Continuity and change in lithic technological and economic strategies: The Middle and Upper Paleolithic industries of the Brive Basin (France)

This dissertation focuses on a series of hypotheses regarding changes in technological and economic strategies during the Late Pleistocene in western France. Based on an ecological approach of lithic assemblages, this analysis identifies differences and similarities in the use of lithic raw materials among eight lithic assemblages located in the Brive Basin region of western France. These assemblages were chosen on the basis of typology as samples of the main techno-complexes of the Middle and the Upper Paleolithic of Western Europe (Mousterian, Chatelperronian, Aurignacian, Gravettian, Solutrean and Magdalenian). The core of the analysis consists in quantifying the distribution of the different lithic raw material categories in different technological and typological categories for each assemblage. As a result, the overall similarity in lithic material category distribution in each assemblage strongly suggests the existence of continuous lithic raw material procurement strategies from the Middle Paleolithic to the end of the Upper Paleolithic in the Brive Basin. The general distribution of lithic materials is best defined as a large representation of the Senonian chert category originating from the nearby Perigord region. The main differences among the assemblages were therefore based on the relative variation of more discrete raw material categories. These differences can be described as the gradual introduction of an increasing amount of non-local lithic raw materials into the Brive Basin. However, this increase in non-local material use is most significant in the Gravettian and Solutrean assemblages. The technological analysis of these assemblages also demonstrates that the relative proximity of the large Senonian chert outcrops from the nearby Perigord region did not favor the implementation of economizing or maximizing strategies designed to cope with the lack of local raw materials as first hypothesized. Rather, the analysis supports the idea that certain components of the different assemblages, in particular the production of small flakes using different methods, were designed to maximize blank production. This emphasis on small flake production is interpreted as a local characteristic of the Brive Basin Paleolithic lithic industries demonstrating again continuity of some technological solutions during the Late Pleistocene.