Change and continuity in subsistence during the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic in the Ach Valley of Swabia (south‐west Germany)

AbstractThis paper examines the faunal assemblages from Middle Palaeolithic cave sites in the Ach Valley and views them in a broader chronological context along with the Upper Palaeolithic assemblages of the region. We present data from the key Middle Palaeolithic sites of Geißenklösterle, Sirgenstein, Große Grotte and Kogelstein. Except Kogelstein, which is a hyena den, the other three sites served as cave bear hibernation dens, where cave bear is the most abundant species. The most frequent game species during the Upper Palaeolithic are horse, mammoth and reindeer. But these animals are mainly represented by specific skeletal elements, which were important as raw material for the production of organic tools. The large variety of organic tools made from bone, antler, and ivory, and the refuse resulting from their production in Upper Palaeolithic layers stands in contrast to the extreme rarity of organic tools and production debris in Middle Palaeolithic layers. The faunal assemblages in the Ach Valley document continuity in the seasonal use of the landscape and the preferred game, but reflect changes in the use of sites and organic technology between the Middle and the Upper Palaeolithic. Based on the faunal and lithic assemblages from the caves of the Ach Valley, most of the sites were used more intensively in the Upper Palaeolithic than in the Middle Palaeolithic. If these assemblages provide representative samples, the available data suggest lower population densities and greater mobility of Neanderthals during the Middle Palaeolithic than of modern humans during the Upper Palaeolithic. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.