grave markers middle and early upper paleolithic burials and the use of chronotypology in

Grave Markers: Middle and Early Upper Paleolithic Burials and the Use of Chronotypology inContemporary Paleolithic ResearchAuthor(s): Julien Riel‐Salvatore and Geoffrey A. ClarkReviewed work(s):Source: Current Anthropology, Vol. 42, No. 4 (August/October 2001), pp. 449-479Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of Wenner-Gren Foundation for AnthropologicalResearchStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/321801 .Accessed: 21/11/2011 07:19

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449

C u r r e n t A n t h ro p o l o g y Volume 42, Number 4, August–October 2001� 2001 by The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. All rights reserved 0011-3204/2001/4204-0001$3.00

Grave Markers

Middle and Early UpperPaleolithic Burials and the Useof Chronotypology inContemporary PaleolithicResearch1

by Julien Riel-Salvatore andGeoffrey A. Clark

Comparison of mortuary data from the Middle and Early UpperPaleolithic archaeological record shows that, contrary to previousassessments, there is much evidence for continuity between thetwo periods. This suggests that if R. H. Gargett’s critique of al-leged Middle Paleolithic burials is to be given credence, it shouldalso be applied to the “burials” of the Early Upper Paleolithic.Evidence for continuity reinforces conclusions derived fromlithic and faunal analyses and site locations that the Upper Pale-olithic as a reified category masks much variation in the archae-ological record and is therefore not an appropriate analytical tool.Dividing the Upper Paleolithic into Early and Late phases mightbe helpful for understanding the cultural and biological processesat work.

j u l i e n r i e l - s a l v a t o r e is currently a graduate research fel-low at the Archaeological Research Institute, Department of An-thropology, Arizona State University (Tempe, Ariz. 85287-2402,U.S.A. [[email protected]]). Born in 1977, he was educated at Mc-Gill University (B.A., Honours, 1999) and at Arizona State Uni-versity (M.A., 2001). He has conducted fieldwork in Spain and It-aly, and his research interests include the symbolic capacities ofEurasian Paleolithic hominids, lithic technology and classifica-tion, rock art, and research frameworks and traditions.

g e o f f r e y a . c l a r k is Distinguished Research Professor ofAnthropology at Arizona State University. Born in 1944, he waseducated at the University of Arizona (B.A., 1966; M.A., 1967)and the University of Chicago (Ph.D., 1971). His recentpublications deal with the logic of inference in modern-human-origins research (e.g., with John Lindly, “Modern Human Originsin the Levant and Western Asia,” American Anthropologist 91:962–85, and “Symbolism and Modern Human Origins,” currentanthropology 31:233–61) and applications of neo-Darwinian ev-olutionary theory in archaeology and human paleontology (e.g.,with coeditor Mike Barton, Rediscovering Darwin [Washington,D.C.: American Anthropological Association, 1997]).

The present paper was submitted 20 iii 00 and accepted 2 i 01.

1. We are grateful to many friends and colleagues for helping usbring this work to fruition. We thank Bill Kimbel (Institute of Hu-man Origins, Arizona State University) for incisive comments onan earlier draft; we have tried to incorporate his suggestions when-ever possible. We also acknowledge the useful remarks of two anon-

Since it was recognized in the early 20th century thatUpper Paleolithic humans buried their dead (Defleur1993:17–18), debate has raged over whether the practicealso existed in the Middle Paleolithic. Although oftenimplicit, this controversy is linked to perceptions of therespective cognitive capacities of Middle and Upper Pa-leolithic hominids and thus deeply imbedded in the con-troversy over the origins of modern humans. Althoughmany archaeologists and physical anthropologists work-ing with Paleolithic material have come to accept theexistence of Middle Paleolithic burials, their meaning inbehavioral terms is still much discussed (Chase and Dib-ble 1987, Hayden 1993).

In 1989, Robert Gargett proposed that all of what hadtypically been accepted as evidence of Middle Paleolithicburials could be explained in terms of natural processes.For him, burials first appeared in the Upper Paleolithic,presumably as part of a “symbolic explosion” heraldingmodern behavior claimed by some archaeologists to havetaken place at the Middle–Upper Paleolithic transition,roughly 35,000 years b.p. (see, e.g., White 1989a, b). Al-though his view was met with much skepticism (e.g.,Belfer-Cohen and Hovers 1992, Hayden 1993, Defleur1993, Gargett 1989, Louwe Kooijmans et al. 1989), Gar-gett has recently published another paper on the issue(1999). In this latest salvo he attributes more cases, in-cluding some recent ones that were excavated more “sci-entifically,” to natural depositional and taphonomicprocesses.

While his call for a more rigorous examination of al-ternative explanations for Middle Paleolithic burials iswelcome, we suggest that his view is too extreme. Belfer-Cohen and Hovers (1992) have convincingly argued thatif Gargett’s criteria for Middle Paleolithic burials wereto be applied to the Natufian burials of the Near East,we would still fall short of conclusive evidence of pur-poseful burial in that region. This suggests that Gargettis selective in the application of his principles—an ap-proach that he never adequately justifies. We argue herethat the only way in which his approach could be jus-tified would be to submit the earliest, if not all, UpperPaleolithic burials to the same critical scrutiny. We pro-pose to test some of the implications of Gargett’s posi-tion by comparing the Middle Paleolithic evidence withthat for the Early Upper Paleolithic. If, as Gargett (1999:30) argues, burial practices developed only in the UpperPaleolithic, no Upper Paleolithic burials from any periodshould share any significant patterns with putative bur-ials from the Middle Paleolithic.

ymous referees. Filippo Salvatore (Concordia University) and SteveSchmich (Arizona State University) read earlier versions of the man-uscript and provided useful comments. We thank Alexandra deSousa (George Washington University) for stimulating discussionson the nature of Paleolithic burial, the subject of her B.A. honorsthesis at Arizona State University. We are, of course, responsiblefor all errors of fact or omission.

450 F current anthropology Volume 42, Number 4, August–October 2001

The Question of the Early Upper Paleolithic

Recent work in various areas of the Old World has pro-vided scholars with “hard” evidence that what is ofteninterpreted as typically Middle Paleolithic behavior, no-tably subsistence strategies and tool making, shifted totypically Upper Paleolithic patterns only after about20,000 years ago (Lindly and Clark 1990, Duff, Clark,and Chadderdon 1992, Stiner 1994, Kuhn 1995). In fact,observable patterns often show a great deal of continuityacross “cultures” and over time (Clark 1992). Recentclaims of a possible Neanderthal/Homo sapiens sapienshybrid dating to the latter part of the Early Upper Pa-leolithic (Duarte et al. 1999, Trinkaus, Zilhao, andDuarte 1999) also suggest that the simplistic equationof “cultures” with hominid types, a correlate of tradi-tional interpretive frameworks of Paleolithic research, isseriously flawed and probably counterproductive for anunderstanding of the transition.

Recognition of distinct Early and Late Upper Paleo-lithic periods has not been unanimously accepted. Somescholars have insisted that the Upper Paleolithic is acoherent temporal and cultural unit (see White 1989band various papers in Knecht, Pike-Tay, and White 1993).This period, they claim, was associated exclusively withmodern humans and a very few acculturated Neander-thals and was defined by an unmistakable “symbolic ex-plosion” that included as a single package art, symbolism(including burials), bone and antler technology, complexsocial structures, and perhaps even language (Noble andDavidson 1991, 1993, 1996). This point of view, whichignores much of the evidence for Middle Paleolithic sym-bolism (e.g., Marshack 1989), agrees well with Gargett’sperception of the differences between the Middle and theUpper Paleolithic. Indeed, his view effectively “dehu-manizes” Neanderthals and implies that they were, forall intents and purposes, evolutionary dead ends.

Both positions, however, appear to accept that culturaldiversity intensified in the course of the Upper Paleo-lithic. This being the case, we can assume that the ear-liest phases of that chronotypologically defined periodwould be characterized by simpler forms of the samebehavior found in its later phases. Thus, if we are to takesome fraction of the Upper Paleolithic as a basis for po-tential behavioral comparisons with the Middle Paleo-lithic, it appears sensible to take the allegedly behavior-ally “incipient” portion of that period as that baseline.The first three Upper Paleolithic “technocomplexes”(Chatelperronian, Aurignacian, and Gravettian) will bethe ones characterized by the earliest and presumablysimplest manifestations of symbolic behavior, includingpurposeful burial. If Gargett is right and intentional in-terment begins only with the earliest Upper Paleolithic,the patterns derived from this limited sample shouldshow no qualitative similarities whatsoever to those de-rived from a sample of alleged graves from the MiddlePaleolithic.

By trying to discern how burial practices in the EarlyUpper Paleolithic differed from or resembled those sug-

gested for the Middle Paleolithic, this paper will also testthe validity of the Upper Paleolithic as an analytical unit,since it will show whether an unambiguous Middle/Up-per Paleolithic division exists in a body of evidence otherthan stone tools. By extension, the validity of typologicaland etic approaches to the dynamic cultural and biolog-ical processes of the Paleolithic will also be assessed.

Burials and Modern Human Origins

Almost everyone involved in modern-human-origins re-search accepts that humans had started to bury their deadby the earliest phases of the Upper Paleolithic. The issuebefore us, then, is whether purposeful burial also existedin the Middle Paleolithic.

One group of researchers, spearheaded by Gargett(1989, 1996, 1999), argues that geological or nonhumannatural processes alone can account for all apparent Mid-dle Paleolithic hominid burials recovered so far. Thisimplies that they view Upper Paleolithic graves in gen-eral as radically different from all the material claimedin support of intentional burial in the Middle Paleolithic.A major difficulty with this point of view is the unlike-lihood that the geological processes at work in MiddlePaleolithic sites would not also have affected those ofthe Upper Paleolithic. The presence of proportionallygreater numbers of Upper Paleolithic graves should beperfectly explicable by such processes. Indeed, besidesthe fact that Early Upper Paleolithic sites were morenumerous and widespread than Middle Paleolithic ones(White 1985:57), bodies buried 100,000 years ago aremuch less likely to have been preserved to the presentthan those buried a “mere” 25,000 years ago. This per-spective suggests that modern humans, who were, afterall, present for most of the Middle Paleolithic, eventuallycrossed some kind of cognitive threshold beyond thereach of the “symbolically challenged” Neanderthals,who were destined to be replaced. It is not surprising,therefore, to see proponents of this interpretation invok-ing the extreme replacement scenario of Stringer(Stringer, Hublin, and Vandermeersch 1984, Stringer andAndrews 1988; but cf. Clark and Willermet 1995) andMellars (1989, 1996; but cf. Clark and Lindly 1989a,Clark 1997b).

Another group of researchers accepts the existence ofMiddle Paleolithic graves but sees them as different fromthose of the Upper Paleolithic. Chase and Dibble (1987;Chase 1991) argue that Middle Paleolithic burial is ev-idence of a level of caring and emotional attachment wellabove that of any other higher primates but that “thereare no other obvious signs of ritual” (Chase and Dibble1987:276). In other words, Middle Paleolithic hominidswere gregarious, emotional, socially complex, and adeptat hunting but had no ritual or symbolic behavior toorganize their sociality. (Exactly how emotion is de-tached from “humanness” is never made clear.) This po-sition has the notable advantage of being able to accountfor the very limited number of apparent graves recoveredfrom Middle Paleolithic contexts, since it implies that

riel -salvatore and clark Grave Markers F 451

burial was not a regular part of the Neanderthal behav-ioral repertoire and was, therefore, likely to have beensporadic. It is handicapped, however, by evidence thatMiddle Paleolithic modern humans also sporadicallyburied their dead for no symbolic reason. This observa-tion can be interpreted as suggesting that modern hu-mans and Neanderthals were the same species andshared a behavioral repertoire—a view that is supportedby lithic (Boeda 1988) and faunal (Chase 1989) evidencestrongly suggesting that the two hominids had similarlifeways for an interval of at least 60,000 years (Lindlyand Clark 1990). The alternative interpretation preferredby Chase and Dibble (1987:285) is that Neanderthals andmodern humans were two distinct species and that onlymodern humans would eventually develop the capacityfor symbolic behavior, or “neoculture,” giving them acompetitive advantage over “paleocultural” Neander-thals, who were driven to extinction. Despite a lack ofconcrete evidence, most of the proponents of the non-symbolic-burial interpretation adhere to this view.

Others in this group see both kinds of Middle Paleo-lithic hominids as having the capacity for symbolic be-havior, but what this means is debated. Some researchersargue that despite their ability to act symbolically, Ne-anderthals apparently never “refined” this capacity tothe same degree as modern humans and were thereforecondemned to be replaced by them (Defleur 1993; Mel-lars 1996). A broadly similar expression of this viewbased on the analysis of stone and bone tools and per-sonal ornaments has recently been proposed by someEuropean workers (d’Errico et al. 1998, Zilhao andd’Errico 1999a; see Clark 1997a, 1999a). Others argue,however, that the “embryonic” ritual behavior embodiedin burials postdating 100,000 years b.p. provides supportfor the hypothesis that the two hominid groups weresimply regional variants within a single, wide-ranging,polytypic species (Brose and Wolpoff 1971, Wolpoff, Wu,and Thorne 1984, Clark and Lindly 1989a, Wolpoff 1989).In their view, the Middle Paleolithic archaeological rec-ord provides evidence of a fair degree of social complexitythat increased at a different rate from that of biologicalevolution (Marshack 1989, Hayden 1993). May (1986:157, translation ours)2 sums up this position when shestates that “the Upper Paleolithic is in continuity withthe Middle Paleolithic, developing further what it con-tained in germinal form. . . . It is the very principle ofevolution.” This position has the advantage of being ableto indicate some of the elements that should or couldbe found in Early Upper Paleolithic burials, thereby pro-viding the test implications for Early Upper Paleolithicburial that the other approaches have studiously avoided.

In fact, the multiregional hypothesis predicts that ex-tremely robust modern humans showing some Nean-derthal features will be the earliest buried hominids ofthe Upper Paleolithic. It happens that many of the ear-liest recovered hominids from the Upper Paleolithic

2. “Le Paleolithique superieur est en continuite avec le Paleoli-thique moyen, developpe ce qu’il contenait en germe. . . . C’est leprincipe meme de l’evolution.”

have, in fact, been described as very robust and showingNeanderthal affinities (see Wolfpoff 1997:746–58; 1999:761–69). The problem is that it is impossible to comparethem with Neanderthals as a whole because, despiteclaims to the contrary (see Stringer, Hublin, and Van-dermeersch 1984), we do not have a list of traits thatunambiguously characterizes Upper Pleistocene homi-nids as Neanderthal or modern (Willermet 1993, Willer-met and Clark 1995, Clark 1997a). This renders the clas-sification of limitrophe specimens difficult if notimpossible, resulting in a conceptual impasse in whichplayers from multiregional and replacement camps citethe same evidence but interpret it differently. It is in-teresting, however, that the robust modern humans pre-sent in the earliest Upper Paleolithic (see descriptions ofCombe Capelle, Les Cottes, and Predmostı in May 1986)are precisely what is expected by continuity advocatesand can be accommodated only with difficulty by thereplacement model. The recently discovered Lagar VelhoNeanderthal/modern “hybrid” (Duarte et al. 1999, Trin-kaus, Zilhao, and Duarte 1999) is another “aberration”that can be explained more adequately from a continuitythan from a replacement perspective (but see Brauer1984, 1989).

We take the position that burials are crucial for un-derstanding both the biological and the cultural transi-tion and that, like stone tools, they can serve as impor-tant sources of information about the origins of what isseen as typically modern behavior. As with stone tools,however, it is quite unwarranted to link burials withspecific hominid taxa. It is very unlikely that intermentwas the only way our Paleolithic forebears had of dis-posing of the dead (Ucko 1969), and their mortuary prac-tices may not always have left traces in the archaeolog-ical record (e.g., Le Mort 1988). Therefore, while burialscan certainly be used as a source of evidence in inferringpast lifeways, if we are ever to resolve the issues sur-rounding our origins they cannot be studied in isolationfrom other lines of evidence (e.g., tool technologies, set-tlement and subsistence patterns, etc.).

