocene outcrops, and on

occasions collected fossil species of similar form to the living species that they recovered on the beach.

Is it possible to identify distinct characteristics of the Perigordian with respect to their aurignacian predecessors living in the same regions and exploiting the same shell sources? The aurignacian choice of shell species for ornamentation is much more open-ended. The five dominant species are, in order of frequency: Littorina obtusata, Littorina littorea, Dentalium, Nucella lapillus and Hinia reticulata. But there are also significant quantities of Natica, Turritella, Trivia europea, and Littorina saxatilis Olivi. The Mediterranean component is more abundant and varied: Sphaeronassa mutabilis, Arcularia gibbosula L., Semicassis saburon, Homalopoma sanguineus, Cyclope neritea, Columbella rustica, and Cypraea. The same tendency exists in the shells collected from Miocene beds, of which there are many examples.

The Perigordians in the Atlantic zone retained the same choice of species as the Aurignacians of this region with respect to both Atlantic and Mediterranean species, but they reduced this choice to a very few species, precisely those that were the most numerous in the Aurignacian. The number of shells actually collected is comparable but the choice was more restricted, and Dentalium becomes more frequent. This tendency, already noted for the Gravettian of the

Mediterranean zone, may well be a cultural characteristic (Onoratini and Combier 1995).

2.2 REGIONS FAR FROM MARINE SHORELINES Regions far from marine shorelines reveal the powerful interest of local groups in sea shells. In Burgundy, Germany, Austria and in Central Europe, the Gravettians and related groups sought to obtain shells because they were part of their culture. Two procurement possibilities exist: the exploitation of fossil outcrops and long expeditions to marine shores. If neither of these was feasible, facsimiles were manufactured in other materials: bird bones for Dentalium, and small beads and pendants more or less round in form.

The sites of Trilobite and Renne at Arcy-sur-Cure prove that the Perigordians scoured Eocene fossil outcrops, probably those of the Paris Basin, for shell species resembling traditional, classic forms. For example, Ampullina resembles Cyclope neritea, and Bayania lactea is elongated like Nucella lapillus.

In Germany, the Gravettians had access to local fossils (Mainz-Linsenberg, Geissenklösterle, Brillenhöhle) but occasionally were able to obtain Mediterranean species such as found at Mainz-Linsenberg and Sprendlingen.

(12)

138

HUNTERS OF THE GOLDEN AGE

The Aurignacians of this same region focused on the fabrication of beads in ivory. We know little about their shell collection practices. Fossil species from the Vienna region have been found in aurignacian levels at Krems-Hundssteig and dentalium shells were present at Willendorf (Hahn 1972).

The dense gravettian/pavlovian occupation in Moravia has all the characteristics of a local group that developed its own particular values, while maintaining its traditional taste for shells in spite of its great distance from marine shores. This logistical factor may explain the great creativity in

ornamental forms fashioned in ivory, in river pebbles, in soft stone and in fired loess (One 1981).

Species recovered are often dentalia, sometimes in great numbers, such as in the Francouzskä Street burial in Brno. But there are also Tertiary species such as Melanopsis from the Miocene and numerous and varied Miocene shell species in Dolni Vestonice I and II, Pavlov I and II, and Predmosti and Milovice (Klima 1963; Hladilova 1997). A fine-grained comparison with the perigordian exploitation of the Tertiary outcrops of the Aquitaine Basin is possible. The species chosen from the Miocene levels of the Vienna Basin, located less than 20 km from Milovice, are more numerous but largely the same as those chosen by the Perigordians in the Aquitaine Basin.

It is equally interesting to compare closely the two perigordian/gravettian contexts with respect to the species chosen by the Aurignacians in extreme Western Europe. The similarity is striking and is reinforced by the presence of a Mediterranean species at Moravany-Podkovica.

Further east, shell traditions were difficult to maintain due to an absence of fossil outcrops. Nevertheless, sites such as Moravany-Lopata, Zakovska and Certova pec in the Vah valley and Oblazowa in the Bialka valley, show long distance procurement.

Pavlovian/Gravettian groups living near Miocene outcrops showed great interest in shells from these fossil sources, while their Western European counterparts only collected from fossil outcrops when it was convenient, preferring species (the same species collected by their aurignacian predecessors) collected from the contemporary Atlantic or Mediterranean littoral. 3. Animal teeth ornaments between 30,000 and

20,000 bp

In contrast to shells, the availability of animal teeth for ornaments was more or less the same across Europe.

For the French Perigordian, a review of the perforated or circumincised teeth allows an appreciation of the choices made. Fox canines and bovine incisors are the most frequent teeth among all groups, with fox teeth being slightly more abundant in the Pyrenees and bovine teeth slightly more abundant in the Périgord. Red deer vestigial canines are homogeneously distributed but less frequent than the two

species mentioned earlier. Canines and incisors of bear, wolf, and lion are present but infrequent in all groups. Horse incisors are even rarer (except on the body of a woman from Ostuni 1; Coppola and Vacca 1995). Some species are found in exceptionally low numbers, such as for example incisors of ibex and reindeer.

