Hominid Adaptations in the Last Glacial of Central Europe

Abstract

A framework of climatic changes and archaeological chronologies during the Last Glacial is discussed with particular reference to the correlation among MIS stages, GISP2 ice core oscillation, and calibrated radiocarbon dates from palaeolithic sites in Rhineland, Germany as one of the most intensively studied areas in Central Europe. Although the fine chronologies have been set up in the last decade, an analysis of a concrete example of a palaeollithic site is needed when hominid adaptation in the Last Glacial has to be discussed. This paper focuses on the subsistence of a late Magdalenian Gennersdorf settlement in the oldest Dryas period. Excavations have revealed two large houses, one big hut, and two small huts. Archaeological features that have been well preserved made it possible to set out a hypothesis that the large house was repeatedly used every winter and the small huts were used in summer by different human groups, in relation to the lithic raw material, procurement systems. Hominids of the late Palaeolithic period were characterized by having developed a subsistence system for the all round adaptive procurement of environmental conditions through seasonal migrations.