Some Comments on Burial Analysis

In analyzing mortuary data, regularities or patterns mustbe identified in grave contexts. Following Binford (1971),patterns in the mortuary record can be assumed to reflectsome of the various social personae (statuses occupiedor activated in life) of the deceased (see also Clark andNeeley 1987). This suggests that, if we can control fortaphonomy and diagenesis, at least some of the patternsin the Middle and Early Upper Paleolithic record couldrepresent or index the social personae recognized by thesocieties in which purposefully interred individuals onceparticipated. As is pointed out by Harrold (1980:196),however, this approach is based on cross-cultural obser-vations derived from fully modern populations that typ-ically use formal cemeteries to dispose of their dead.Paleolithic burials are much fewer and much morewidely distributed in space and time than those of any


anthropological culture. We may also be dealing withtwo different species (or, more likely, populations of thesame species), with the result that anthropologically de-rived principles are probably not applicable to the periodunder scrutiny. Therefore, while patterns may be visiblein the mortuary record of the later phases of the Paleo-lithic, one must be extremely careful in interpretingthem and wary of generalizing them to archaeologicallydefined analytical units, which are by definition fairlystatic and of very long duration and therefore quite dif-ferent from cultures in the purely anthropological senseof the term (Clark 1997a).

Selection of Data

The geographical area under scrutiny consists of most ofWestern Eurasia and Western Russia, that is, the wholearea in which typologically defined Middle and UpperPaleolithic tool assemblages have been identified. Thisis an area of several million square kilometers. Althoughmany sites there have yielded human remains, onlythose considered to have been purposefully buried areexamined here.

One of Gargett’s major criticisms of research on Mid-dle Paleolithic burials is that the mere presence of anarticulated skeleton in an archaeological context is oftentaken as evidence for purposeful burial (1989:160–61;1999:31–33, 41–42). This criticism is a valid one. Al-though is it true that skeletons are rarely so preserved(1989:157–58), nonhuman processes can and sometimesdo result in the preservation of articulated skeletal parts.Many researchers (May 1986, Smirnov 1989, Defleur1993) do in fact start their analyses of Middle Paleolithicburials with the presumption that an articulated skele-ton represents intentional burial (but see Vandermeersch1993 for an alternative approach). All agree, however,that an articulated skeleton by itself is never sufficientevidence of a burial.

A common solution is to look for other elements thatmay indicate purposeful interment. These include a skel-eton’s position, the presence of a pit or some other typeof burial structure, and the presence of gravegoods—objects unambiguously associated with the re-mains and therefore assumed to have been intentionallyplaced in a grave (Defleur 1993:57–58). As concerns theidentification of burial inclusions as “grave goods” inMiddle Paleolithic contexts, we refer the reader to De-fleur’s (1993) thorough and competent discussion of thematter and to the original sources in which they werereported as such in recently discovered burials (i.e., De-deriyeh 1 [Akazawa et al. 1995] and Amud 7 [Hovers etal. 1995, Hovers, Kimbel, and Rak 2000, Rak, Kimbel,and Hovers 1994]). May (1986:4) also suggests that at-tention be paid to the total area in which the remainsare found, and Smirnov (1989:216) proposes that the pres-ence of associated features be taken into account. Whenone or more of these elements co-occurs with an artic-ulated skeleton, it seems likely that we are dealing witha purposeful inhumation.

Technically, the number of supposed Middle Paleo-lithic burials included in this study should be of no im-portance, since, if they do not carry a symbolic loading,they should not show any patterns similar to those de-rived from Early Upper Paleolithic burials (Gargett 1999:30). Nevertheless, we classified the apparent Middle Pa-leolithic burials as “certain,” “probable,” or “possible”(Defleur 1993) and omitted the “possible” burials fromour sample. When possible, reference was also made tothe original publications for the older sites reviewed byDefleur (e.g., Solecki 1971; Heim 1976, 1982) to increasethe accuracy of our interpretations. Additional data fromrecently discovered Middle Paleolithic burials were gath-ered from articles or excavation reports and included inthe sample (Bar-Yosef et al. 1992, Rak, Kimbel, and Hov-ers 1994, Akazawa et al. 1995, Hovers et al. 1995, Tillier1995, Vermeersch et al. 1998).

A number of criteria were used to determine if a burialbelonged to the Middle Paleolithic. First and foremost,given that typological approaches have repeatedly beenshown to be seriously flawed (Dibble 1984, 1987; Dibbleand Rolland 1992; Bisson 2000), we looked instead for aMiddle Paleolithic or Mousterian technological “signa-ture”—the dominance of flake-based retouched tools inlithic assemblages (except in the Levant, where blade-based tools appear to be the norm for that period [seee.g., Bar-Yosef and Kuhn 1999]). This definition roughlyparallels the traditional typology-based one and makesidentification of Middle Paleolithic archaeological stratapossible even in a survey that must depend on second-hand sources. If a proposed burial associated with anassemblage of Middle Paleolithic signature was recorded,it was assumed to date to the Middle Paleolithic. (Theuse of this concept of signature is proposed simply as atool for classifying burials for the purposes of this study.)

In the rare instances when dates were available, if theburial was dated to over 40,000 b.p.3 it was also includedin the Middle Paleolithic sample. A big problem here isthat the various dates available were obtained by differ-ent methods applied to different materials across thesites (for a very detailed discussion of dating methodsapplied to the Paleolithic period, see Zilhao and d’Errico1999a). Effectively, this means that the dates cannot bedirectly compared with each other. Since there are notemporally distinct Middle Paleolithic tool traditions(but see Mellars 1996), dates never contradicted the at-tribution of a grave to the Middle Paleolithic based onassemblage signature.

The Early Upper Paleolithic burials considered herewere compiled from a variety of sources, including syn-theses (Oakley, Campbell, and Molleson 1971, May 1986,Palma di Cesnola 1993) and detailed journal articles(Klima 1987a, b; Svoboda 1989; Svoboda and Vlcek 1991).There were, however, significant problems in identifying

3. The date of 40,000 b.p. is not typically associated with the endof the Middle Paleolithic but is used here because it excludes eventhe earliest recorded manifestation of the so-called Middle–UpperPaleolithic transition, characterized by the development of UpperPaleolithic tool types.


the sites to be included in the sample. Very few sites aresecurely dated, and, although the “cultures” included inthe time interval chosen, 40,000–20,000 years b.p., areonly the Chatelperronian, the Aurignacian, and theGravettian, these denominations are not valid over thewhole geographical area under investigation. For exam-ple, the Gravettian in Moravia is called the Pavlovian,defined as a unique and distinctive Moravian variationon the Gravettian theme (Svoboda 1994). This lack of aunified terminology points to the need for revision of theconceptual frameworks used for dealing with Upper Pa-leolithic “industries” (see Barton, Olszewski, and Coin-man 1996 for a lithic-based example). Furthermore, the“cultural sequence” is not necessarily the same in thevarious parts of the area under scrutiny. This often makesit difficult to understand precisely what researchersmean in temporal terms when they use similarchronotypological designations in different areas. If noth-ing else, this fundamental problem should cast seriousdoubt on the unilineal cultural evolution implied in theUpper Paleolithic typology devised by de Sonneville-Bor-des and Perrot (1953, 1954, 1955, 1956).

Another problem was the significant discrepancies be-tween typological designations and absolute dates. Forexample, while Palma di Cesnola (1993:406–10) assignsall the Barma Grande graves to the earliest part of theUpper Paleolithic, recent 14C dates (Bisson, Tisnerat, andWhite 1996) show that they really postdate 20,000 yearsb.p. and therefore fall outside of our time range. This isa major problem, since most Early Upper Paleolithic siteshave been classified chronotypologically but never dated.It can be hoped, however, that renewed interest in thismaterial, most of it excavated in the late 19th or early20th century, will eventually result in a more adequateradiometric chronology. In sum, most of the material inthe Early Upper Paleolithic sample was either supportedby absolute dates or assigned to the Chatelperronian, theAurignacian, or (more rarely) the Gravettian.

The compilation of the data resulted in a sample of 45alleged Middle Paleolithic and 32 alleged Early UpperPaleolithic burials (excluding the 18 individuals from thePredmostı mass grave, for which secure information islacking). The variables selected for study include sex,age, body position, grave orientation, grave features, andgrave goods, all of which are fairly standard in the studyof Paleolithic burials4 (Binford 1968, Harrold 1980, Smir-nov 1989, Defleur 1993). In addition, the hominid “type”of recovered skeletons was also recorded on the chancethat species- or population-specific mortuary practicesmight be identified. Finally, evidence of pathology on therecovered skeletons was also noted, following Defleur’s(1993:225) suggestion that it may have been a significant

4. Most of these criteria are far from unambiguously identified.Besides those characteristics of skeletons which can often be mis-interpreted in incomplete individuals (age and sex), the question ofburial orientation is also difficult, since burials may have beenoriented according to nearby features of the landscape that havelong since disappeared (rivers, trees, etc.) rather than according tothe eight cardinal directions of Western geography. Beyond that,orientation relative to a specific spatial referent is rarely evident.

determinant of who was buried in the Middle Paleolithic.The relevant information is tabulated in tables 1 and 2.

It might have been interesting here to generate and usea “diversity index” like that employed by Harrold (1980:200) in his comparative study of Paleolithic burials.However, since we do not know the relative culturalvalue of various types of grave goods or whether the ab-sence of grave goods could be mitigated by more elabo-rate ritual ceremonies that left no archaeological traces,we considered it risky to do so.

Data Analysis

middle paleolithic burials

Analysis of the Middle Paleolithic sample (table 3) allowsthe following general observations. First, juveniles com-prise the largest part of the sample. Most recovered ju-veniles appear to be under 10 years of age, while mostmales belong to the 16–30 and 41–50 age brackets.5 Fe-males are underrepresented.

Roughly one in five Middle Paleolithic burials con-tained an individual who showed signs of pathology. Twoout of seven identified females (disproportionately highfor this period) exhibited pathology.

The vast majority of inhumed individuals were Ne-anderthals. That the three sites that yielded modern hu-man burials produced roughly 30% of the burials mightbe interpreted as evidence that modern humans showeda higher propensity to bury their dead, but this wouldbe a risky assertion. Two of these sites (Qafzeh andSkhul) are among the oldest in our sample, while thethird, Taramsa, yielded a single rather plain grave anddates to between roughly 80,000 and 50,000 years b.p.(Vermeersch et al. 1998). Following the same dubiousline of reasoning, one could conclude that modern hu-man behavior actually became simpler rather than morecomplex over time.

In most cases, the placement and resting plane of therecovered individuals were not reported by the excava-tors. This is unfortunate, since in many ethnographiccultures body position is a significant part of the mor-tuary program (Carr 1995). Those bodies for which in-formation was available show that roughly equal num-bers rested on their backs or right sides andproportionally fewer of them on their left. This periodhas the only evidence for “kneeling” and “seated” po-sitions. Most of the skeletons were found in a contractedor tightly flexed position.

Data on grave orientation are also scarce, but mostburials for which information is available were orientedone way or another along an east-west axis. The onlysites where bodies were consistently oriented along aparticular axis are La Ferrassie and Qafzeh, and the sites

5. Most paleodemographic studies rely on five-year age-brackets,but we are using the brackets proposed by Defleur not to reconstructa life table but to compare patterns between Middle and Early UpperPaleolithic groups. This use should not mask much of the varia-bility in the mortuary record.


table 1Middle Paleolithic Mortuary Data

Burial Status Sexa AgeAge–Class Pathologyb

PhysicalTypec

BodyPositiond

Orien-tatione Featuresf Grave Goods

La Chapelle-aux-Saints

Certain M �50 41–50 N Ne D/C W–E P Bones, lithics?, nearbypits (lithics, boneshards)

Le Moustier 1 Probable M Youngadult

16–30? N Ne R/F? ? – Bone shard � lithic“pillow”

Le Moustier 2 Probable J Child 2–10 N Ne ? ? P Lithics?, nearby pits(lithics, boneshards)

La Ferrassie 1 Certain M 40–45 41–50 N Ne D/F W–E P Bone shards, rocksLa Ferrassie 2 Certain F 25–30 16–30 N Ne R/C E–W P –La Ferrassie 3 Certain J �10 2–10 N Ne ? ? P Lithics, nearby pits

(lithics, boneshards)

La Ferrassie 4a∗ Certain J Foetus Foetus N Ne ? ? P Lithics, rock overgrave

La Ferrassie 4b∗ Certain J 1 mo. 0–1 N Ne ? ? P Lithics, rock overgrave, three nearbypits

La Ferrassie 5 Certain J Foetus Foetus N Ne ? ? P/M LithicsLa Ferrassie 6 Certain J �3 2–10 N Ne ? E–W P Lithics, rock over

graveLa Ferrassie 8 Probable J �2 2–10 N Ne ? ? – –La Quina Certain F ? 16–30 Y Ne R/? ? – Spheroid, bone shards,

sediment covering?Le Regourdou Certain ? ? 31–40 N Ne L/C W–E P/M/H Lithics, bear bones,

rock over skeletonLe Roc-de-Marsal Certain J �3 2–10 N Ne L/F? N–S P Sandstones, bone

shard “pillow,” ant-lers, sedimentcovering?

Spy 1 Certain M ? 31–40 N Ne ? E–W – –Spy 2 Probable F ? 16–30 N Ne ? ? – –Tabun Certain F �30 16–30 N Ne D/F W–E P –Skhul 1 Certain J Child 2–10 Y AMH K ? P –Skhul 4 Certain M 40–50 41–50 N AMH R/C SE–NW P Lithics?Skhul 5 Certain M 30–40 31–40 N AMH D/C W–E P Boar mandibleSkhul 6 Probable M ? 31–40 N AMH ? ? – –Skhul 7 Certain F �35 31–40 N AMH R/C ? – –Skhul 9 Probable M ? 41–50 Y AMH ? ? – –Qafzeh 3 Certain F ? 41–50 N AMH L/E? ? – –Qafzeh 8 Certain M Adult 31–40 N AMH R/F E–W P Lithics?, ochre, stones

over skeleton, dou-ble grave

Qafzeh 9∗ Certain F Youngadult

16–30 Y AMH L/F N–S P –

Qafzeh 10∗ Certain J �6 2–10 N AMH L/C E–W P –Qafzeh 11 Certain J 13–14 11–15 N AMH D/C N–S P Ochre?, bone shards,

trophies, rocks overskeleton

Qafzeh 15 Probable J 8–10 2–10 N AMH ? ? P –Shanidar 1 Certain M 30–40 31–40 Y Ne D/? W–E P/M Sediment covering?Shanidar 2 Probable M 20–30 16–30 N Ne ? ? M/H Lithics?Shanidar 3 Certain M 40� 41–50 Y Ne R/? E–W P/M –Shanidar 4 Certain M 30–40 31–40 N Ne L/C SE–NW P/M Flowers, sediment

covering?Shanidar 5 Certain M 40� 41–50 Y Ne ?/C ? M/H Large mammal bones?Shanidar 7 Certain J 9 mos. 0–1 N Ne R/C N–S H –Amud 1 Certain M Adult 16–30 N Ne R/C N–S – –Amud 7 Certain J 10 mos. 0–1 N Ne R/E NW–SE P Red deer maxilla on

pelvisKebara 1 Probable J 7 mos. 0–1 N Ne ? ? – –Kebara 2 Certain M Adult 16–30 N Ne D/? E–W P/H –Dederiyeh 1 Certain J 1–3 2–10 N Ne D/E S–N P Limestone slab over

head, triangularflint flake overheart

Taramsa 1 Certain J 8–10 2–10 N AMH S/C E–W P/M –


table 1(Continued)


PhysicalTypec

BodyPositiond


Kiik-Koba 12 Probable M Adult 31–40 N Ne ? ? P –Kiik-Koba 2 Probable J �1 0–1 N Ne ? ? P –Teshik-Tash Certain J 8–10 2–10 N Ne ? ? P Circle of goat hornsStaroselje Probable J �2 2–10 Y Ne D/E W–E P –

∗ Multiple burial.aM, male; F, female; J, juvenile (impossible to determine sex).bY, present (injury, disease, malformation); N, absent.cNe, Neanderthal; AMH, anatomically modern human.dD, dorsal; L, lying on left side; R, lying on right side; V, ventral; F, flexed; C, contracted; K, “kneeling”; E, extended (based on head-feet axis); S, “seated.”eW, west; E, east; N, north; S, south; SE, southeast; NW, northwest.fP, pit (visible or deduced); M, mound; H, hearth.

which contained the most burials, Skhul and Shanidar,show a lack of standardization in grave orientation. Thismay be significant, since one would assume that a co-herent mortuary program represented by multiple suc-cessive inhumations would consistently orient bodies inthe same or similar directions.