In comparing some forty French aurignacian sites with perforated or circumincised teeth, we see that fox canines make up more than one third of the total, followed by bovine incisors and wolf canines. Red deer vestigial canines are relatively less numerous. There is then a slight modification in the Perigordian, with bovine incisors and red deer vestigials taking on greater importance. However, when all French regions are combined, no original contribution to the traditional repertoire on the part of the Perigordians is discernible.

Elsewhere in Europe, the most frequently cited teeth are fox canines, with wolf and bear canines trailing far behind. There are some exceptional cases, such as the horse teeth from the Francouzskä Street burial in Brno and from Willendorf II, the red deer vestigials from Geissenklösterle and Hohle Fels, and the wolf teeth from the Dolni Vestonice triple burial. It seems that a general scarcity of red deer vestigials resulted in the fabrication of imitations in ivory and stone.

The Aurignacians in these same regions seem to have exercised a wider choice: fox, bear, horse and wolf canines, and horse, beaver and reindeer incisors.

4. Formed ornaments between 30,000 and 20,000 bp

This category of ornaments allows considerable creativity in raw material choice (ivory, soft stone, bone, antler) and object form. It also allows for the possibility of decorative engraving. As a consequence, fashioned ornaments are exceptionally good group markers. Availability of raw material seems to have played a minor part. Ivory, for example, was certainly easier to find in Central and Eastern Europe than in the West, but it was never absent (Taborin

1992; White 1992).

4.1 BEADS AND PENDANTS

These two subcategories are distinguishable only by their relative dimensions. Beads, often non-spherical, are merely small pendants. In France, perigordian beads are rare and executed in various materials: jet, bone, amber, ochre, river pebbles. Ivory ornaments are rare.

(13)

139 YVETTE TABORIN - GRAVETTIAN BODY ORNAMENTS

widely used in the French Perigordian, it is not particularly abundant among ornaments. Some pieces are noteworthy, such as the serpent pendant from Brassempouy and the imitation cowrie from Pair-non-Pair (Fig. 2). Apparently in ornamental contexts, ivory was used for extraordinary objects.

Decoration is nonexistent or limited to a few parallel striatums. There are, however, some exceptions, such as the pendant with two engraved vipers from Lespugue-Rideaux or the 'bupreste' in limestone from Masnaigre (Taborin 1987).

The Aurignacians produced thousands of beads, most of them in ivory and from a few sites in the Périgord.

Generally, there are few elongated pendants. Ivory was used widely, and also for exceptional pendants, such as those from Tuto de Camalhot and Abri Blanchard (White 1993).

Thousands of ivory beads and some ivory and schist pendants from the Sungir' burials (White 1995) confirm the aurignacian European tendency: the best technology to make beads in series and the need for rich individual ornament. But this example falls outside the geographic references of Western and Central Europe that are the subject of this article.

The altitude of the Perigordians seems to have been a continuation of that of the Aurignacians except for the production of beads in series.

In Belgium and Germany, where the use of ivory is widespread in the Aurignacian, the Gravettians continued this tradition in the production of beads and pendants. Scheer (1992) has shown the importance and the distribution of ivory pendants that imitate red deer vestigials. This form goes back to the Aurignacian, and the best examples come in the Gravettian (Arene Candide) and the Magdalenian (La Marehe). It is possible that these objects are part of a wider family linked by their globular and asymmetrical form: red deer vestigials, Cyclope ncritca, Arcularia gibbosula, Cyprea, Trivia europea, female silhouettes from Gönnersdorf and Roche de Lalinde, and claviform signs. This is one of the strongest indications of the eternal, transcultural values that pervade the European Upper Palaeolithic.

Certain groups adapted this traditional asymmetric form to their own particular contexts: the famous bilobate pendants from Dolnf Vèstonice I and the bilobate and plano-convex beads from Barma Grande. It is also worth remembering that the ( ypraea from the male burial at Laugerie-Basse were attached in back-to-back pairs.

Apart from this group with a rather feminine valence, other forms of pendants were created, abundant in Moravia (Klima 1963), but with isolated examples elsewhere: diadems, hair bands, rings, discs, tubes. Most are in ivory, as

1 cm i 1

Fig. 2. Cowrie in ivory from Pair-non-Pair.

are the majority of perforated zoomorphic figures, which are not necessarily personal ornaments.

This superb ornament production bears little relationship to the Aurignacian in the same region.

