The Upper Palaeolithic at Trenčianske Bohuslavice, Western Carpathians, Slovakia: Journal of Field Archaeology: Vol 45 , No 4

ABSTRACT

Trenčianske Bohuslavice Gravettian site has been known since the early 1980s, with possibly the longest sequence of Upper Palaeolithic human occupation in the region, including a peculiar assemblage of lithic tools composed of bifacial leaf points. This paper presents the results of the 2017 excavation season that produced new data on the absolute chronology, stratigraphy, paleobotany, archaeology, and archaeozoology of the site. We found that the earliest occupation most probably belongs to the Aurignacian. This is followed by two Late Gravettian layers and the layer that yielded the bifacial leaf points. An Early Epigravettian layer dated to 26 kya seals the sequence. The succession of biological remains and geological evidence enabled the reconstruction of a cooling climate and disappearing boreal forest, which corresponded well with the development of the Last Glacial Maximum.

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Acknowledgments

J. W. was supported by the National Science Centre (NCN), Poland, decision No: UMO-2015/18/E/HS3/00178. A. N. was also supported by the research project APVV–14-0742, Dynamics of the exploitation of silicate material resources during the Palaeolithic and Neolithic in the western Slovakia. B. P. G was supported by the Premium Postdoctoral Research Grant of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA). G. L. was supported by the National Science Centre (NCN), Poland, decision No. DEC-2016/23/P/HS3/04034, the ÚNKP-19-4P New National Excellence Program of the Ministry for Innovation and Technology (TNRT/1419/51/2019), and the Bolyai János Research Fellowship (BO/00629/19/2) of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA). This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 665778. M. MdH. was partly supported by the stautory research of IB PAS. We are grateful to Michal Horsák (Masaryk University, Czech Republic) for identifying some of the helicoid shells and Prof. Natalia Piotrowska of the Department of Radioisotopes at the GADAM Centre, Gliwice, Poland, for providing access to the archives of the Gliwice Radiocarbon Laboratory.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on Contributors

Jarosław Wilczyński (Ph.D. 2010, Institute of Systematics and Evolution of Animals, PAS, Kraków, Poland) is an archaeologist and archaeozoologist. His archaeological research focuses on the Upper Palaeolithic of central Europe, especially on the Gravettian and the Epigravettian cultures, studying lithic raw material distribution, lithic tool technology, and lithic tool typology. His archaeozoological research involves mammalian remains from both Pleistocene and Holocene prehistoric periods.

Ondrej Žaár (Ph.D. 2013, Constantine the Philosopher University, Nitra, Slovakia) is a head researcher of PAMARCH, Ltd. company in Nitra, Slovakia, which deals with the protection, revitalization, and reconstruction of monuments, as well as corresponding research in archaeology and historical architecture. He specializes on Palaeolithic research along the rivers Váh and Nitra, the Morava valleys, and central Europe, with an emphasis on field prospection and spatial analysis of archaeological site distribution.

Adrián Nemergut (Ph.D. 2012, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic) is an archaeologist in the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods, with a focus on the technology of lithic industries and raw material procurement. From 2015–2019, he was a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Archaeology, Slovak Academy of Sciences, where he currently holds a position as a scientific researcher at the Department of the Prehistoric Archaeology.

Bernadeta Kufel-Diakowska (Ph.D. 2008, University of Wrocław, Poland) is an assistant professor at the Laboratory of Archaeometry and Archaeological Conservation of the Institute of Archaeology of the University of Wroclaw. She studies subsistence economy and the lifestyle of hunter-gatherers and early farmers. She specializes in use-wear analysis of lithic tools and experimental archaeology. She is engaged in research projects concerning human activities in the Upper and Late Palaeolithic and the Neolithic period.

Magdalena Moskal-del Hoyo (Ph.D. 2010, University of Valencia, Spain) is a researcher at the Department of Palaeobotany of the W. Szafer Institute of Botany of the Polish Academy of Sciences. Her main scientific interests include the reconstructions of past woodland vegetation from charcoal and wood remains of Pleistocene and Holocene archaeological and natural sites. She has worked on plant macro-remains of Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Greece, Germany, Cyprus, Israel, and Jordan.

Przemysław Mroczek (Ph.D. 2005, Maria Curie-Skłodowska University, Lublin, Poland) specializes in geological surveys of loess sediments and buried soils forming loess-paleosol sequences. His main research topics are the paleogeography of loess areas of central Europe in the period of individual cold and warm stratigraphic Quaternary units. His scientific interests focus on relief reconstruction of loess areas based on soil catena analyses, applied micromorphological methods (undisturbed thin sections), and laser diffraction (clastic sediments granulation). His entire professional career is connected with the Institute of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin.

Barna Páll-Gergely (Ph.D. 2015, Shinshu University, Japan) is a malacologist working mainly on the taxonomy, systematics, ecology, evolutionary biology, fossil history, and invasion biology of terrestrial molluscs of Europe and Southeast Asia. He is currently a Premium Postdoctoral Research Fellow of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Besides his main research subject (systematics revisions of southeastern Asian snails), he has been working on molluscs of European Quaternary and Holocene loess sediments for 10 years.

Tomasz Oberc (M.A. 2013, Jagiellonian University, Poland) is a younger researcher in the Centre for Mountains and Uplands Archaeology of the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology PAS and a Ph.D. candidate in the Institute of Archaeology of Jagiellonian University in Kraków. He specializes in 2D and 3D documentation and modelling techniques, GIS, and statistics. His research concern is mainly the central European Neolithic, with its settlement patterns and demography being a main topic of his Ph.D. project. In the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology PAS, he works as a lithic and use-wear analyst.

György Lengyel (Ph.D. 2006, University of Haifa, Israel) is currently an assistant professor in archaeology at the University of Miskolc. His research field is the Upper Palaeolithic with a special focus on how hunter-gatherer ecology formed the archaeological record. He is also involved with lithic technology, experimental knapping, and Epipalaeolithic research of the Near East.