Slightly more than three-quarters of the burials hadassociated features (pits, hearths, mounds, stone casings).Most were associated with pits. Mounds and hearthswere also reported with some burials but were rare. Mostgraves had a single associated feature. This implies thatat least some effort and energy was expended in disposingof most Middle Paleolithic bodies in graves.

A little more than half the burials contained gravegoods. Most of these appear to have been stone tools(although no use-wear studies appear to have been con-ducted to see whether they were used prior to being bur-ied), but animal bones, oddly shaped rocks, and sedi-ments of distinctive color or texture were all also foundin graves (Defleur 1993:257). Only two graves containedochre, and when present this material was found onlyin pebble form. Striae show that these pebbles had beenrubbed repeatedly across relatively hard surfaces prior totheir inclusion in the graves.

If one thing characterizes putative Middle Paleolithicgrave goods, it is that they are not extremely variable innature and that, except perhaps for the associated animalbones, most do not appear to have been “exceptional”items. The problem, of course, is that we have no wayof knowing what, if anything, was symbolized by theinclusion of these items. Vandermeersch (1976) is of theopinion that many of the so-called grave goods couldhave become associated with the skeletons as a result ofthe filling of the pits. This may be true, but the fact thatsome bodies were found with unambiguous gravegoods—despite Gargett’s claims to the contrary—suggests that the practice was present (see Hovers et al.1995, Hovers, Kimbel, and Rak 2000). Subtlety is de-manded in assessing whether items recovered withgraves represent intentional inclusions, as it has beenshown that the criteria used by researchers may often be

too strict when it comes to Middle Paleolithic burials(Belfer-Cohen and Hovers 1992).

early upper paleolithic burials

For the Early Upper Paleolithic, it appears that maleswere buried more often than both females and juveniles.Adults appear to have accounted for at least three-quar-ters of the burials, but females were half as numerousas males. Burial seems to have been reserved mostly forindividuals in age-brackets 16–30 and 31–40.

Pathology is rare and distributed evenly between adultmales and females. This suggests that pathology may nothave been a significant consideration in the selection ofindividuals for burial, although Dolnı Vestonice XV (the“female” of the triple burial) exhibits pathology (Klima1987a, b).

The overwhelming majority of burials were modernhumans; only one Neanderthal (Saint-Cesaire 1) and asupposed Neanderthal/modern hybrid (Lagar Velho 1)were recovered. In the absence of clear criteria for dis-tinguishing Neanderthals from modern humans, it wasimpossible to determine whether “extremely robust” in-dividuals represented a significant part of the sample.Interesting insights regarding the biological processes atwork during the Early Upper Paleolithic might well bederived from isolating such a group and analyzing italong with Lagar Velho 1.

The preferred body position appears to have been adorsal and fully extended one, although some tightlyflexed (contracted) and semiflexed burials account for afair share of the reported graves. Interestingly, this periodis the only one to show evidence of skeletons buried facedown (two cases). These observations would tend to sup-port the notion of a widespread mortuary program, al-though the high frequency of burials with unknown bodypositions precludes any statistical assessment.

Grave orientation does not appear to be patterned inany remarkable way. Only bodies found in multiple bur-ials were found oriented either in the same way or, as isthe case for Sungir 3 and 4, in complementary ways.


table 2Early Upper Paleolithic Mortuary Data


PhysicalTypec

BodyPositiond


Balzo della Torre I Certain M 25–30 16–30 N AMH D/E NW–SE – Headdress, necklace,bracelet, armband,ochre cover, bonepoint, ochred splitbear canine, animalhide?

Balzo della Torre II Certain M Adult 16–30 N AMH D/E NW–SE H Necklace, armband,“kneecap,” flat uni-facial blade, ochredflint pebble

Balzo della Torre III Certain J 15 11–15 N AMH V/E NW–SE – –Grotta del Caviglione

ICertain M Adult 16–30 N AMH L/F N–S S, H Headdress, “kneecap,”

ochre cover, 2blades, ochre-filled“canal,” animalhide?

Grotta dei Fanciulli I∗ Certain M Youngadult/17

16–30 N AMH R/C ? P, S Ochre cover (thick onskull), blade,“headdress”

Grotta dei FanciulliII∗

Certain F Olderadult/40

31–40 N AMH R/C ? P Ochred bracelets, 2scrapers, 2 serpen-tine pebbles onforehead

Paglicci II Certain M Teen/13 11–15 N AMH D/E SW–NE S Headdress, necklace,bracelet, “anklet”,ochre cover (thickon head), many“good” lithics

Paglicci III Certain F 18–20 16–30 N AMH D/E S–N P Two diverse fill types,ochre cover (thickon head) and bed,chunks of ochredstone over grave,lithics, “diadem”

Veneri Parabitta I∗ Certain M 125 16–30? N AMH F/L ? P –Veneri Parabitta II∗ Certain F 125 16–30? N AMH D/E ? P Ochred pebble, head-

dress, ochre overhead

Agnano Certain F �20 16–30 N AMH ?/C ? – Ochre, headdress,bracelet

Dolnı Vestonice III Certain F 38–42 30–40 N AMH R/F ? P Ochre, 2 incisedmammoth shoulderblades as cover, 10fox canines

Dolnı Vestonice XIII∗ Certain M 17–23 16–30 N AMH D/E S–N P Ochre on head, mam-moth ivory stakethrough pelvis, “di-adem,” mammothivory pendant

Dolnı Vestonice XIV∗ Certain M 17–23 16–30 N AMH V/E S–N P Ochre on head,“diadem”

Dolnı Vestonice XV∗ Certain F? 17–23 16–30 Y AMH D/E S–N P Ochre on head andbetween thighs, “di-adem,” piece ofdeer or horse rib inmouth

Dolnı Vestonice XVI Certain M 40–50 41–50 Y AMH R/F E–W P, H Ochre on head, chestand pelvis, 4pierced canines,belt?

Pavlov I Certain M 40–50 41–50 N AMH ?/C ? P Incised mammothshoulder blade ascover


table 2(Continued)


PhysicalTypec

BodyPositiond


Brno II Probable M Middle-aged

31–40 N AMH ? ? P Ochre, necklace,bone/ivory discsand rings, variousbone/stone tools

Brno III Probable F Middle-aged

31–40 N AMH R/C ? – Ochre

Predmostı 22 Probable J 9–10 2–10 N AMH ? ? – Hare teeth onforehead

Predmostı 27 Probable ? Adult ? N AMH D/E ? – Traces of defleshingPredmostı 1–18 Certain n.a. n.a. n.a. n.a. n.a. n.a. n.a. P Multiple grave (differ-

ent times)Sungir 2 Certain M 55–65 50� N AMH D/E NE–SW P Headdress, lithics,

necklace, bracelets,armbands, “suit”

Sungir 3∗ Certain J 7–9 2–10 N AMH D/E SW–NE P Ochre bed, mediummammoth tuskspear, 8 javelins, 2knives, disc nearright temple,beaded clothes,headdress, bracelets,pins, rings, 2 boneornaments onchest, 2 “batons decommandement”

Sungir 4∗ Certain J 12–13 11–15 N AMH D/E NE–SW P Ochre bed, long mam-moth task spear, 3javelins, 1 knife,disc near right tem-ple, beaded clothes,headdress, bracelets,pins, rings

Combe Capelle Certain ? Adult ? N AMH D/E N–S P Pierced shells, toothon right wrist

Les Cottes Probable M? 50–60 50� Y AMH ? ? – –Saint-Cesaire Probable M Adult – N Ne SB? ? – –Cro-Magnon 1∗ Probable M 50� 50� N AMH ? ? – Shells? Pendant?Cro-Magnon 2∗ Probable F 20–30 16–30 Y AMH ? ? – Shells?Cro-Magnon 3∗ Probable M 30–40 31–40 N AMH ? ? – Shells?Cro-Magnon 5∗ Probable I 1 mo. 0–1 N AMH ? ? – Shells?Lagar Velho 1 Certain J �3 2–10 N Hybrid D/E E–W P, H Ochre, wrap, stones

and red deer boneslining, singlepierced shell

∗ Multiple burial.aM, male; F, female; J, juvenile (impossible to determine sex).bY, present (injury, disease, malformation); N, absent.cNe, Neanderthal; AMH, anatomically modern human.dD, dorsal; L, lying on left side; R, lying on right side; V, ventral; F, flexed; C, contracted; K, “kneeling”; E, extended (based on head-feet axis); S, “seated.”eW, west; E, east; N, north; S, south; SE, southeast; NW, northwest.fP, pit (visible or deduced); M, mound; H, hearth.

A significant number of graves were found with noassociated features, although most showed traces of apit. A few exhibited hearths or stone casings over theirheads and/or feet. No mounds were reported for any bur-ial of this period. Only a handful of burials had as manyas two associated features.

Finally, the vast majority of Early Upper Paleolithicburials appear to have contained grave goods of somekind. This pattern may be more apparent than real. It is

based on figures that include the four Cro-Magnon bur-ials claimed by May (1986:37–38) to be associated withover 300 shells and a single pendant. The association ofthis material with any of the Cro-Magnon skeletons isfar from unambiguous, and some writers discount it al-together (Oakley, Campbell, and Molleson 1971:104–5;Harrold 1980:205). If this were done here, the proportionof Early Upper Paleolithic graves unambiguously asso-ciated with grave goods would fall to three-quarters.


table 3Characteristics of Middle (N p 45) and Early Upper(N p 32) Paleolithic Burials Compared

Characteristic Middle Upper

SexMale 17 16Female 7 8Juvenile 20 6Unknown 1 2

Age0–1 7 12–10 12 311–15 1 316–30 9 1231–40 9 541–50 7 250� 0 3Unknown 0 3

PathologyPresent 8 4Absent 37 28

Physical typeNeanderthal 32 1Modern 13 30“Hybrid” 0 1

PlacementExtended 4 13Flexed 6 4Contracted 14 6Unknown 21 9

Resting planeDorsal 9 12Ventral 0 2Left 6 2Right 10 5Seated 1 0Kneeling 1 0Unknown 18 11

Grave orientationN 4 3NE 0 2E 6 2SE 2 0S 1 4SW 0 2W 7 0NW 1 3Unknown 21 16

Grave featuresPit 31 17Hearth 5 4Mound 8 0Stone casing 0 3

Number of features0 11 121 26 162 8 43 1 0

Grave goodsPresent 23 28Absent 22 4

The Middle and Early Upper PaleolithicCompared

Despite claims that both periods display definite regionalburial groups with fundamental similarities (Binford1968, Defleur 1993), the case for such clustering is shaky.While concentrations of Middle Paleolithic graves havebeen found in the French Perigord as well as in northernIsrael, these graves are not contemporaneous within thelimits of dating techniques and do not exhibit standard-

ized sets of mortuary practices. In fact, except for theprobably insignificant recurrence of grave orientation,these clusters do not appear to be internally consistentin the distribution of the variables analyzed in this study.This suggests that they represent random accumulationsof burials over long periods of time and that they werenot used as formal cemeteries by specific hominid groupswith different customs in the Middle Paleolithic. Simi-larly, for the Early Upper Paleolithic, although mostgraves were found clustered in the Grimaldi Caves inItaly (Balzo della Torre, Grotta del Caviglione, Grotta deiFanciulli) or near Pavlov Hill in Moravia (Dolnı Vesto-nice, Brno, Pavlov, Predmostı), the burial practices re-flected in individual graves in these “clusters” are quitevariable. In fact, most of the observable “within-cluster”similarities are derived from multiple burials. Multipleburials do appear, however, to be much more frequentin the Early Upper Paleolithic than in the Middle Pale-olithic, perhaps because increased population densitymade multiple simultaneous deaths a more frequentoccurrence.

Both samples have many more males than females,but the proportion of juveniles is much higher in theMiddle Paleolithic than in the Early Upper Paleolithic.Purposefully buried individuals do not constitute an ad-equate basis for reconstructing the population of whichthey were part, since it is likely that certain individualswere accorded preferential treatment as a result of statusand prestige derived from other aspects of their socialpersonae (Ubelaker 1978). Therefore it is hazardous totry to interpret this patterning, especially across time.The large number of buried juveniles in the Middle Pa-leolithic may reflect an emphasis on the value of youngindividuals or a higher juvenile death rate, but it wouldbe dangerous to accept either of these interpretationsgiven the extremely small and almost certainly non-representative sample available. Doing so would also im-ply acceptance of the reified interpretation of the Middleand Upper Paleolithic derived from typological syste-matics that portray them as distinct by definition (Bordes1961; Sonneville-Bordes and Perrot 1954, 1955, 1956).

Nothing reliable can be said of the position of the bod-ies or of grave orientation because for many graves fromboth periods these data are unrecorded. We can, however,say something about the prevalence of particular hom-inid taxa in the two periods; it is interesting that a Ne-anderthal and a “hybrid” are present in contexts that,defined typologically and chronometrically, are unques-tionable Early Upper Paleolithic.

Lagar Velho 1 is especially interesting in this regard.Indeed, the presence of this “hybrid” in a Gravettian orproto-Solutrean context dated to roughly 24,500 b.p.(Duarte et al. 1999, Trinkaus, Zilhao, and Duarte 1999)underscores the realization that first emerged with thediscovery of the Saint-Cesaire Neanderthal in a Chatel-perronian context (Leveque and Vandermeersch 1980,1981)—that “cultures” as defined by typological syste-matics cannot be equated with specific hominid “types”(Clark, cited in Norris 1999:46). Typological interpreta-tions are based on retouched stone tools, but the habit


of linking modern humans with symbolic behavior orburials inferred from the Upper Paleolithic archaeolog-ical record is simply an extension of that traditional ty-pological framework.

Comparing the number and kinds of features associ-ated with burials also results in interesting patterns. Pro-portionally more Middle Paleolithic than Early UpperPaleolithic burials have associated features, and MiddlePaleolithic burials have more of them. Except for Tar-amsa 1, which was covered by a mound, none of theMiddle Paleolithic modern human burials was associ-ated with more than a pit. The presence of pits is note-worthy here, since it is one of Gargett’s criteria for pur-poseful burial and he sees pits as absent in the MiddlePaleolithic. Roughly 70% of Middle Paleolithic graveswere reported as associated with a pit that either wasvisible to the excavators or could be inferred from theskeleton’s position. This is substantially more than theroughly 50% of Early Upper Paleolithic burials claimedto have included pits—pits that in all probability weredetected in much the same ways as in Middle Paleolithiccontexts. Mounds were reported only from Middle Pa-leolithic contexts, while stone casings were found as-sociated exclusively with the Early Upper Paleolithic.Mounds were, however, somewhat more frequent. Anumber of possible interpretations of this clear-cut pat-tern could be offered, but they would be of little utilitybecause the meaning attached to each is likely to beculture-specific.

The one variable that has repeatedly been argued toshow a strong dichotomy between Middle and Early Up-per Paleolithic burials is grave goods (Binford 1968, Har-rold 1980), although some believe they provide convinc-ing evidence of continuity (e.g., May 1986). The onlysupposedly empirical treatment to which grave goodshave been subjected is Harrold’s “diversity index.” Whatshould in fact be measured, however, is not so much thedifference between the two periods as variation withinthem. If grave goods are consistently the same withineach period, then we cannot use them to monitor changein mortuary behavior. The differences in the nature ofthe grave goods characteristic of each period could beexplained in a number of ways. For example, recent workby Stiner in Italy and Israel has shown that small gameand shellfish were increasingly incorporated into UpperPaleolithic diets but were virtually absent in some areasduring the Middle Paleolithic (Stiner 1994, Stiner,Munro, and Surovell 2000). If this was indeed the case,the presence of discarded shells and the bones of smallanimals in Early Upper Paleolithic burials would surelyconstitute little evidence for a significant “cognitiveleap” over the Middle Paleolithic pattern of includingthe discarded bones of large mammals in graves. A sim-ilar argument could be made about the “incised” mam-moth scapulae reported from a number of Eastern Eu-ropean Early Upper Paleolithic burials.

