Mesolithic and Neolithic cultures coexisting in the upper Rhone valley.

Perrin, Thomas

Introduction

The Rhone valley joins the Mediterranean to the lands of western Europe and is marked by a wide range of cultures all through later prehistory. Since some aspects of the cultural material refer to the Mediterranean world, they can be used to track the influx of new ideas from the south up the Rhone corridor. The upper Rhone basin also enjoys a strategic location at the point where the cultural current from the Mediterranean joins that from the Danube. The archaeological evidence from this region has therefore a double importance: not only to define the societies present in the region itself, but to characterise indirectly those cultural groups whose influence was bought to bear, with greater or lesser strength, upon them.

At the Grotte du Gardon stratified deposits have been defined which run from 5300 to 2200 BC. They have allowed the construction of a sequence of lithic industries which can be applied generally to the Neolithic cultural groups in the centre east of France and to the problem of the transition from the Mesolithic.

The Grotte du Gardon

The Grotte du Gardon is situated at altitude of nearly 380 m at the foot of a limestone cliff in the valley of the Balmeaux in the extreme south-west of the Jura. The archaeological site (Figure 1) lies mainly in a wide porch about 240 metres square which fronts a network of underground caves. Most of the lower parts of this network as so far known are in standing water, but the upper area next to the porch is generally dry and saw human occupation. Water from inside the cave could nevertheless inundate the upper levels and it was one of these rare floods which led to the discovery of the archaeological site on 9 December 1954. The main excavation campaign took place from 1986 to 2000 under the direction of Jean-Louis Voruz (Bois-Gerets et al. 1991), and brought to light a particularly well stratified archaeological deposit (Figure 1).

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

Most of the layers consisted of silty occupation levels or episodes of flooding represented (in the key cases at least) by more or less bedded sands. Micromorphology was used to identify or refine a number of different formation processes, such as short-lived occupation, long-term habitation, sheep folds and others (Sordoillet 1999-Perrin et al. 2002). A reliable chronological framework was provided by more than 70 radiocarbon dates on samples taken from most layers (summarised in Figure 2). The sequence of assemblages is remarkable, in that although the layers were deposited in chronological order, artefacts of Mesolithic tradition are found with Middle Neolithic material. This is interpreted as implying that peoples of two traditions were in contact with each other.

[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]

The earliest occupation, layers 61-58 (Figures 1, 2)

There were traces of human occupation in the earliest layers defined (60 and 59), but they were insufficient for any cultural attribution. The first well characterised layer was 58 which was dated between 5300 and 4900 and contained not only struck flint and worked animal bone, but sherds of pottery decorated with grooves and chevrons, and tentatively associated with wares from Limbourg (Nicod 1991; Jeunesse et alii 1991; Manen 1997). The stone debitage suggests the production of small blades of standard width, removed from selected high quality flint cores by indirect percussion. The most characteristic implement of layer 58 was the tranchet arrowhead (Figure 3). These were made by truncating a blade, splitting the pieces to make them thinner and retouching the edges (standard BG32: Perrin 2003). These artefacts are identical to those found in the assemblages with early Neolithic impressed wares in the south (two microburins and three arrowheads of a latter type found in layer 58 can probably be considered intrusive). The production of blades by indirect percussion, and their working into geometric shapes for use in arrow-heads and sickles is typical of early Neolithic in Provence (Binder 1987). The industry remains essentially the same throughout the period represented by impressed wares, apart from an improvement in the quality of raw materials procured and a increasing robustness of the blades (Binder 1987, 1998).

[FIGURE 3 OMITTED]

In the central Rhone valley, only layer 6 of the Baume d'Oulins has so far produced a similar assemblage (Beeching 1980; Beeching et al. 1995; Binder 1998). Here two separate chains of manufacture were distinguished, one producing blades from imported materials and the other irregular blades and flakes from local flint. However laminar blades may also be fashioned from local flint, implying that the source of the raw material is less significant than what is done with it. A similar situation was encountered in Baume de Ronze, where A. Beeching (1980: 63) found high quality blades made from imported flint among an industry producing flakes and laminar blades from local materials. In Languedoc, the industries mainly make use of local materials (Briois I997), and only in the most recent contexts in the east does imported yellow flint make an appearance (Camprafaud c.20 to 16 and Font-Juvenal c. 12--Briois 1997, 436). The assemblage consists mainly of flakes obtained by direct percussion which then provide the most commonly used tools.

It seems therefore that the middle Rhone valley, Provence and Languedoc all exhibit two productions in parallel, one local and one indistinguishable from the early Neolithic in the south. The latter can be seen also in the North Alps, at the Grande-Rivoire (layers B1 and B2a--Picavet 1991) and the rock-shelter at Aulp-du-Seuil (C1--Bintz et al. 1999). Thus from the Mediterranean coast to the slopes of the Jura, the farming population prepared their flint following similar manufacturing procedures at precisely the same period in the early Neolithic.

