Program > By author > Barbaza Michel

Lithic armatures are among the elements with the highest morphological variability in Late Palaeolithic techno-complexes. As suggested by several ethnographic studies, this seems to be related to two main factors: the hunting techniques and their role as markers of ethnic and personal identities. For this reason, they have often been used as key elements to identify distinct socio-cultural traditions through time and space. Increasing our knowledge on these instruments, which for many decades have been analysed through a mere typological approach, might allow highlighting similarities and divergences across a specific territory in a diachronic and spatial perspective.

In order to face this issue, we present a comparison between the armature assemblages from layers dated to the Late Glacial of two Southern European sites. Riparo Tagliente (VR, Italy) covers the span between the last part of GS-2 and the first half of GI-l (from 17,219-16,687 cal BP to 14,535-13,472 cal BP) while the sequence of Troubat (Hautes Pyrénées, Fr) is dated between the last part of GS-2 (17,770-16,981 cal BP) and the GS-1 (12,115-11,766 cal BP). Thanks to a morpho-scopic analysis focused on blanks selection, backing methods and retouch techniques it was possible to identify several analogies and differences between these sites. If on one side armatures are clearly different from a morpho-typological viewpoint, the technical solutions adopted to produce them show some similarities during the time span analysed, i.e. between the Late Epigravettian sequence of Riparo Tagliente and the Middle-Upper Magdalenian-Late Azilian sequence of Troubat.