Similarly, ochre, which becomes relatively commonin Early Upper Paleolithic graves, can be explained infunctional rather than symbolic terms. It could have pro-vided better insulation against cold and humidity, pro-

duced smoother surfaces on ground and polished bonebeads, served as an astringent or antiseptic, or evenslowed down putrefaction (Wreschner 1980; May 1986:203–4). Therefore its presence in graves may simply in-dicate knowledge of a useful substance that was gradu-ally invested with aesthetic and/or ritual properties overthe course of the Upper Paleolithic. Its occurrence insome of the Qafzeh burials shows that it was known(and probably used) in the Middle Paleolithic. This sug-gests that it may have come into widespread use onlylater, perhaps after 20,000 years b.p.

In any case, even if the Cro-Magnon burials are ex-cluded from the count, a higher proportion of Early UpperPaleolithic than Middle Paleolithic burials are associatedwith relatively unambiguous grave goods. The propor-tional difference between the two is significant. Ratherthan suggesting a radical behavioral departure in theEarly Upper Paleolithic, however, what this pattern sug-gests to us is the emergence of a behavior that appearsto have been already well established in the MiddlePaleolithic.

Although Early Upper Paleolithic grave goods tend toinclude bracelets, headdresses, necklaces, armbands, andother ornaments in contrast to the animal bones foundin Middle Paleolithic contexts, it is now clear that Mid-dle Paleolithic Neanderthals did manufacture some or-naments (see d’Errico et al. 1998 for a review of some ofthe evidence). Given the evidence of continuity sug-gested by the inclusion of stone tools in many burials ofboth periods, this suggests that the meaning originallyassociated with unworked bones or bone fragments maygradually have come to be embodied by ornaments. Thegradual nature of this phenomenon is supported by theco-occurrence of animal bones and ornaments at EarlyUpper Paleolithic sites such as Pavlov, Dolnı Vestonice,and Lagar Velho. Perhaps the higher incidence of gravefeatures in the Middle Paleolithic sample also reflectsthis phenomenon. It is, of course, impossible to knowthe precise meanings these grave goods had for the ex-tinct societies of which they were once part. Their time/space distributions are orders of magnitude beyond thoseof any real or imaginable foraging society or group ofsocieties known to us from ethnography (Clark 1993). Itis indisputable, however, that grave goods were an in-tegral part of mortuary practices starting in the MiddlePaleolithic and increased in frequency in later peri-ods—slowly during the Early Upper Paleolithic and morerapidly in the Late Upper Paleolithic (Duff, Clark, andChadderdon 1992).

Discussion and Conclusions

Comparing the Middle and Early Upper Paleolithic ev-idence for burial proves to be an illuminating exercise.Gargett’s assumption that “the Upper Paleolithic evi-dence reveals differences that obviate the need for a com-parison between the two” (1999:30) is wrong. Indeed, thepicture that emerges is one of broad continuity betweenthe two periods. That said, there is also little doubt that


analyzing burials from the Upper Paleolithic en blocwould show a quite different picture, as is suggested bythe pioneering studies of Binford (1968) and Harrold(1980). This is largely because of the numerical domi-nance of Late Upper Paleolithic, especially Magdalenian,burials that postdate 20,000 years b.p. (Duff, Clark, andChadderdon 1992). However, the continuity clearly vis-ible in the mortuary data of the Middle and Early UpperPaleolithic suggests that the Upper Paleolithic taken asa whole is not an appropriate unit of comparison. A com-parison of the patterns derived from an analysis of LateUpper Paleolithic burials with the patterns here identi-fied for the Early Upper Paleolithic is under way.

The continuity documented across the Middle–UpperPaleolithic transition, at least as far as burials are con-cerned, cannot be reconciled with the radical culturechange at the onset of the Early Upper Paleolithic en-visioned by most replacement advocates (e.g., Mellars1989, 1996). It also contrasts sharply with Gargett’s ex-pectations about the Upper Paleolithic as a whole. Itwould appear from all this that the Upper Paleolithic asa category is not a very useful analytical tool (see alsoLindly and Clark 1990, Straus 1990, Stiner 1994, Kuhn1995). Subdivision into early (40,000–20,000 years b.p.)and late (20,000–10,000 years b.p.) phases would make ita much better framework for examining the behavioraland biological processes that were taking place in West-ern Eurasia at the time (Duff, Clark, and Chadderdon1992).

The results of the work reported here reinforce thoseof studies of lithic and faunal assemblages and of sitesettings and context in underscoring the problems as-sociated with uncritical use of temporal constructs de-rived from typological systematics (Clark and Lindly1991, Dibble and Rolland 1992, Bisson 2000). While use-ful as a descriptive tool and a lingua franca for scholars,la methode Bordes, besides masking much variability inthe archaeological record, is based on unsupported as-sumptions about qualitative differences between moreor less arbitrary phases of the Paleolithic. The findingspresented here call into question the basis for this tra-ditional approach to the interpretation of Upper Pleis-tocene assemblages.

In sum, categorical rejection of Middle Paleolithic bur-ial is clearly unwarranted, and the continued use of tra-ditional temporal and conceptual frameworks in Paleo-lithic research is in need of serious rethinking. Suchrethinking should not be undertaken in the spirit of de-fending entrenched positions in the modern-human-or-igins debate, although it will likely have a significantimpact on them. Rather, it should be part of an effort toincrease the credibility of our interpretations, an objec-tive often sidelined in scholarly disputes despite its cen-tral importance in affirming the significance and unique-ness of archaeology as a form of scientific inquiry.

Comments

ia in davidson and william nobleSchool of Human and Environmental Studies/Schoolof Psychology, University of New England, Armidale,N.S.W. 2351, Australia ([email protected]).31 iii 01

Riel-Salvatore and Clark do not address what Gargett(1999) demonstrated. Gargett’s point was that the goodtaphonomic information from well-excavated Neander-tal skeletons allows discussion of the taphonomic his-tories of the bodies. He showed that among the remainsof Neandertals claimed as burials, two processes seemto have operated. On the one hand are bodies crushedby rockfall like beer cans that someone has stomped on.These tend to be complete but broken collections ofbones, as at Shanidar and Saint-Cesaire. This process isalso evident in the bodies of “early modern humans,”contemporary with Neandertals, from Qafzeh. On theother hand are bodies that had lain in natural depressionsin the sediment such as might have been formed by cry-oturbation at La Ferrassie. Natural processes of sedimentformation had generally covered these bodies slowly; thetypical absence of significant limb segments stronglysuggested that the meat had rotted before interment ofthe bodies. This taphonomic history would explain theabsence of the skull from the Kebara 2 skeleton. Therewill be modern human bodies in caves for the same tworeasons as for Neandertals. That people were wanderingaround in dangerous landscapes long after the emergenceof modern human morphology is shown by Otzi, theNeolithic body found in the Austrian/Italian Alps (Spin-dler 1994).

The inclusion of Saint-Cesaire in table 2 confirms ourexpectation that “beer cans”/rockfall victims occurredafter 40,000 years ago, and we have no doubt that somebodies from this period would have been found withmissing parts just like the “rotten meat” Neandertals.The numbers of bodies subject to the Neandertal ta-phonomy will be much smaller because the time periodis shorter. If there were about 12 “beer cans” in the100,000 years of table 1, in the 20,000 years of table 2there should be about 2. This in itself suggests that thereis something rather different about the Early Upper Pa-laeolithic sample that would account for the larger num-bers of bodies per thousand years, and indeed there issomething different. Many of the burials are in theopen—certainly Dolnı Vestonice, Pavlov, Brno, Pred-mostı, and Sungir are—and there are none in the openfor the sample in table 1. We have commented elsewhere(Noble and Davidson 1996) that a single open-air “burial”of a Neandertal would do more to confirm the hypothesisof Neandertal deliberate burial than any manipulationof the currently available (and not very reliable) evidence.The presence of burials of modern humans in the open,of course, is not unexpected, as the earliest (and earlier)burials of modern humans in Australia are also in the


open (Davidson 1999a). Nothing could be a clearer in-dication of the danger of ignoring taphonomic histories.That there are more bodies per thousand years in thesample in table 2 is itself suggestive of different occur-rences affecting the items in the two tables, and furtheranalysis of the samples reveals what that differenceis—modern humans were and Neandertals were not de-liberately buried.

It comes as a surprise, therefore, that Riel-Salvatoreand Clark argue that there is a similarity between table1 and table 2. Inspection of the data in table 2 shows theextent to which they have been willing to overlook ev-idence that they present. A x2 test on the frequencies ofgrave goods in the two sets of data gives a value (x2 p9.5), which is highly significant (p ! 0.01). Further in-spection of the nature of the grave goods confirms a sub-stantial difference between table 1 and table 2—all of thethings claimed as grave goods in table 1 occur as part ofthe debris left in caves used by Neandertals and mighthave washed into natural hollows as part of the normalsedimentation process. This has been pointed out beforeby Harrold (1980). The grave goods in table 2 are differentfrom what is found in the earlier sample and would beeasier to associate with symbolic structuring of the world(albeit we acknowledge the need for caution pointed outby Riel-Salvatore and Clark).

We have classified the specimens from table 1 accord-ing to Gargett’s (1999: fig. 9) analysis of “beer cans” (Qaf-zeh, Shanidar, Dederiyeh) and “rotten meat” (La Cha-pelle-aux-Saints, La Ferrassie, Le Roc de Marsal, Amud,Kebara, and Kiik-Koba). We omit Teshik Tash because itis so clearly ravaged that little can be said about theoriginal state of deposition of the body except that it wasnot buried. “Grave goods” are rare with the “beer cans,”and those with the “rotten meat” are mostly lithics.There are two possible scenarios that do not require thesefinds to be grave goods. Either the “rotten meat” hadtheir gear with them, like Otzi, and died in their beds,or the lithics washed into the natural hollows where theydied. The fact that most of those in the sample were thejuveniles from La Ferrassie suggests that these are wash-ins, as it may be less likely that very young infants werecarrying their gear. The “beer cans” did not generallyhave grave goods (except for the flowers—and these havebeen dismissed many times [Gamble 1989; Gargett 1989;Noble and Davidson 1989, 1996]). We might be temptedto go farther and suggest that Neandertals may not havecarried gear with them in the manner of Otzi anyway,but carrying seems to have been the distinctive homi-nine adaptation since 2.5 million years ago. It is morelikely that they did not sleep with their gear.

Overall, then, the data in tables 1, 2, and 3 show thatthere was a substantial difference between the bodiesthat date earlier than the Early Upper Palaeolithic andthe sample of later ones. Riel-Salvatore and Clark haveelegantly confirmed the importance of Gargett’s (1999)analysis. Neandertals (and contemporary early modernpeople) were not buried; people from the Upper Palaeo-lithic (and contemporary people in other parts of theworld) often were. This is a separate matter from the

issue of variation in symbolic behaviour during the Up-per Palaeolithic (Davidson 1997, 1999b).

f . d ’errico and m. vanhaerenInstitut de Prehistoire et de Geologie du Quaternaire,CNRS, and Universite Bordeaux I, Talence, France([email protected]). 3 iv 01

The potential of Palaeolithic burials for the debate onthe origin of symbolism and, by extension, of articulatedoral language and cultural modernity has been often un-derestimated, and the literature on the subject is mainlycomposed of surveys, mostly of old finds, and osteolog-ically based descriptions. Therefore, we welcome Riel-Salvatore and Clark’s attempt to use burials as an in-dependent means of evaluating processes of biologicaland cultural change during the Upper Pleistocene. Thatsaid, we find that their attempt has some majorweaknesses.

The assumption on which they base their analy-sis—that the earliest phases of a cultural phenomenonmust necessarily be characterized by simpler forms ofbehaviour—should certainly be substantiated before be-ing accepted as a reliable theoretical framework. Notonly have many cultural anthropologists already criti-cized this faith in the continuous and inexorable progressof mankind (e.g., Kuper 1988) but also one can wonderwhether mortuary practices are the best place to applysuch a model. As is shown by the ethnography of tra-ditional societies, complex cultural systems may becharacterized by simple burials with high archaeologicalvisibility or, alternatively, complex mortuary practicesthat leave little or no archaeological evidence. Also, du-rable grave goods may be absent in burials produced byhighly complex societies. We see, in principle, no reasonthis should have been different in Upper and even MiddlePalaeolithic societies. If we are right, the pattern thatRiel-Salvatore and Clark try to read as a process mayinstead represent snapshots of behaviours from differentsocieties with equivalent cognitive abilities. It would, inthis case, be only the presence or absence of funerarypractices rather than their apparent variability that mat-ters for identifying evolutionary trends.

We see a major epistemological problem in Riel-Sal-vatore and Clark’s way of “testing” Gargett’s naturalinterpretation. It is not by comparing and looking fordifferences between Middle Palaeolithic and Upper Pa-laeolithic burials that one can establish whether the for-mer are natural or anthropic in origin. We need naturalanalogies to test natural interpretations, and it is pre-cisely the lack of these analogies that, in our view, keepsthe debate on Neandertal burial practices open and even-tually weakens Gargett’s position. The inadequacy ofRiel-Salvatore and Clark’s approach is demonstrated bythe fact that, according to their model, they would haveconsidered the Middle Palaeolithic burials natural in or-igin if they had found significant differences betweenthem and the Upper Paleolithic burials. Still, given thevariability of mortuary practices in traditional societies


(see Pearson 1999), differences between Middle Palaeo-lithic and Upper Palaeolithic burials do not imply thenatural origin of the former and may, in the absence ofa natural analogue, simply reflect cultural changes withno evolutionary implications. In other words, we cannotoblige Middle Palaeolithic people to bury their dead inthe same way Upper Palaeolithic people did to grantthem the right to be incorporated into modern humanitywhile at the same time claiming diversity of mortuarypractices to be a hallmark of cultural modernity.

We also have reservations about the criteria used hereto separate the Middle from the Upper Palaeolithic andsubdivide the latter. The chronological criterion—beforeand after 40,000 b.p.—is of little value considering theuncertainty of the dating methods of this period and thefact that most of the burials are not directly dated. Theblade/flake ratio is even more inadequate. Blade-basedindustries occur in the Middle Palaeolithic, and not justin the Near East (Bar-Yosef and Kuhn 1999), and flake-based industries occur in the Upper Palaeolithic. The useof this last criterion seems to overlook the contributionto the characterization of Palaeolithic industries of re-cent technological studies (see Zilhao and d’Errico1999a:357 for an extensive discussion). These studieshave shown that Upper Palaeolithic technocomplexes,seen as chronologically and spatially defined technicalsystems, are useful analytical entities for exploring cul-tural variability, including changes in mortuary prac-tices, and the ecological adaptation of European hunter-gatherers during oxygen-isotope stages 3–2. Independentof their views on the transition, most of our colleaguesshare with us the opinion that insight into this timeperiod will not be reached without a better characteri-zation of these entities. Riel-Salvatore and Clark’s cru-sade against the Upper Palaeolithic technocomplexes iseven more surprising given that they use chronologicallimits between technocomplexes (Gravettian/Solutrean)to establish an “arbitrary” frontier within the Upper Pa-laeolithic. Why not, instead, get rid of all chronologicalbarriers and look for significant clusters in the availabledata? This would be more coherent and avoid the im-pression that boundaries are being chosen to fit themodel.

Criticisms can also be leveled at their database. Giventhat many scholars believe that the placing of gravegoods in Neandertal burials has not been unambiguouslyproven, a thorough examination of the evidence, includ-ing observations on site taphonomy, should have beentheir first concern. This does not appear in their list,which incorporates almost all of the claimed evidence,sometimes dubious, for symbolic behaviour associatedwith Middle Palaeolithic burials.