5. General aspects of adornment between 30,000 and 20,000 bp

Viewed globally, European ornaments from this 10,000 year period show considerable variability. The Ligurian admirers of Cyclope neritea and the pavlovian creators of new forms in ivory and in fired loess were worlds apart! Either they were non-contemporaries or they were just wonderfully ignorant of each other... Their territories are far apart and separated by the Alps. Their cultural origins may even have been different.

(14)

140 HUNTERS OF THE GOLDEN AGE

references

Barthes. R. Coppola, D., E. Vacca Giacobini. G.. G. Malerba Hahn, J. Klima, B. Mussi, M. Onoretini, G., J. Combier Otte, M. Scheer, A. Taborin, Y. While. R.

1967 Systeme de la Mode. Paris: Le Seuil.

1995 Les sepultures paliolithiques de la grotte de Sciinte Marie d'Agnano ä Ostuni (Italië). In: Nature et Culture, Colloque de Liege (13-17 décembre 1993), 795-808, Liege: Université de Liege (ERAUL 68).

1995 Les pendeloques en ivoire de la sepulture paléolithique du "Jeune Prince" (Grotte des Arene Candide, Finale Ligurie, Italië). In: J. Hahn, M. Menu, Y. Taborin, Ph. Walter and F. Wideman (eds), Le travail et l'usage de l'ivoire au Paléolithique supérieur. 173-189, Roma: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca della Stato.

1972 Aurignacian signs, pendants and art objects in Central and Eastern Europe, World

Arehaeology 3(3), 252-272.

1963 Dolni Véstonice. Praha: Academia.

1992 Popoli e civiltä dell'Italia antica, Biblioteca di Storia patria 10.

1995 Rituels funéraires dans les sepultures gravettiennes des grottes de Grimaldi et de la grotte

delle Arene Candide: une mise au point. In: Nature et Culture, Colloque de Liege

(13-17 décembre 1993), 831-844, Liege: Université de Liege (ERAUL 68).

1995 Restes d 'enfant et parure de coquillages du site gravettien du Maronnier

(Saint-Rémczc-Ardèche): témoins de l'expansion oecidentale de la culture de tradition noaillienne méditerranéenne. In: Nature et Culture, Colloque de Liege (13-17 décembre 1993),

259-271, Liege: Université de Liege (ERAUL 68). 1981 Le Gravettien en Europe centrale. Brugge: De Tempel.

1992 Pendeloques en ivoire durant le Gravettien en Allemagne du sud - un indice chronologique et social? In: J. Hahn, M. Menu, Y. Taborin, Ph. Walter and F. Wideman (eds), Le travail

et l'usage de l'ivoire au Paléolithique supérieur, 137-172, Roma: Istituto Poligrafico e

Zecca dello Stato.

1987 Le decor des objets de parure. In: l'Art des Ohjets au Paléolithique, Actes des Colloques de la Direction du Patrimoine, 19-37, Paris.

1992 Formes et decors des elements de parure en ivoire du Paléolithique francais. In: J. Hahn, M. Menu, Y. Taborin, Ph. Walter and F. Wideman (eds), Le travail et l'usage de l'ivoire au

Paléolithique supérieur, 63-93, Roma: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato.

1993a Shells of the French Aurignacian and Périgordian. In: H. Knecht, A. Pike-Tay and R. White (eds), Before Lascaux: the complex record of the Early Upper Paleolithic, 211- 228, Boca Raton: CRC Press.

1993b La parure en coquillage au Paléolithique, Gallia Préhistoire suppl. XXIX, CNRS. 1997 La mer et les premiers hommes modernes, Congres CTHS Nice 1996.

1992 Ivory personal ornaments of Aurignacian age: technological, social and symbolic perspectives. In: J. Hahn, M. Menu, Y. Taborin, Ph. Walter and F. Wideman (eds), Le

travail et l'usage de l'ivoire au Paléolithique supérieur, 29-62, Roma: Istituto Poligrafico e

(15)

I l l YVETTE TABORIN - GRAVETTIAN BODY ORNAMENTS

While. R. 1993 Technological and Social Dimensions of "Aurignacian-Age" Body Ornaments across Europe. In: H. Knecht, A. Pike-Tay and R. White (eds). Before Lascaux: the complex record of the Early Upper Paleolithic, 277-300, Boca Raton: CRC Press.

ANALECTA PRAEHISTORICA LEIDENSIA

ANALECTA

PRAEHISTORICA

LEIDENSIA

ANALECTA

PRAEHISTORICA

LEIDENSIA

PUBLICATION OF THE FACULTY OF ARCHAEOLOGY

UNIVERSITY OF LEIDEN

HUNTERS OF THE GOLDEN AGE

THE MID UPPER PALAEOLITHIC OF EURASIA 30,000 - 20,000 BP

EDITED BY WIL ROEBROEKS, MARGHERITA MUSSI,

JIRI SVODOBA AND KELLY FENNEMA

contents

Yvette Taborin 10 Gravettian body ornaments in Western and

Central Europe

138

references