With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Paul Thacker and colleagues will conduct three seasons of geological and archaeological fieldwork in three different regions of Portugal: Estremadura, Ribatejo, and Alentejo. The interdisciplinary team includes Portuguese and American specialists assembled to investigate regional differences in flaked stone tools during the Magdalenian period, ca. 15,000 years ago. Changing environmental conditions at the very end of the Pleistocene make the Magdalenian especially interesting and appropriate for examining the articulation of prehistoric technology with hunter gatherer subsistence and settlement strategies. Untangling the meaning of stone artifact assemblage variability requires understanding the situational environment in which prehistoric tools were made and used. This project is of broad archaeological interest because each of the three study areas is characterized by different stone raw material types, abundances, and sizes. For example, high-quality, large chert cobbles were exploited throughout the Paleolithic in the Rio Maior region, in contrast to the Sor drainage which lacks chert sources but has abundant quartz and quartzite gravels. Comprehensive sampling and statistical description of these different raw material deposits will provide the context within which Magdalenian foragers generated stone tool assemblages. Four Upper Paleolithic open air campsites will be excavated to obtain large lithic assemblages with associated radiometric dates, two in the Alcobertas valley and two in the Sor valley. Intrasite spatial analysis of three-dimensionally plotted occupation levels will determine the impact of post depositional processes and the degree to which site assemblages are functionally-comparable analytical units. This sampling strategy will provide at least one Early Magdalenian and one Late Magdalenian assemblage in each region, facilitating chronological comparison as well as regional ones between the valleys and numerous Magdalenian assemblages previously published from the Rio Maior vicinity. Laboratory analyses and refitting studies of excavated flaked stone assemblages will explore variability at the site and regional level. The organization of stone tool technology, transport decisions and artifact use lives will be compared and contrasted across the three regions. Paleoenvironmental data will be obtained through charcoal-wood species determination while residue and use wear studies will contribute to the functional interpretation of site assemblages.
This research is important for several reasons. Planned archaeological fieldwork will provide new data on the Stone Age occupation of two previously unresearched regions of Iberia. The comparative approach of this project will investigate the numerous behaviors that result in Portuguese Magdalenian lithic variability, possibly revealing stone acquisition and reduction behaviors that are social rather than functional in origin. Results will have theoretical and methodological significance for archaeologists working in other geographic regions and chronological periods, especially researchers exploring the interface of hunter-gatherer technological organization and raw material exploitation with subsistence and settlement strategies.