Incidentally, Riel-Salvatore and Clark group Zilhaoand d’Errico with researchers such as Mellars who “arguethat despite their ability to act symbolically, Neander-thals apparently never ‘refined’ this capacity to the samedegree as modern humans and were therefore con-demned to be replaced by them.” From the debate onthis topic (see d’Errico et al. 1998; Zilhao and d’Errico1999a, b; Mellars 1999) it is clear that they defend a quite

opposite view—that Neandertals were fully capable ofsymbolic behaviours and may even have produced thembefore contact with anatomically modern humans, as issuggested by archaeological evidence, notably from Arcy,and a critical reappraisal of relevant sites and C14 dates.Riel-Salvatore and Clark’s attempt to examine the em-pirical evidence without any wishful thinking about ahuman type’s cognitive abilities in fact complementsZilhao and d’Errico’s effort, which was, however, carriedout in a quite different theoretical framework.

robert h. gargettArchaeology and Palaeoanthropology, School ofHuman and Environmental Studies, University ofNew England, Armidale, N.S.W. 2351, Australia([email protected]). 1 iv 01

Riel-Salvatore and Clark caricature my recent contri-butions (see also Gargett 2000) by implying that Gargett(1999) is nothing more than a replay of Gargett (1989)when in fact it examines a wide range of processes thatdetermine the preservation of skeletons in caves androck-shelters. Furthermore, instead of grappling with theissues I raise they defer to Binford (1968), Harrold (1980),and Defleur (1993), none of whom has adequately ex-amined the variables with which I deal in my recentarticle. Their unwillingness to acknowledge my misgiv-ings about what they treat as evidence for burial severelyhobbles their argument. Beyond this, their paper hasother serious failings.

First, their argument begs the question whether pur-poseful burial occurred in the Middle Paleolithic. Their“sample” of Middle Paleolithic “burials” includes onlythose specimens that conform to criteria they say allowone to infer purposeful burial. If this is truly a test ofwhat they claim is my “position” (i.e., that purposefulburial first occurred in the Upper Paleolithic), why dothey ignore the many fragmentary Middle Paleolithic re-mains? The relatively few more-or-less-intact specimensclaimed as burials represent only a small subset of asample that describes a continuum of preservation in-cluding, for example, single fragments, disarticulated,fragmented, and incomplete skeletons, articulated por-tions of skeletons, articulated complete or nearly com-plete skeletons, and everything in between. The vast ma-jority of Middle Paleolithic specimens fall into the firsttwo of these categories, and the vast majority of putativeburials fall into the third; only a few could be consideredcomplete or nearly so. Riel-Salvatore and Clark draw theline opportunistically at various places along that con-tinuum. Clearly, this is stacking the deck in favor of theirhoped-for outcome.

Furthermore, they contend that they began by select-ing articulated specimens and included only those forwhich other archaeological discoveries supported the in-ference of purposeful burial. Yet their sample includes anumber of specimens that are anything but articulated(to say nothing of those for which the degree of articu-lation is a matter of interpretation)–for example, Teshik-


Tash, Regourdou, La Ferrassie 4a, and Saint-Cesaire.These specimens were apparently included because of abelief that they had been purposefully buried based onfragments of bone or chipped stone interpreted as funeralofferings and inferences of invisible pits and other so-called ritual structures. Thus, Riel-Salvatore and Clark’ssampling technique has the effect of skewing the dataon which their test is to be conducted.

Perhaps most damaging to their argument, the “evi-dence” that Riel-Salvatore and Clark employ is at bestequivocal. For example, in the absence of articulation asa sign of purposeful burial, interpreting Teshik-Tash’sgoat horns as a ritual structure depends on the belief thatthe individual had been purposefully buried (or at leastthat Neandertals were capable of burying their dead). Inmuch the same category is the claim that the moundsat La Ferrassie are “ritual structures,” which fails to takeinto account the obvious, abundant evidence of cry-oturbation in stratum c/d (from which all of the remainsat La Ferrassie derive). The mounds that Peyrony (1934)describes are in all probability sediments that have beendistorted and convoluted by cryoturbation. Laville andTuffreau’s (1984) photograph of the witness profile at LaFerrassie clearly shows the result of cryoturbation instratum c/d, and Heim (1968) includes a profile thatclearly and unequivocally illustrates the convoluted sed-iments. Four of these convolutions are on the order of50 cm high. However, in Heim’s diagram the tops of atleast two of them are leaning to one side and have theshape of cresting waves. Such a profile could not haveoccurred if the mounds had been artificially created andlater covered naturally with sediment (unless they werethen subjected to cryoturbation—a coincidence that Iwould find it hard to imagine, although it is impossibleto rule it out). Here, then, are the present-day remnantsof “mounds” like the nine so often considered mortuarystructures. With clear evidence for cryoturbation just afew meters away from the putative burial mounds, mustone go on believing that they were created with a ritualpurpose in mind?

Finally, Riel-Salvatore and Clark’s criteria for assessingbehavioral “continuity” are only weakly justified. Onthe face of it, comparing the Middle Paleolithic with theUpper Paleolithic is a reasonable test of what they callmy “hypothesis.” But is it reasonable to suggest thatsignificant patterns will be observable on both sides ofthe Middle/Upper Paleolithic “boundary”? The answerseems to depend on one’s definition of “significant” andone’s choice of “pattern.”

There is, first of all, the straightforward kind of patternthat one can read off the skeletons—sex, age, patholog-ical lesions. But sex and age are “straightforward” onlyif one overlooks the difficulty of, for example, determin-ing sex in skeletons that are, more often than not, miss-ing the telltale pubic architecture, requiring a determi-nation based on robusticity and comparison withpresent-day human sexual dimorphism. Assessing rela-tive robusticity is in no way straightforward in a veryrobust, biogeographically widespread morphospeciessuch as the Neandertals, which have an unknown degree

of sexual dimorphism. What this means for Riel-Salva-tore and Clark’s data on differential mortuary treatmentis an open question, but one can certainly be skepticalabout their conclusions. They seem unconcerned thatmany of these “patterns” are reified categories that havetheir origin in the questionable interpretations of otherarchaeologists.

Next there is the kind of pattern that one needs toargue more strenuously for. For example, Riel-Salvatoreand Clark aver that fragments of bone might just rep-resent the beginning of a trajectory of cultural transfor-mation that sees them as the meaningfully constitutedMiddle Paleolithic equivalent of the carved images andornaments of the Early Upper Paleolithic. Although thisis a plausible scenario, it is by no means the basis for anunequivocal inference of “continuity.”

The most egregious misuse of the notion of pattern isin their so-called burial features (primarily pits andmounds). We are told that there are 31 pits associatedwith Middle Paleolithic remains, and these are presentedas support for claims of purposeful burial. In all cases ofunobservable pits, the inference that the pit once existeddepends on the a priori assumption that the individualhad been purposefully buried—more circular argument.Moreover, such pits could just as easily be seen as pre-requisite for natural burial. Low spots (regardless of howthey were created, and there are many natural ways) pro-mote natural burial. Under the circumstances it is hardto see such “evidence” as compelling, especially giventhat the very few observable depressions were filled notwith the same sediments into which they were dug,which would be expected in a purposeful burial, but withthe same sediments that overlie those into which theywere dug, which is strongly suggestive of natural in-fill-ing and in any case precludes the use of the pit or lowspot as unequivocal support for the claim of purposefulburial.

All of Riel-Salvatore and Clark’s conclusions rest onarguments from want of evident alternatives. Ultimatelytheir argument is fallacious and their analysis uncon-vincing because both rest on the a priori acceptance ofshakily supported claims of purposeful Middle Paleo-lithic burial.

I am resigned to the reality that most paleoanthro-pologists will never be persuaded by my “position,” butI hope that readers will see that my skepticism is rig-orously empirical and grounded in a nuanced under-standing of archaeological site formation. Moreover, Ihope that they will see this paper for what it is—a whole-sale recycling of dubious archaeological claims in thepursuit of evidence for the regional “continuity” modelof modern human origins.

erella hovers and anna belfer-cohenInstitute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University ofJerusalem, Jerusalem 91905, Israel ([email protected]). 30 iii 01

Tracing uniquely human behaviors has always been afocal point of prehistoric research. Riel-Salvatore and


Clark are to be congratulated for bringing to the forefrontof contemporary discussion the complexities of the ar-chaeological record concerning intentional human burialin the Middle and Upper Paleolithic. They achieve thisby confronting the available data instead of acceptingGargett’s (1999:30) premise that “the Upper Paleolithicevidence reveals differences [in burial behavior] that ob-viate the need for a comparison” between these twoperiods.

Indeed, in the Paleolithic we are dealing with time andspace distribution orders of magnitude greater than those“of any real or imaginable foraging society or group ofsocieties known to us from ethnography.” Another im-portant point made by Riel-Salvatore and Clark is thatthe simplistic equation of culture with hominid type iscounterproductive to attempts to understand culturechange at the Middle/Upper Paleolithic boundary. Withthese points taken, a caveat is called for: human behavioris multifaceted, encompassing as it does constituentswhich are variably and not always understandably in-terrelated. Dealing with the Paleolithic, we rest assuredthat the unfolding record is one of mosaic cultural ev-olution rather than of a linear trajectory of change. Un-derstanding the Paleolithic story depends on the scale ofone’s observations and insights as it does on the datathemselves. Unquestionably, human behavior becomesmore complex through time, but when observed in morerestricted time spans the Paleolithic pattern of culturechange is clearly not linear. At any given time and place,some behaviors may change gradually while others re-main static and yet others may undergo dramatic mod-ifications. The European Middle and Upper Paleolithicrecord is a case in point.

Much of the recent anthropological literature epito-mizes intentional burial as the marker of a plethora ofsymbolic capacities (see Gargett 1999 and referencestherein). But the existence of intentional burial in theMiddle Paleolithic record speaks only to the presence ofthis particular behavior as part of the cultural packageof hominids at this time. Intentional burial is not as-sociated exclusively with any one of the hominid taxaknown from this time span (Belfer-Cohen and Hovers1992, Schepartz 1993, Tillier 1990) and may well be anexpression of a shared, “pleisiomorphic” capacity forsymbolic behavior (Hayden 1993, Hovers et al. 1995).From the perspective of mosaic cultural evolution, theoccurrence of intentional burial need not be taken apriori as an indication of the existence of other symbolicbehaviors, nor is it a yardstick against which the inten-sity of other symbolic behaviors can be measured. Byextension, where change through time is patterned asmosaic evolution, the rate of change in mortuary behav-ior cannot be used as a proxy for the tempo and modeof cultural evolution. It is for this reason that, even ifone accepts that mortuary behavior changed graduallyfrom the Middle Paleolithic to the Early Upper Paleo-lithic, the occurrence of large-scale parietal art in theEarly Upper Paleolithic, ca. 30,000 years ago, at Chauvetand Cosquer Caves (Bahn and Vertut 1997) remains un-accounted for. Other mechanisms need to be invoked in

order to explain first the revolutionary and dramatic ap-pearance of such art and second its coexistence with therelatively conservative mortuary behavior.

Moreover, gradual shift in burial practices does notappear to be an all-inclusive pattern of change throughtime between the Middle and the Early Upper Paleo-lithic. Gradualism is more apparent than real for somecharacteristics of burials, as is clearly seen from Riel-Salvatore and Clark’s table 3. For instance, at Sungir, anEarly Upper Paleolithic site dated to 30,000–25,000 yearsago (Bader 1998:217), the sheer numbers (over 13,000beads) and variety of grave goods are overwhelming(Bader 1998:72–73, 77; Gamble 1994:186–87). Certainlythis site resembles more the finds known from the LateUpper Paleolithic than it does accepted instances of in-tentional burial in the Middle Paleolithic.

Gradual transformation as the main explanatorymechanism of culture change masks the boundaries be-tween “cultures.” The differences among the Chatel-perronian (considered to be a Mousterian-based tradi-tion), the Aurignacian (believed to be intrusive intoWestern Europe), and the regional variants of the Grav-ettian (d’Errico et al. 1998, Otte and Keeley 1990) areobliterated when burial data are used to treat the EarlyUpper Paleolithic as a whole. These classifications andcultural subdivisions of the entities of the Early UpperPaleolithic rely mainly on lithic techno-typological cri-teria and certainly have their problems. Nevertheless,classifications of this type are more consistent with thedynamics of the period, including population move-ments and influx into Europe during the time span ofthe Early Upper Paleolithic (e.g., Semino et al. 2001).

While the article deals with a particular phenomenonof human behavior, it relates to a profound analyticalissue—the “measure” of the phenomena observed in thearchaeological record. It seems that whenever we suc-ceed in obtaining an answer that has eluded us for years(in the case, the validity of Middle Paleolithic burials),we have to face the consequences of that answer. Theseare rarely, if ever, simple or clear-cut. One way to cometo terms with this unsettling reality is by rememberingthat this is, in fact, the normative procedure of scientificinquiry.

grover s . krantz363 Gunn Rd., Port Angeles, Wash. 98362, U.S.A.([email protected]). 2 ii 01

Riel-Salvatore and Clark have done rather well in fol-lowing the modern rules of successful publication: (1)keep the subject as narrow as possible to minimize thenumber of people who are qualified or likely to criticizeit; (2) quantify all data for at least arithmetic manipu-lation (statistics is better and computer analysis is best);(3) follow Established Doctrine wherever possible; and(4) provide an impressive bibliography that proves thatyou did your homework.

Their biggest failing is in rule 1, where they have in-cluded both Middle Paleolithic (Mousterian) and Early


Upper Paleolithic interments and covered the fairly largearea of Europe and the Near East; there are simply toomany people who are or believe they are familiar withthis subject. Still, they have managed to keep their da-tabase down to just 77 examples. Their major opponent,Gargett, did somewhat better with rule 1 by coveringonly the earlier time zone and using far fewer examples,but at least they avoid the Later Upper Paleolithic andstay out of the rest of the world.

The quantification of data (rule 2) is a bit looser thanmight be desirable because so much information is miss-ing or unclear, but the arithmetic treatment is as detailedas the data allow. At least they are able to make a fairlygood case, given these data, for a less-than-dramaticchange of interment circumstances at the Middle-to-Early-Upper Paleolithic boundary.

They follow rule 3 in accepting without question thatthe Skhul and Qafzeh burials are of Mousterian date. Idisagree, however, and hope soon to publish some in-formation showing that the Skhul burials were almostcertainly about 35,000 years old and those at Qafzeh per-haps a bit more recent. What bothers me most is theiracceptance of La Ferrassie as “definite” burials when theexcavators themselves (Capitan and Peyrony in 1909,cited in Boule and Vallois 1952:215) stated quite clearlythat there was no evidence to this effect. Without themRiel-Salvatore and Clark’s picture of a gradual transitionfrom Middle through Upper Paleolithic would be greatlyaltered. Their conclusion is an apparent requirement ofthe multiregional-evolution theory. An alternative viewwould be of a remarkably rapid in-place transition. Forthis to have been the case, the reason for that transitionwould have to be correctly identified.

My inclusion of rule 4 will annoy some of my goodfriends. For students’ papers, the bigger the bibliographythe better—it shows that they have read all the pertinentmaterial. For a professional paper the practice ought tobe to cite only enough sources to avoid plagiarism andthose that the usual readers might want to consult.

Despite all of the above, I find some useful contribu-tions here. The need to decouple Early from Late UpperPaleolithic is not sufficiently appreciated, and yes, thereis clear continuity from Mousterian to their immediatesuccessors in Europe in terms of lithic techniques andskeletal remains, while in the Levant this seems not tobe the case. Until the appearance of the Chatelperronianthere was no change in the Mousterian Neandertalsother than the beginning of tooth-size reduction (Brace1995). It was gratifying to learn that the rare occurrencesof Mousterian red ochre had been rubbed on hard sur-faces, not on soft bodies. What is most conspicuouslymissing is any successful explanation of why the earliestUpper Paleolithic in Europe included Neandertalswhereas the Mousterian in the Levant included someskeletons of more modern anatomy. What was the natureof the cultural transition, and how did it relate to humananatomy?

lars larssonInstitute of Archaeology, University of Lund, S-223 50Lund, Sweden ([email protected]). 31 iii 01

There are good arguments both for and against the ex-istence of deliberate burials in the Middle Palaeolithic.Let us hope that the debate over natural processes versusculturally based activities will continue. What tends toreceive less consideration is the fact that burial is an actrooted in a mental conceptual world. It is not just a ques-tion of the criteria for regarding a collection of humanbones as a grave but also what variations within a cri-terion one is prepared to accept.

