干旱区生态环境知识资源中心

One of the main issues in Paleolithic archeology is to understand the relationship that the evolution of techniques, cultures, and the territories occupied by human groups, has with changes in the climate, flora, and fauna. The aim of the Magdatis project was to provide elements of answer through the study of a key case: the Middle and Upper Magdalenian (ca. 19.000-14.000 cal. BP) from the Western Aquitaine basin. This region shows sharp ecological contrasts that make it an ideal context to study the behavior of human groups in different environments at the end of the last glaciation. A precise paleoenvironmental survey, multidisciplinary archaeo-logical studies and radiocarbon dating were realized. The results of this project significantly changed our perception of the Western Aquitaine basin in the Paleolithic, of its environmental constraints and human settlements. The Gironde, then mostly a steppe-like region, was apparently deserted for two millennia, probably because of environmental degradation. A periglacial desert laid in the Landes during the whole period considered. This probably explains the small human presence in this region that was a constraining environment for life. Conversely, the coastal areas were more often visited and more intensively exploited than previously thought, attesting the existence of a seashore economy. In the Pyrenean lower valleys, the deglaciation was completed early and opened new landscapes that were rapidly settled by human groups. The environmental changes hence permit to draw a map of attractive and repulsive areas. The lithic and osseous industry, however, show the existence of distribution networks not conditioned by natural obstacles: their extent is instead linked to social dynamics. The cultural dynamics observed on this scale cannot be simply related to environmental changes.