A Mesolithic reprise

The formation of layer 58 was possibly owed to inundations, and this may have been true of some of the layers 57-54 which succeeded (Figure 2). However, layer 57, which may relate to the top surface of layer 58, also showed evidence for burning in situ and may represent a hearth. Layer 54 seemed to be stratigraphically intact and a radiocarbon date of 5400-5000 BC has been obtained from it. The assemblages from these two layers (57 and 54) were small, not more than 300 objects in all, but significant in that they refer to Mesolithic traditions. The implication is that Mesolithic communities and Neolithic groups were living at the same time in the same territory.

The assemblage from layers 57 and 54 is mainly dedicated to small blades, but includes asymmetric arrowheads with a biracial concave base (standard BG 15, Perrin 2003: Figure 3). These arrowheads have similarities to the pointe de Bavans (Aired 1984), the pointes de Sonchamp and to other types with asymmetric triangles with opposed flat retouches (Marchand 1999), normally dated to the last phases of the Mesolithic (Thevenin 1998). The typology of Mesolithic implements in the Jura is well studied (Thdvenin 1990, 1991, 1998; Frelin-Khatib & Thevenin 2000), but the understanding and classification of technical processes of manufacture is less advanced (Seara 1998; Pelegrin & Riche 1999). Typological data in general refer only to arrowheads which are considered the best chronological and cultural markers (Bintz et al. 1995). A statistical analysis of the industries from published sites has shown that the end of the Mesolithic can be divided into two phases: one dominated by asymmetric triangular and trapezoidal arrowheads, with a second final phase in which the symmetric trapezium makes an appearance (Perrin 2002, 2003). The number of tools present in layers 57 and 54 is too small to be included in this analysis, but it can be pointed out that the arrowheads present are those which characterise the later Mesolithic in the Jura. By contrast, these kinds of arrowhead never appear in the assemblages of the Early Neolithic. There is some confirmation of these attributions from an examination of the quality of flint and the type of production technique used (Figure 3). It can be seen that while layer 58 clusters with the other Neolithic layers, layer 57 and to a lesser extent layer 54, are outliers.

Thus while layer 58 may be culturally associated with the southern early Neolithic, layer 57 and 54 seem to represent a cultural reference to the local Mesolithic. The layers do not seem to have been produced by flooding or redeposition (which would explain their inversion), and it seems legitimate therefore to interpret them as successive occupations by groups who were culturally Neolithic and then Mesolithic. The context in both cases could have been the use of the cave by relative outsiders: at first by newcomers and the by a subsequently marginalised traditional group.

Transition to the middle Neolithic

Layers 52 to 49 allows us to address the problem of the transition between the early and middle Neolithic. The data from the grotte du Gardon (and other deposits) lead to an association between a specific type of lithic assemblage with ceramics of the Saint-Uze type (Beeching et al. 1997). Both lithics and ceramics link to the early Neolithic. But although the mode of producing blades by indirect percussion on good quality flint conforms with early Neolithic practice, the type of tools being produced--asymmetric arrowheads with a biracial concave base--recall the Mesolithic and suggest the continued gradual assimilation of the last hunter-gatherers of the Jura. A similar model was advanced from the bone assemblage of the Grotte des Planches (Petrequin et al. 1985). Thus, rather than representing a ceramic style, Saint-Uze could refer to a culture which defined the transition between early and middle Neolithic and saw the last vestiges of the Mesolithic. It was superseded in the middle Rhone valley by the Chasseen culture around 4500 cal BC.

Conclusion

These observations offer a new model for the "neolithization" process in the upper Rhone valley (Figure 4). The process begins around 5800-5600 cal BC, with the first Neolithic installations on the Mediterranean coast of France, indicated in Provence by the presence of ceramica impressa originating from northern Italy (Binder 1995), and in Languedoc by Ligurian types (Roudil 1990; Manen 2000). The Rhone valley is occupied by the Castelnovien culture and the Cardial culture is making an appearance. Around 5600 cal BC, the Cardial culture is spreading along the coast and by 5500 is established up the Rhone. All this time, Mesolithic populations still seem to be present in Jura. There was probably a profitable interaction between the two cultural worlds, until from around 4900 to 4700 Mesolithic flint making was gradually absorbed into the Neolithic mode of production.

[FIGURE 4 OMITTED]

However, this model should not rely exclusively on stone tools, and future research aims to broaden definitions of economic and cultural behaviour to which we currently give to the crude terms Mesolithic and Neolithic.

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Thomas Perrin *

* Centre d'Anthropologie, 39, allees Jules Guesde, F-31000 Toulouse, France (Email: tperrin@free.fr)

Received: 21 May 2002 Revised: May 2003 Accepted: 16 October 2002