We project our own conceptions of symbolic acts ontoa culture borne by Neanderthal man—a species seem-ingly different from our own, with a conceptual worldwhich may have differed significantly from that repre-sented by Homo sapiens sapiens. This is why Riel-Sal-vatore and Clark’s claim to be able to distinguish clearsimilarities in the treatment of human bodies during theMiddle Palaeolithic and Early Upper Palaeolithic is soimportant. Certain differences are suggested betweenburials in this period and those in the later Upper Pa-laeolithic. Further interesting aspects of mortuary prac-tice could also have been considered. One of these is thepreservation of the skeleton. If only complete, articu-lated skeletons are accepted as evidence of burial (Gar-gett 1999), many finds will probably be excluded. At theend of the Upper Palaeolithic and the beginning of theMesolithic, there are several instances in which consid-erable handling and circulation of skeletal parts occurredboth peri- and postmortem (Cauwe 1998, Cook 1991).Articulated skeletons are rarely found here, which meansthat these cases are not included among burials. Yet thereare strong indications that human bones were used inrituals associated with conceptions about the specialstatus of humans, and there is no doubt that they rep-resent traces of actions with symbolic value.

This means that the identification of collections ofhuman bones as graves is not really such an importantissue. Is it not more important to try to discover thepreconditions for the deliberate handling and depositionof skeletal parts, using arguments for or against someform of symbolic act? In this context the assessment ofthe Early Palaeolithic hominid remains from Atapuercaassumes significance (Bahn 1996). The same applies tothe interpretation of the distribution of hominid remainsand other bones at the Early Palaeolithic site of Bilzings-leben—whether as a form of symbolic handling (Mania1998:51–55) or the result of natural taphonomic pro-cesses (Gamble 1999:172). If it is possible to distinguishspecial patterns in the distribution and composition ofthese skeletal parts, then they are of more significancefor abstract thinking about ideas on the treatment of thebody after death than complete skeletons in cavedeposits.

The discussion of grave goods in conjunction withskeletons can scarcely be left as a simple matter of pres-ence versus absence. This is clear from observations fromMesolithic burials (Larsson 1993)—admittedly much


later than those studied here but nevertheless capable ofproviding important insights into human behaviour overtime and space. Here deliberately deposited objects occurnot just alongside the interred but, in several cases, inthe grave fill a few centimetres above it. This makes thequestion of grave goods more complicated. It has notbeen possible to determine whether such deposits canbe compared to the “real” grave goods in the Middle andUpper Palaeolithic graves discussed here.

If, with Gargett, one assumes that some deaths werecaused by rockfalls, one may wonder why similar oc-currences are not found in southern Africa, where nu-merous caves were inhabited during the Middle Palaeo-lithic—although it should be pointed out that relativelyfew have been studied in detail. That rockfalls really didoccur is clear from the pieces of cliff found in the stra-tigraphies. If they were a common cause of death, notonly humans but also other cave-dwelling animals, suchas hyenas, would be found in more or less undisturbedpositions. This aspect does not appear to have beenconsidered.

Gargett argues ad absurdum in cases where a naturaldeath on account of natural processes cannot be ruledout. It would be more rewarding to learn his criteria foraccepting something as a grave. Riel-Salvatore and Clarkhave adopted more creative approach. We must keep inmind that we are not going to arrive at an unambiguousview of the occurrence of burials during the Middle Pa-laeolithic or even, in certain cases, the Upper Palaeo-lithic. It is important, however, that the phenomenoncontinue to be critically studied, chiefly with argumentsfor and against the criteria for interpreting remains asthe result of a conscious act of symbolic relevance.

alexander marshackPeabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology,Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. 02138, U.S.A.1 iv 01

Riel-Salvatore and Clark have evaluated the flaws in Gar-gett’s arguments and data concerning Middle Paleolithicburial and symboling capacity. I agree with much of theirpresentation and will not dwell on the details. However,having for years argued for a broad and diverse range ofpre- and early Upper Paleolithic symboling and problem-solving capacities, I present some data and pose somequestions concerning the presence or absence of Paleo-lithic burial data that may have relevance to the issuesthey raise.

Riel-Salvatore and Clark note that the dating and sig-nificance of the beads and imagery found in the multipleburial at Cro-Magnon have been questioned. There aredata at Cro-Magnon that raise issues of a different type.The left temple of the female interred in the same caveof Cro-Magnon has a hole the size and the shape of aspear point. When Paul Broca, the neuroanatomist whohad recently found that language could be disabled byinjury to the left frontal lobe, examined it, in the 19thcentury, he wrote that a “flint instrument” had appar-

ently produced the hole and that “the width of the open-ing shows that the brain must have been injured . . . butthe skull shows that she survived some 15 days” (Broca1873). The woman would probably have had some lossof language or cognition. When I reported Broca’s de-scription (Marshack 1985) I was informed by numerouscolleagues that there was no evidence of interpersonalviolence or intergroup aggression in the Upper Paleo-lithic. An argument against Broca’s interpretation of thehole was, in fact, published some years later, suggestingthat it had probably been caused by the pickaxe of aworker during the excavation (Delluc and Delluc 1989).A macrophoto of the hole, prepared for me by M. Sakkaof the Musee de l’Homme, documents a rounding of theedge in a process of healing rather than the jagged edgethat would occur if a pickaxe had struck an ancient skull.A dozen years later an arrowhead was discovered in thethigh of a late Upper Paleolithic female buried at SanTeodora Cave in Sicily (Bachechi, Fabri, and Mallegni1997), with the comment that “new bone growth . . .indicate(s) that the individual under study survived thewound for some time.” Broca had also noted that the“old man” buried at Cro-Magnon had a “hollow similarto that produced in our day by a spent ball” in one ofhis femurs. It is not the fact of such injury that is relevantbut that such injuries may have been more common thanis indicated in our rare Paleolithic burials.

Paleolithic hunter-gatherers were seasonally mobile,and so deaths would periodically have occurred duringa group’s seasonal round. Would accidental death at aseasonal camp have invited a burial that was differentfrom that found at longer-term sites or shelters or in theirnearby caves? Would the pragmatics of burial at a tem-porary habitation have led to a simple burial, probablyin a shallow pit, have grave goods or criteria indicatingstatus or rank as noted by the Binfords, or have containedat most the momentary weapon or tool of that individ-ual? Such simple burials would not have persisted ar-cheologically, not only because of taphonomic processesbut also because of their seasonal locale and context. The“old man” at Cro-Magnon had survived till his burial atthe apparently “long-term” seasonal site at Les Eyzies;the female, with an injury to skull and brain, would nothave been highly mobile and was probably able to survivefor some weeks because of a seasonal encampment atLes Eyzies. There is a sense in Cro-Magnon that therehad been separate recurrent burials. The cave is at thefoot of the high cliff shelf and overhang of the Abri Pa-taud, which overlooks the Vezere River and its flood-plain. Hallam Movius excavated many levels at Pataudextending from the Aurignacian and Perigordian to theProto-Magdalenian and Solutrean, a period encompass-ing some 15,000 years. Where, except for the four skel-etons in Cro-Magnon a few yards below, were all theburials? Did their absence mean that no one had diednear there, that there were no burials, or that tapho-nomical processes had destroyed thousands of years ofevidence? Would those who died while the group wascamped on the shelf have been buried on that shelf, onthe floodplain below, or, depending on the season, on the


table 1Mid Upper Palaeolithic (30,000–20,000 years b.p.) Burials from Italy and Adjacent South-Eastern France

Specimen Sex Age Positiona Orientation Ochre Featuresb Grave Goods

Grotta du Marronier ? ca. 8 ? ? yes P yesGrotta du Figuier ? 2–3 ? SE-NW yes D yesGrotta dei Fanciulli 4 M adult E N-S yes P, St yesGrotta dei Fanciulli 5 F old F N-S ? P, St yesGrotta dei Fanciulli 6 F? 13–15 F N-S yes P, St yesGrotta del Caviglione M adult E/F S-N yes P? St yesBarma Grande 1 M adult E N-S yes P? St yesBarma Grande 2 M 33–35 E E-W yes P yesBarma Grande 3 F? 12–13 E E-W yes P yesBarma Grande 4 F? 14–15 E E-W yes P yesBarma Grande 5 M adult E N-S no ? yesBarma Grande 6 M adult F N-S ? ? yesBaousso da Torre 1 M adult E NW-SE yes ? yesBaousso da Torre 2 M 25–30 E NW-SE yes ? yesBaousso da Torre 3 ? ca. 15 EV NW-SE no ? noArene Candide 1 M 14–15 E S-N yes P, St yesPaglicci 2 M 13–14 E SW-NE yes St yesPaglicci 25 F 18–20 E N-S yes P yesOstuni 1 F ca. 20 E/F S-N ? P, St yesOstuni 1 bis ? fetus – – – – –Ostuni 2 ? not child E/F S-N ? ? ?Veneri 1 M ! 30–35 E/F S-N yes P yesVeneri 2 F ! 30–35 E/F S-N yes P yes

sources: Onoratini and Combier (1996), Mussi (2001).aE, extended; F, tightly flexed; E/F, extended with flexed legs; EV, extended on the abdomen.bP, burial pit; D, use of a natural depression; St, stones variously arranged.

plateau a few yards above the overhang? If interred onthe plateau in winter when the ground was frozen, woulda “burial” have been under a lattice of antlers orbranches? Such a plateau “burial” would not have lastedfor centuries, but it might have lasted long enough tomark that territory and place for some generations of acultural group using the shelter. The pragmatics of con-text, as much as the symbolism of burial, may alwayshave been part of burial behavior.

The Neanderthals, like anatomically modern humansof the early Upper Paleolithic, were seasonally mobile.Their close-encounter hunting of big game was oftendangerous. Would the pragmatics of a Neanderthal burialat a transitory hunting site or encampment have differedfrom more “formal” burials at long-term seasonal shel-ters such as those at La Ferrassie? The well-known burialat Shanidar may not, as some argue, have been a “flowerburial,” but it was certainly a seasonal burial at a sea-sonal place. What type of burial would have occurredwhen a Neanderthal group was “on the road”? At theother end of our chronology, by the later Upper Paleo-lithic not only had there been an increase in population,social complexity, and intensive exploitation of re-sources within a territory but longer-term sites had in-creasingly become embedded in a more complex sym-bolic cultural surround. The Franco-Cantabrian sanctu-ary caves regionally document this generic process.Would burials at culturally embedded sites have differedfrom burials at transitory ones? Would the grave goodsfound or absent in different burials have often been con-textual and seasonal? There is inferential evidence in

some late Upper Paleolithic imagery that childbirth mayhave occurred at some remove from a site’s hearth, craft,and sleeping areas. Would the death of a woman or infantat such a time have invoked a simple burial near thebirthing place? Would such a contextual burial, whichmight skew the available record, indicate a cultural dis-crimination of women?

This is simply a set of questions concerning the pos-sible variability of early burial behavior and its depen-dence on context and circumstance. The available dataare, of course, crucial, but can one adequately argue proor con degrees of early species capacity for symbolingbehavior from the nature, quantity, or presence/absenceof a particular class of data at a particular time or place?

m. muss iDipartimento di Scienze dell’Antichita, Universita diRoma “La Sapienza,” Rome, Italy ([email protected]).2 iv 01

To comment on a review paper such as this, two ques-tions must be answered first: (1) Is the assembled database adequate? and (2) Is the chronology correctlyassessed?

As far as the data base is concerned, I will focus onthe Italian sample of Upper Palaeolithic burials, includ-ing adjacent south-eastern France. As my table 1 shows,in the time range considered there are approximatelytwice as many specimens from Italy as are presented byRiel-Salvatore and Clark. Six were discovered at Barma


Grande, one of several Ligurian sites at which C14 de-terminations on human remains are currently under way(V. Formicola, personal communication, 2000). The pre-liminary results do not contradict previously suggestedarchaeological correlations (Mussi 1986, 1996, 2001).While state-of-the-art knowledge cannot be expected ofauthors working with secondhand inventories (includingMay 1986, notorious for both incompleteness and du-plication [Mussi 1989]), there should be at least somecritical assessment of the literature. Bisson, Tisnerat, andWhite (1996), instead, are quoted at face value to claimthat the Barma Grande burials “postdate 20,000 yearsb.p.” The so-called new dates for Barma Grande havealready been discussed elsewhere (Bolduc, Cinq-Mars,and Mussi 1996). Suffice it to say that Bisson, Tisnerat,and White make use of three bone samples, one withoutany known depth and a second belonging to a rodent;the third was apparently found at �8 m, where an Au-rignacian level once existed: the resulting age is 19,000years, while an age in excess of 30,000 years would beexpected if this futile exercise in “paleostratigraphy” hadany scientific meaning at all.

At a general European level, Riel-Salvatore and Clarkdo not mention the “Red Lady of Paviland,” redated byAldhouse-Green and Pettit (1998), and omit most of theevidence on Predmostı that is easily available in Jelınek(1991). Combe Capelle and Les Cottes are included, but,according to Gambier’s revision (1990), they do not be-long to the Palaeolithic.

Then, much emphasis is given to the “proposal” ofsubdividing the Upper Palaeolithic into “early”(40,000–20,000 years b.p.) and “late” (20,000–10,000years b.p.) to allow a better understanding of changesthrough time. Not only has such a subdivision long beenstandard among both archaeologists and physical an-thropologists—and obviously in the study of burial prac-tices—but it has already been further refined: at an in-ternational symposium held in Moravia in 1995, theneed for the identification of a Mid Upper Palaeolithic,between 30,000 and 20,000 years ago, was discussed bya group of 27 specialists from 11 European countries andsubstantiated by an even wider number of scientific con-tributions (Mussi and Roebroeks 1996, Roebroeks et al.2000). If this more detailed subdivision is used, not onlyall the specimens assembled in my table but practicallyall those of Riel-Salvatore and Clark fall within the MidUpper Palaeolithic time range: they are Cro-Magnon bur-ials related either to the final Aurignacian or to the UpperPerigordian (Bouchud 1966, Movius 1969), with CombeCapelle and Les Cottes best dismissed and only one EarlyUpper Palaeolithic grave left, Saint-Cesaire, the only Up-per Palaeolithic burial of a Neandertal. It is quite clearthat, all over the middle latitudes of Eurasia, from theAtlantic coast to Siberia, the Mid Upper Palaeolithic bur-ials are the first uncontroversial evidence of anatomi-cally modern humans’ burying their dead. Their age clus-ters in the millennia around 25,000 years b.p., while theNeandertal graves span 50,000 years or more, with thelatest, Saint-Cesaire, some 10,000 years earlier than theMid Upper Palaeolithic burial.

The time gap and some recurrent characteristics of theMid Upper Palaeolithic burials such as a mostly ex-tended position, stones and other arrangements, gener-alized use of ochre, and elaborate grave goods all argueagainst the hypothesis of continuity in mortuary prac-tices. Furthermore, the many robust and tall adolescentsand adults of the Mid Upper Palaeolithic burials arelinked by recent studies not to hybrids but to anatomi-cally modern human groups interconnected by signifi-cant gene flow and enjoying high nutritional standards(Formicola and Giannecchini 1999, Churchill et al.2000).

To sum up, this poorly researched paper fails to provideeither a new methodological approach or circumstantialevidence allowing a better understanding of Palaeolithicgraves or of the Middle-to-Upper Palaeolithic transition.

lawrence g. strausDepartment of Anthropology, University of NewMexico, Albuquerque, N.M. 87131, U.S.A.([email protected]). 23 iii 01

The time-honored and deeply ingrained but ultimatelyarbitrary categories of Middle and Upper Paleolithicmask long-lasting processes of biocultural evolution inWestern Eurasia. Reifying them has forced prehistoriansto support an essentially punctuationist model of changethat is increasingly indefensible. Riel-Salvatore andClark’s analysis adds to the evidence indicating consid-erable continuity in many aspects of human adaptationacross the latter half of the Upper Pleistocene and sup-ports an analytical distinction between earlier and laterUpper Paleolithic time.

