Upper Palaeolithic

Upper Palaeolithic
Name	Upper Palaeolithic
Period	Late Paleolithic
Start	c. 50,000–40,000 BP
End	c. 10,000 BP
Major sites	Lascaux, Altamira, Kostenki, Sungir, Mezhirich, Clacton-on-Sea
Notable artifacts	Venus of Willendorf, Baton de commandement, Levallois technique, Solutrean points

Upper Palaeolithic The Upper Palaeolithic marks the final major phase of the European and Eurasian Palaeolithic, characterized by profound changes in Homo sapiens behaviour and material culture during the Late Pleistocene as seen near sites such as Lascaux, Altamira, Kostenki, Sungir, and Mezhirich; scholars including Jean Clottes, Jürgen Conard, Paul Bahn, Richard Klein, and Ofer Bar-Yosef place its onset with the spread of modern humans and key lithic innovations and its end with transitions recorded at Younger Dryas, Natufian culture, Mesolithic cultures, and early Neolithic Revolution contexts. Major debates among researchers like Chris Stringer, Svante Pääbo, David Lordkipanidze, Katerina Douka, and Colin Renfrew concern chronology, population dynamics, and the provenance of symbolic practices documented at Blombos Cave, Hohle Fels, Chauvet Cave, Lepenski Vir, and Grotte de Chauvet-Pont d'Arc.

Definition and Chronology

Scholars such as A. Leroi-Gourhan, Graeme Barker, Nick Barton, Paul Mellars, Jean-Jacques Hublin, and John Shea define the period by technological phases including the Aurignacian, Gravettian, Solutrean, and Magdalenian and by radiometric sequences anchored at sites like Kostenki, Willendorf II, Sungir, and Mezhirich; chronologies depend on methods developed by teams including Willard Libby, Camille Armand, Eric Boëda, Michael Richards, and Eugène Dubois with calibration against Greenland ice core records, Marine Isotope Stage 2, and the Last Glacial Maximum. Debates between proponents of models advanced by Chris Stringer and Marta Mirazón Lahr center on arrival dates refined by studies from Grotte des Fées, Ksar Akil, Skhul and Qafzeh, and Ust'-Ishim.

Human Populations and Migration

Genetic, fossil, and archaeological evidence synthesized by teams led by Svante Pääbo, David Reich, Eske Willerslev, Johannes Krause, Mark Hubbe, and Svante Pääbo supports major dispersals of Homo sapiens across Eurasia, interactions with Neanderthals at sites like Gibraltar, Vindija Cave, Denisova Cave, and Krapina, and introgression events inferred from samples such as Ust'-Ishim, Oase 1, Salkhit, and Tianyuan. Migration corridors traced through Levantine Corridor, Caucasus, Beringia, and Siberia link finds from Ksar Akil, Skhul, Mount Carmel, Kostenki, Yana Rhinoceros Horn Site, and Bluefish Caves; models from researchers like Eske Willerslev, David Reich, Chris Stringer, Marta Mirazón Lahr, and Alan Cooper emphasize pulses tied to climatic shifts recorded at Younger Dryas and Heinrich events.

Technology and Material Culture

Upper Palaeolithic toolkits attributed to technocomplexes such as Aurignacian, Gravettian, Solutrean, and Magdalenian include blade technologies, burins, backed blades, and bone implements evidenced at Grotte des Fées, Côte d'Azur sites, Mezhirich, Sungir, and Lascaux and analyzed by specialists like Graeme Barker, André Leroi-Gourhan, Jean Tixier, Marcel Otte, and Sergei Semenov. Organic technologies—antler points, osseous harpoons, and sewing needles—are documented from Kostenki, Mezhirich, Hohle Fels, Dolní Věstonice, and Předmostí and interpreted by researchers including Paul Mellars, Ofer Bar-Yosef, Alexander Marshack, and Nicholas Conard. Raw material procurement networks linking sources such as Mammoth steppe, Ob River, Rhine basin, Pentland Firth, and Iberian Peninsula appear in sourcing studies by John Gowlett, Mike Parker Pearson, Ian Mathieson, and Anna Belfer-Cohen.

Art, Symbolism, and Ritual

Cave paintings, portable art, personal ornaments, and ritual deposits at Chauvet Cave, Altamira, Lascaux, Hohle Fels, Dolní Věstonice, and Grotte du Renne demonstrate symbolic behavior discussed by Jean Clottes, Paul Bahn, Nicholas Conard, Timothy Taylor, and David Lewis-Williams; motifs include animal representations, hand stencils, and female figurines such as the Venus of Willendorf and the Venus of Hohle Fels, and contexts linked to sites like Grotte des Pigeons, Kostenki, and Mezhirich. Interpretations range across ritual frameworks proposed by Jean Clottes, shamanic models advanced by David Lewis-Williams, and social signaling theories from Steven Kuhn, Dean Snow, and Simon Kirby; dating and pigmentation studies by Emmanuel Anati, Félicien de Saulcy, Paul Pettitt, and Christophe Sabin refine temporal and cultural associations.

Subsistence and Environment

Faunal assemblages dominated by Woolly mammoth, Reindeer, Aurochs, Bison priscus, Horse, and small game at sites including Mezhirich, Kostenki, Sungir, Grotte de la Vache, and Gough's Cave reflect hunting strategies reconstructed by analysts like A. W. G. Pike, John Jull, Michael Richards, Katie Manning, and Marian Vanhaeren; stable isotope, zooarchaeological, and palynological studies by S. Ran Barkai, Eske Willerslev, Richard Klein, Mike Richards, and Paul Mellars link subsistence shifts to climatic events such as the Last Glacial Maximum and Heinrich event 1. Seasonal mobility, storage, and processing are inferred from features at Kendrick's Cave, Star Carr, Dolní Věstonice, Pincevent, and Mezhirich, with ethnographic analogies referenced by Richard Lee, David Lewis-Williams, and Tim Ingold.

Regional Cultures and Sites

Distinct regional traditions—European sequences at Aurignacian, Gravettian, Solutrean, Magdalenian; Near Eastern records at Ksar Akil, Skhul and Qafzeh, and Natufian culture precursors; Siberian and Central Asian evidence from Denisova Cave, Yana Rhinoceros Horn Site, and Kostenki—are documented by field teams including Ofer Bar-Yosef, Jean-Jacques Hublin, Vadim Stepanchuk, André Leroi-Gourhan, and Marta Mirazón Lahr. Key sites such as Lascaux, Altamira, Chauvet Cave, Dolní Věstonice, Předmostí, Mezhirich, Sungir, Kostenki, Ksar Akil, Denisova Cave, and Hohle Fels provide stratigraphic, artefactual, and human remains that anchor regional chronologies studied by Paul Bahn, Jean Clottes, Nicholas Conard, Svante Pääbo, and David Reich.

Legacy and Transition to the Mesolithic

The end of the Upper Palaeolithic encompasses demographic, technological, and ecological changes leading into Mesolithic cultures, the development of sedentism and cultivation seen later in Natufian culture and the Neolithic Revolution, and genetic continuities and turnovers documented in studies by David Reich, Ofer Bar-Yosef, Eske Willerslev, Svante Pääbo, and Chris Stringer; archaeological sequences at Saxony sites, Star Carr, Würm glaciation margin sites, and early Holocene deposits such as Epipaleolithic contexts illustrate gradual regional transformations debated by Marta Mirazón Lahr, Paul Mellars, Jean Clottes, and Colin Renfrew.

Category:Paleolithic