This is not a new idea; it was clearly enunciated byJohn Campbell (1977) in his study of the Upper Paleo-lithic of Britain—which is not surprising, since the twoperiods of human occupation were separated by a hiatusin settlement of this northerly region of Europe due toabandonment during the Last Glacial Maximum. Amongmany others seeing such a distinction in the record, Free-man (1973) and then I (e.g., Straus 1977) suggested thatthere was major intensification in human subsistence inthe later Upper Paleolithic in Cantabrian Spain, withmore similarities in terms of hunting and gathering be-tween the Middle and the earlier Upper Paleolithic thanbetween the Early and the Late Upper Paleolithic. Thenotion of the “Upper Paleolithic” as a monolithic“stage” in human evolution is highly debatable. Humanculture and even anatomy were not the same under, forexample, the interstadial conditions of Hengelo or Arcy,the pleniglacial ones of the Last Glacial Maximum, thenearly interglacial ones of Bolling/Allerod, or the DryasIII crisis. The distinction between Early and Late UpperPaleolithic is of proven significance in the study of bi-ological stress and functional anatomy, as linked withbehavioral changes including technology and subsis-tence (e.g., Brennan 1991, Churchill, Weaver, and Nie-woehner 1996). There are major differences in technol-ogy, subsistence, art, and human settlement between the


Mousterian and the Magdalenian (e.g., Straus 1983), butthere are no absolute breaks in all aspects of culture fromone intervening Mortilletian period to the next.

At the same time, it is now undeniable that Nean-dertals (not just Cro-Magnons) were capable of change(see d’Errico et al. 1998, but with caveats in the com-ments) and that there were regional developments insubsistence (e.g., Stiner’s 1994 evidence for increasedhunting in west-central Italy after ca. 55,000 b.p. andpossibly Farizy, David, and Jaubert’s 1994 suggestion ofspecialized bison hunting in southern France), in tech-nology made by Neandertals (e.g., the Chatelperronianof France and Spain [e.g., Pelegrin 1995; Arrizabalaga andAltuna 2000], the Olchevian of Croatia [Karavanic 1995],and possibly the Uluzzian of Italy [Kuhn and Bietti 2000]and the Szeletian sensu lato of Central Europe [e.g.,Allsworth-Jones 1986]), and even in representation (e.g.,the ca. 54,000-year-old engraving on a flint nodule atQuneitra on the Golan Heights [Goren-Inbar 1990]). Infact, as has been pointed out (most recently by Bar-Yosefand Kuhn 1999), Neandertals had repeatedly inventedprismatic blade manufacturing sometime early in thetime range of the Middle Paleolithic, and this was onlyone aspect of the variability and flexibility that charac-terized the technology of this “stage” (e.g., Kuhn 1995).

In short, the story can be seen as a play in threeacts:

Prologue: The Neandertals change (whether on theirown or as a result of contacts with Cro-Magnons or both).

Act 1: Certain useful inventions (e.g., Aurignaciansplit-base antler points) diffuse widely via a network ofsocial relations or via human movements—or both—butwith considerable regional variation in content and tim-ing under often relatively benign environmentalconditions.

Act 2: With a climatic downturn, humans create a yetmore elaborate set of regionally specific cultural re-sponses (e.g., the Pavlovian, the Font-Robert Gravettian,the Perigordian) and then abandon northern Europe forrefugia in the south, where there are dramatic develop-ments in weapons-related technology, subsistence inten-sification, settlement systems, regional population den-sity and territorialism, and symbol systems and ideology(e.g., the Solutrean, the early Epigravettian).

Act 3: Gradual but irregular amelioration of climatebrings expansion of the human range into upland andmontane areas and eventually recolonization of northernEurope by Magdalenian bands equipped with complex,specialized lithic and osseous technologies and a wide-spread network of symbols and social relationships mademanifest by portable art styles and exotic objects suchas marine and fossil shells, amber, and special nonlocalflints.

Epilogue: Dramatic environmental changes, with gen-eralized reforestation, glacial retreat, sea-level rise, andextinction of Pleistocene faunas, lead to radical simpli-fication of technologies, termination of the old symbolsystem, and a variety of strategies for survival rangingfrom (momentarily) clinging to old ways to rapid“mesolithization.”

Overall, the story is one of mosaic evolution (see, e.g.,Straus 1996, 1997). Human burial appears among Nean-dertals in some regions (Belgium, Germany, southwest-ern France, and Israel), and some of those regions alsotend to be rich in Cro-Magnon burials, while otherequally archaeologically rich regions (e.g., CantabrianSpain) have none. Some regions (Liguria, Moravia) havemany Upper Paleolithic burials but few or no demon-strable Neandertal ones. In the critical period between40,000 and 27,000 b.p. (uncalibrated), some regions seethe early appearance of so-called Aurignacian assem-blages, others have particular “transitional” industriesof their own, and yet others (notably southern Iberia)witness the long survival of Mousterian technology(sometimes associated with Neandertals). The burial ev-idence highlighted by Riel-Salvatore and Clark thusmakes sense in a murky situation. The so-called Middle-to-Upper Paleolithic transition can be characterized as a“punctuation event” only from the perspective of a ge-ological time scale. When we want to approach an un-derstanding of processes we must look at things moreclosely, and then they get complex. In many respects,the Middle-to-Upper Paleolithic transition may amountto a trait-frequency distribution shift, ultimately part ofcontinuum of change that we call “evolution.”

Finally, I would note that Riel-Salvatore and Clarkmistakenly classify the Starosele child burial as a Nean-dertal when the latter attribution was convincingly dis-proven in the pages of this journal by Marks and col-leagues (1997) as a very likely intrusive Musliminterment.

anne-marie till ierUMR5809 Laboratoire d’Anthropologie desPopulations du Passe, Universite Bordeaux 1, Avenuedes Facultes, 33405 Talence, France ([email protected]). 6 iv 01

Riel-Salvatore and Clark address the question of the va-lidity of Gargett’s rejection (1989, 1999) of the presentarchaeological evidence for purposeful burial of a fewMiddle Paleolithic hominids. According to Gargett, mostreports of such discoveries have failed to recognize therole of natural depositional events. As a member of theKebara team, I was quite surprised to learn (Gargett 1999:64) that if the right hipbone of the Kebara 2 hominid wasbetter preserved than the left it was because it “was near-est the cave’s entrance” and therefore “nearer the sourceof wind-blown and colluvial sediments.” In fact the Ke-bara 2 skeleton was oriented generally west-east andboth hipbones had the same orientation with regard tothe cave entrance.

Riel-Salvatore and Clark tend to accept a view alreadyexpressed by others (e.g., Tillier 1990, Belfer-Cohen andHovers 1992, Hayden 1993, Hovers et al. 2000, Bar-Yosef2000) that Gargett’s approach to the criteria that appearto be primarily of behavioral relevance in the MiddlePaleolithic hominid sample is rather subjective. Indeed,the view that, in contrast to Upper Paleolithic hominids,


Middle Paleolithic hominids (either Neandertals or earlymodern humans) lacked the capacity for innovative be-havior beyond their quest for food seems to be less com-mon among scholars trained in the Old World.

Riel-Salvatore and Clark compare Middle Paleolithicand Early Upper Paleolithic sites on several categoriesof “mortuary data.” Their aim is to submit both samplesof hominid skeletal remains currently considered as theresults of purposeful burials “to the same critical scru-tiny,” and they deserve credit for this approach. Theiranalyses are based on the examination of distributionsof variation within and between the two hominid sam-ples of biological (age at death, sex, bone lesions, phy-logenetic affiliation) and taphonomic (body position, pit,archaeological deposits) data. While they make somecautious remarks in their introduction, we expect themto express more uncertainties in their analysis beforeadopting any interpretation. Yet the data presented arenot always appropriate and/or up-to-date. Although Icannot discuss the paper in detail, I have a few commentsto offer.

In table 1, the mention of a probable burial for La Fer-rassie 8 is quite surprising in the light of its originaldescription (Heim 1982:13). It is Qafzeh 11 instead ofQafzeh 9 that exhibits a bone lesion, as does the Qafzeh10 immature specimen (Vandermeersch 1981; Tillier1984, 1999). There is no reason to consider the Staroselyechild a probable Neanderthal burial; this specimen isfully modern in its skeletal morphology (Howell 1957,Alekseev 1976, Tillier in Ronen 1982:315) and absolutedating (Marks et al. 1997).

Discussing the sex distribution of the burials, Riel-Salvatore and Clark assert that “more males were re-covered than females.” However, they should recognizethat sex estimation based on invalid criteria is question-able. For instance, among Middle Paleolithic hominidsin Europe, the low frequency of female skeletons can beexplained by the choice of the discriminant variable em-ployed in sex estimation, cranial capacity (La Quina 5,Spy 2).

Finally, I wonder why there is no analysis of the chron-ological aspects inferred in both the Middle and the Up-per Paleolithic. For each time period all the sites aretreated as a sample. The available dates for the MiddlePaleolithic sites provide evidence of a long human oc-cupation, and consequently the data come from sites sep-arated by tens of thousands of years. Moreover, regardingthe Upper Paleolithic sites listed in table 2, there aremajor problems in chronology, as most of the sites havenever been accurately dated. Thus, Combe-Capelle canno longer be considered part of the Upper Paleolithicsample (see esp. Gambier 1989:195–96).

Examining the Middle/Upper Paleolithic transition,Riel-Salvatore and Clark argue that it is possible to rec-ognize a certain continuity in mortuary behavior. Frommy personal experience I am confident that this is thecase and that it is one more argument for the humannessof Middle Paleolithic hominids.

Reply

g. a . clark and j . r iel -salvatoreTempe, Ariz., U.S.A. 25 v 01

Although we do not necessarily agree with all of them,we very much appreciate the thoughtful comments onour essay. Our position is that, if Gargett’s criteria forevaluating the intentionality of Middle Paleolithic bur-ials are to have general applicability, they should also beapplied to burials claimed for the Early and Late UpperPaleolithic. As does Straus, we think it advantageous todivide the Upper Paleolithic into early and late phasesin pattern searches of all kinds that seek to compare itwith the Middle Paleolithic. This is because human ad-aptations to the middle latitudes of western Eura-sia—variable from one geographical region to thenext—were also very different before and after 20,000years ago, given that the first 20,000 years of the UpperPaleolithic correspond to the relatively mild, althoughdeteriorating, paleoclimates of oxygen-isotope stage 3(57,000–24,000), whereas those of the 24,000–11,000-years interval (oxygen-isotope stage 2) correspond to thepleniglacial maximum and subsequent recovery. The di-visions of the Paleolithic (and, indeed, the Paleolithicitself) were created (not discovered) by several genera-tions of French prehistorians in order to erect a temporalgrid that would bring order to Stone Age archaeology inthe years before the development of radiometric chro-nologies (Sackett 1981). They embody all kinds of im-plicit preconceptions and assumptions about biologicaland cultural evolution and their material correlates thathave no intrinsic meaning apart from the conceptualframeworks that define and contextualize them. Theseconceptual frameworks are accidents of history, ulti-mately arbitrary, always vague, and seldom made ex-plicit, producing miscommunication as scholars defineand use differently terms and concepts thought to be heldin common (Clark 1991).

Davidson and Noble claim that we don’t address Gar-gett’s argument that consideration of taphonomic pro-cesses allows for more nuanced assessments of the in-tentionality involved in claimed human burials. Wedisagree. In fact, one of us (GAC) has explicitly defendedGargett’s approach, describing it as “commendable and,in fact, essential if the discipline is ever to overcome thenaıve and anachronistic expectation that first-handknowledge of data is a sine qua non for credible researchconclusions” (Duff, Clark, and Chadderdon 1992:222).Instead, we take issue with what he concludes from hisresearch (that all Middle Paleolithic burials can be ac-counted for by taphonomic processes). And we are cer-tainly not advocating a disregard for taphonomy. Quitethe contrary (although taphonomic research is still verymuch a work in progress—still in the pattern-searchingstages). All we claim is that something might be gainedby taking into consideration the firsthand observationsof the original excavators. A more accurate restatement


of their final paragraph and one that squares better withour pattern search would be that some Neandertals wereintentionally buried (and some were not), some EarlyUpper Paleolithic hominids were buried (and some werenot), and some Late Upper Paleolithic hominids wereburied (and some were not). This pattern continues intothe Mesolithic and beyond (Newell, Constandse-Wes-termann, and Meiklejohn 1979, Newell et al. 1990, Clarkand Neeley 1987). Frequency shifts over time are due tothe combined effects of better preservation and demo-graphic factors resulting from the compression of humanpopulations into southern European refugia during thepleniglacial maximum (clearly a Late Upper Paleolithicphenomenon). We do not doubt the importance of Gar-gett’s research. If we had thought it trivial we would nothave bothered to write the article in the first place.

Davidson and Noble also point to the contextual di-chotomy of Early Upper Paleolithic open-air burial andMiddle Paleolithic burial in caves and assert that a singleMiddle Paleolithic burial in an open-air context “woulddo more to confirm the hypothesis of Neandertal delib-erate burial than any manipulation of currently available(and not very reliable) evidence.” This statement is puz-zling because table 1 does include an open-air MiddlePaleolithic burial, Taramsa 1, in Egypt’s Nile Valley (Ver-meersch et al. 1998). Gargett also acknowledges the ex-istence of this alleged burial but does not discuss it indetail, preferring instead to “leave it up to the reader toscrutinize Vermeersch et al.’s argument in light of thecriteria [RG] brings to bear in this paper” (Gargett 1999:30). In other words, he dismisses the one case that hasthe greatest potential to undermine his argument.

There are, indeed, proportionately more Early UpperPaleolithic open-air burials than Middle Paleolithic ones.However, most of them (10/13, or 76.9%) are clusteredin Moravia, where no Middle Paleolithic burials are re-ported. With the exception of Sungir, all the others (19/32, or 59.4%) are located in caves or rock shelters—thesame contexts from which claimed Middle Paleolithicburials in those areas are reported. Interestingly, this ap-plies to all the sites mentioned in Mussi’s table, whichshe claims are so evidently linked to the central Euro-pean sample. To us, this bimodal pattern in burial con-texts suggests different land-use strategies rather than aqualitative shift in behavior. It might be linked to to-pography, bedrock, and geomorphological processes pre-ceding and subsequent to the Early Upper Paleolithic,which in turn affected the prevalence of caves and rockshelters in the landscape in the various regions of west-ern Eurasia. Northern Egypt is a good example. In ad-dition to Taramsa 1, three open-air Early Upper Paleo-lithic burials (Nazlet Khater 1 and 2, Kubbaniya) areknown from the area (Vermeersch et al. 1984, Wendorfand Schild 1986). In fact, all Upper Pleistocene burialsin northern Egypt are in the open air, just as all westernEuropean burials are located in caves, irrespective of pe-riod. These observations lend support to our argumentthat the context of burial had much more to do with thekinds of physiogeographical features available for humanuse in a given region than with any hypothetical behav-

ioral changes associated with the Middle–Upper Paleo-lithic transition.

D’Errico and Vanhaeren misconstrue our interpreta-tion of the frequency data (and our view of evolution)when they claim that we expect progressive changes inthe material correlates of social complexity over time.Evolution is directionless, shaped only by context andhistory (Clark 1999a). Arguing for vectored changes inparticular aspects of adaptation is not the same thing asarguing for “progress” in any global or universal sense.The question is why the incidence of intentional burialapparently increases over time, not whether it was pre-sent at all in the Middle Paleolithic. While we acknowl-edge the possibility that our pattern searches might rep-resent “behavioral snapshots” (i.e., sampling error—thisis true of any pattern search using archaeological data),we contend that the key to understanding what inten-tional burial means is precisely whether Middle and Up-per Paleolithic hominids had equivalent cognitive abil-ities. There is no consensus on this. One monitor ofcognitive development is whether, and to what extent,hominids practiced intentional burial.

The divisions of the Paleolithic, the Paleolithic itself,and the biological taxonomic units Neandertals andmodern humans are essentialized, reified, typologicalcategories the behavioral significance of which is by nomeans clear. As originally conceptualized, they were justarbitrary ways of dividing up time and morphologicalvariation. Hominids living in western Eurasia during thelater phases of the Middle Paleolithic might have in-terred their dead with greater frequency than those ofthe early phases of the Middle Paleolithic not becauseof progressive increases in cognitive development(which, nevertheless, undoubtedly occurred over evolu-tionary time), but because of changes in adaptation tostrictly local environments that might have selected fortreating dead bodies differently over time. It isn’t clearto us what d’Errico and Vanhaeren mean by “naturalanalogies” or “natural interpretations.” We acknowledgethat modern mortuary practices are extremely variableand add that, for the same reasons, they were probablyextremely variable in the past. We used the conventionalMiddle–Upper Paleolithic boundary at 40,000 years agowhile acknowledging its arbitrary nature and do not dis-pute the many conflicting criteria used to define it (see,e.g., Clark 1999b). We do dispute the utility of the UpperPaleolithic technocomplexes (e.g., Aurignacian) as ana-lytical units. For one thing, it is by no means clear whatthey represent behaviorally. It is our opinion that “tech-nocomplexes” exhibit little or no time-space discrete-ness, are useless for exploring cultural variation, are notdemonstrably “cultural” at all (i.e., do not correspond toidentity-conscious social units), and, despite a com-mendable shift in emphasis from typology to technology,are often interpreted in exactly the same ways as typo-logical constructs (i.e., as due to identity-consciousnessmanifest in social units like the tribes, nations, and peo-ples of history). Finally, we did not intend to suggest thatMellars (1999) and Zilhao and d’Errico (1999a) have sim-ilar views of human origins. For Mellars, moderns re-


placed Neandertals without admixture because theywere cognitively (hence technologically) more advancedand therefore able to outcompete Neandertals and dis-place them from their traditional homelands. For Zilhaoand d’Errico, moderns and Neandertals were cognitivelyequivalent and Neandertals underwent a Middle–UpperPaleolithic transition independent of and earlier thanthat involving moderns and the Aurignacian; to the ex-tent to which the latter replaced the former it was be-cause of genetic swamping (allowing for admixture andan arguable influx of moderns after 40,000 years ago).

We are somewhat taken aback by Gargett’s criticalreaction to our paper, given our general endorsement ofhis approach. We reiterate that we disagree with Gar-gett’s conclusions (which are the same in the 1989 and1999 essays) and with some of the criteria he uses toevaluate pattern rather than questioning the appropri-ateness of examining the question in the first place (seeClark and Lindly 1989b). Everything in archaeology ismore or (usually) less secure inference. It is impossibleto address any issue or problem in science without mak-ing a priori judgments about the variables consideredsignificant to measure, the methods deemed appropriateto measure them, and, ultimately, the meaning assignedto pattern. How we go about doing this is what makesour inferences weak or strong, naıve or sophisticated. Asis Gargett’s, our entire argument is circumstantial; nei-ther he nor we regard a single criterion in and of itselfas sufficient to lead to secure inference. We were curiousto see what pattern would look like if we employed astandardized set of criteria to monitor intentionality inhuman burial over the Middle and the Early Upper Pa-leolithic and if we divided up time differently than hedoes. He accuses us of stacking the deck in favor of be-havioral continuity over the transition by using novelcriteria for dividing up time (which, it should be noted,is a reference variable used to measure change attributedto other causes) and by selective use of both burial dataand criteria designed to support the anticipated outcomeof our pattern search. We could turn that accusationaround and suggest that Gargett displays only an out-dated, typological understanding of pattern variation inthe Paleolithic archaeological record, compounded by avariety-minimizing, essentialist view of Upper Pleisto-cene biological variation. But we don’t do that. We sim-ply suggest that, until we have a tighter, more reliablechronometric framework for assessing variability in therelevant sites and areas, subdividing the Upper Paleo-lithic into “early” and “late” phases might provide uswith a better analytical tool for studying the full rangeof hominid behavior and morphological variability overthe course of the Upper Pleistocene than the conven-tional bipartite subdivision.

On the question of fragmentary remains, Gargettseems oblivious to the fact that crucial “bits and pieces”of humans show up in archaeological contexts through-out the Upper Paleolithic, Mesolithic, and even Neo-lithic in many areas of western Eurasia. What does thatsay about fragmentation as a criterion for inferring in-tentionality? We also dispute Gargett’s contention that

we have caricatured his argument. As he points out, theimportance of taphonomy in Paleolithic archaeology isseldom adequately recognized, and the role of geoar-chaeology in contemporary archaeological research canhardly be overemphasized. However, by depicting it asan arbitrary approach that seeks to eliminate humanagency altogether, Gargett misrepresents the aim ofgeoarchaeology, which is the careful study of all site for-mation processes and agents, including those associateduniquely with hominids. To imply that hominids couldhave had no role in the preservation of human remainsat sites that are defined first and foremost by their pres-ence courts absurdity.

We explicitly state that we give the original excava-tors’ reports the benefit of the doubt with respect to theircapacity to monitor intentionality. While we acknowl-edge that our understanding of site formation processeshas advanced considerably over the past 30 years andthat Gargett is right to be skeptical, second-guessing peo-ple who were fully competent professionals in their eraseems to introduce as many problems as it solves. Wesuggest that we know as much about Neandertal sexualdimorphism as we do about sexual dimorphism duringthe Early Upper Paleolithic and that there are many cri-teria for determining sex (e.g., gonial angle, cranial boss-ing, characteristics of the orbits, distal humerus, etc.)other than gracility and pubic architecture. Having ex-cavated about 50 human burials (albeit from recent timeframes), Clark can testify that in many contexts pits arerelatively obvious, clear-cut features and not somethingthat is easily confounded with the action of natural pro-cesses. Unequivocal pits are well-documented from Pa-leolithic contexts (e.g., Freeman and Gonzalez-Echegaray1973).

It is with some relief, then, that we turn to Hoversand Belfer-Cohen’s sympathetic comment. Gargett’s as-sertion that “the Upper Paleolithic evidence reveals dif-ferences [in burial behavior] that obviate the need for acomparison” (1999:30) between the Middle and the Up-per Paleolithic is probably the most unfortunate sen-tence he has ever written! We can only agree with Hoversand Belfer-Cohen that our construal of pattern over thetransition is a complex picture of changing monitors ofhuman adaptation. It is this temporal-spatial mosaic thatcalls into question the relatively abrupt and comprehen-sive “replacement” scenarios for the appearance of mod-ern humans in western Europe (Straus 1997, Clark1997a). Hovers and Belfer-Cohen remark on the evidencefor Early Upper Paleolithic parietal art and the numberof beads and variety of grave goods at Sungir as EarlyUpper Paleolithic examples that mirror patterns morecommon in the Late Upper Paleolithic. We do not arguethat there are no Early Upper Paleolithic burials as com-plex as some Late Upper Paleolithic burials or that thereare no Early Upper Paleolithic examples of fully devel-oped parietal art. However, it is clear that art, ornaments,organic technologies, and burials are much more com-mon when scaled to unit time and space in the LateUpper Paleolithic than in the Early Upper Paleolithic,and it is no coincidence that burials and art are concen-


trated when and where they are. Their time-space dis-tributions can be explained as the material consequencesof the demographic compression that was such a con-spicuous feature of the Pleniglacial and Tardiglacial inthe west (Barton, Clark, and Cohen 1994, Clark, Barton,and Cohen 1996) and the relative prevalence of caves inthese regions.

We do not dispute Hovers and Belfer-Cohen’s claimthat even if intentional burial is shown to exist in theMiddle Paleolithic this behavior need not have beensymbolic or linked to other forms of symbolic behavior(Chase and Dibble 1987). At the same time, our studydoes suggest that at least some of the Middle and EarlyUpper Paleolithic burials are directly comparable, withthe implication that if we elect to attribute symbolicloading to all Early Upper Paleolithic inhumations wemust also extend this interpretation to comparable Mid-dle Paleolithic burials. It is also possible that what hadoriginated as an essentially utilitarian form of behavior(getting rid of a dead body) might eventually have takenon a symbolic loading, although this possibility lacks anyclear-cut test implications. Our goal was not so muchto try to demonstrate that Middle Paleolithic hominidshad symbolic behavior as to show that we must be care-ful to avoid interpretive double standards when dealingwith comparable data sets (Roebroeks and Corbey 2000,Gaudinski and Roebroeks 1999).

Tongue in cheek, Krantz chastises us for covering toolarge an area and time span and thereby inviting criti-cism. The intent of the paper was to compare the Middlewith the Early Upper Paleolithic rather than with theUpper Paleolithic en bloc, where, we argue, Late patternslikely swamp Early ones and thus give the impressionof less continuity than may in fact be the case. Humanorigins research is not for the faint of heart; we certainlywere not trying to avoid criticism. Along with the restof the profession, we will be interested to see evidencefor very young dates for Skhul and Qafzeh. At present,and depending on the method used, Skhul is dated from81,000 to 119,000 years ago, Qafzeh from 92,000 to115,000 years ago (Bar-Yosef 1998:47). The LevantineMousterian now extends back to ca. 270,000 years ago(Mercier et al. 1995). By using the available dates forSkhul and Qafzeh we were not subscribing to whatKrantz calls “established doctrine.” Although he ac-knowledges archaeological evidence for continuity in ad-aptation in Europe, he appears to think the situation isdifferent for the Levant. There is, however, abundant ev-idence for archaeological continuity in the Levant, ac-knowledged even by staunch advocates of biological re-placement (e.g., Bar-Yosef 1998). On a global scale, thereare no correlations whatsoever between “kinds” of hom-inids and “kinds” of archaeological assemblages.

Larsson’s observations regarding the tricky business ofinferring subtle differences in cognition are points welltaken. We tried to take skeletal preservation into accountbut were often limited by the nature of the publishedaccounts and the lack of a taphonomic focus amongmany early workers. Having said that, the whole pointof the exercise (and an important subtext of the modern-

human-origins debate in general) is that documented in-tentionality in human burial tells us something inter-esting and important about human cognitive evolution(although clearly it is not the only monitor of cognition).Regarding rockfalls and fragmented but complete skel-etons (Gargett’s “beer cans”), Larsson remarks that ifrockfalls were a common cause of death we might expectto find evidence of other cave-dwelling animals with“beer can” signatures. While we acknowledge that rock-falls occurred in caves and rock shelters throughout ge-ological time and that they were episodic and occasion-ally cataclysmic, to invoke them to explain complete butcrushed human skeletons appears to us to be reaching.To the best of our knowledge, there is no evidence thathyenas and cave bears were ever killed by rockfalls, and,given the very sporadic human use of caves and rockshelters throughout prehistory, the probability is prac-tically nil that the two “events” would ever havecoincided.

Marshack raises a number of interesting questionsabout skeletal evidence for interpersonal violence (betterdocumented in the Mesolithic, when unambiguous cem-eteries show up for the first time), the possible effects ofmobility on whether people were buried, and socio-demographic factors that might have selected for in-creasingly frequent burial (hence improved archaeolog-ical “visibility”) during the Late Upper Paleolithic.Although we used all the data available to us and ac-knowledged that they almost certainly do not representthe full range of mortuary practices over the relevanttime and space intervals, unless there is systematic biasdue to contextual factors (e.g., caves versus open sites,short-term versus long-term sites, etc.) there is no reasonto think that the sample we analyzed would be biasedin any particular direction (although, of course, it is dom-inated by remains recovered from caves and rockshelters).

Perhaps our most acerbic critic is Mussi, who seeslittle redemptive value in the paper. She claims that wehave the chronology of the Italian sites wrong (and inconsequence omitted some cases under the mistaken im-pression that they were late), evidently giving greaterweight to typological criteria for assemblage definitionthan to hard radiometric evidence. This theoreticalstance is problematic in a number of respects. For onething, the Italian Upper Paleolithic industries have tra-ditionally been classified according to Laplace’s analyt-ical framework, which differs markedly from thatof Bordes. Second, not all Italian workers adopt a chron-otypological approach. Bietti (1991) points out that manyof the so-called Upper Paleolithic index-fossil tool typesoccur in varying frequencies outside the prehistorian-defined analytical units to which they are supposedlyconfined (see also Kuhn and Bietti 2000). Italy also ap-parently lacks a Solutrean. Clearly, radiometric dates andpaleoenvironmental data are the only secure foundationsupon which to erect any kind of prehistoric chronology.Mussi advocates dividing the Upper Paleolithic intothree stages, including a Mid Upper Paleolithic datedbetween 30,000 and 20,000 years ago into which most


of our Early Upper Paleolithic cases would fall. No basisfor this subdivision is offered. While it is clearly a goodidea to divide the Upper Paleolithic into more meaning-ful units, the division we use makes more sense thanthe one proposed by Mussi, since the Late Upper Pale-olithic marks the beginning of the last glacial downturn(i.e., it has paleoclimatic correlates that were likely tohave affected human behavior throughout western Eur-asia). That our subdivision has “long been standardamong both archaeologists and physical anthropolo-gists” is news to us, since practically all publications byreplacement advocates use the more conventional Mid-dle–Upper Paleolithic division at ca. 40,000 years ago. Inour view, the conventional schema is favored by mostreplacement advocates precisely because of the expec-tation that the archaeological and the biological transi-tions should coincide. They have this preconceptionabout pattern because one population (moderns makingAurignacian tools) is thought to be replacing another one(Neandertals making Mousterian and/or Chatelperron-ian, Uluzzian, etc., tools). However, as mentioned above,there is no empirical support for a correlation betweenhominid biological types and archaeological assemblagetypes. Biology and culture can and do vary independentlyof one another.

Since we agree with him, there is little we can add toStraus’s remarks except that we must find a way to breakthe confines of the normative, typological thinking thatdominates most discussion of pattern in biological andcultural variation over the last half of the Upper Pleis-tocene. In particular, the basic analytical units (e.g., Au-rignacian, Chatelperronian, Neandertal) have become“naturalized” and so are seldom subjected to criticalscrutiny. Many workers treat them as if they were ob-jectively “real,” intrinsically meaningful, and unprob-lematic, with the implication that the systematics usedto generate them are themselves unproblematic. We sug-gest that this is rather naıve. In default of a concern withepistemology (notably lacking in this type of research),we have no way to determine whether workers in dif-ferent research traditions are defining and using theseanalytical units in the same ways or to justify them asbehaviorally meaningful (i.e., as appropriate for address-ing transition questions). In other words, it is simplytaken for granted that the analytical units and the sys-tematics that underlie them are adequate to address tran-sition questions. We strongly suspect that they are not(Clark 1997a).

We assure Tillier that we are painfully aware of theempirical insufficiencies of our data and of the difficul-ties in inferring the age and sex of incompletely pre-served human remains (see Giles 1970 for a useful sum-mary) but had to proceed on the basis of publishedaccounts. Isolated human remains are the norm through-out the Pleistocene, and it is only with the appearanceof cemeteries late in the Mesolithic that samples de-monstrably representative of the range of variationwithin a biological population become available (Clarkand Neeley 1987). Uncertainties about dating have al-ways figured prominently in transition research, pri-

marily because the interval of interest lies at the limitsof the most widely used and reliable radiometric datingmethod in Europe, radiocarbon. And there are those (e.g.,Mussi) who put more faith in typology than in absolutedates. We acknowledge the probable error, also noted byStraus, in regard to the Staroselye child (Marks et al.1997). In the years since its discovery in 1953, the phy-logenetic status of the Staroselye child (an infant of18–19 months) has been much debated (see Marks et al.1997:116, 117 for a useful summary). It is interesting thatit has changed in concert with prevailing views of whatconstitutes a “modern human,” underscoring the diffi-culties attendant on assigning very young (albeit com-plete) individuals to biological taxonomic units.

Whether Paleolithic humans buried their dead hasbeen debated for well over a century and will doubtlesscontinue to be debated for the foreseeable future. Wehope to have shown here that, if we are to develop abetter understanding of this phenomenon, it is impera-tive that we look at Upper Pleistocene burial as a processand try to place it in the context of the changing regionaladaptations of which it was once a part. Our researchcasts doubt on the utility of conventional chronotypo-logical conceptual frameworks as organizing devices, ashas a complementary study based on the totality of pre-Mesolithic human interments (Riel-Salvatore 2001). Therange of commentary shows that, intellectually, Paleo-lithic archaeology is alive and well and that its practi-tioners, despite diverse theoretical perspectives, none-theless contribute to intelligent discourse about keyissues of the remote human past. A plurality of perspec-tives is essential to the development of the discipline asa rigorous scientific endeavor capable of generating newknowledge about the human career. The assumptions,biases, and preconceptions that underlie the logic of in-ference in the various intellectual traditions involved inthe research must also be subjected to critical scrutinyif we are to avoid the miscommunication that often re-sults when workers differ among themselves with re-spect to what constitutes data, what questions are im-portant to ask of data, and how data should be analyzed.

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