西班牙高等理工学院Herrejn-Lagunilla Angela研究团队取得一项新突破。他们报道了旧石器时代壁炉之间的时间间隔。2024年6月5日出版的《自然》发表了这项成果。

据研究人员介绍，解决旧石器时代人类活动的时间尺度是史前考古学中最具挑战性的问题之一。狩猎采集营地的持续时间和频率反映了社会生活和人类与环境相互作用的关键方面。然而，由于测年技术的限制，沉积物扰动因素的影响以及重写效应的影响，旧石器时代背景的时间维度通常被不准确地重建。

该研究团队报道了通过古地磁和古生物地层分析获得的，西班牙El Salt单元X的六个中旧石器时代壁炉的高分辨率时间差异。这一套壁炉至少有99%的概率覆盖了约200-240年，在不同的壁炉之间有十年和百年之久的间隔。研究结果为研究序列中包含的人类占领事件的时间框架提供了定量估计。

这是旧石器时代考古学的一个进步，在这门学科中，人类行为通常是从一个典型的地质过程的时间尺度来研究的，而重大的变化可能发生在人类世代的较小尺度上。研究结果达到了一个接近人类寿命的时间尺度。

附：英文原文

Title: The time between Palaeolithic hearths

Author: Herrejon-Lagunilla, Angela, Villalan, Juan Jose, Pavon-Carrasco, Francisco Javier, Serrano Sanchez-Bravo, Mario, Sossa-Rios, Santiago, Mayor, Alejandro, Galvan, Bertila, Hernandez, Cristo M., Mallol, Carolina, Carrancho, Angel

Issue&Volume: 2024-06-05

Abstract: Resolving the timescale of human activity in the Palaeolithic Age is one of the most challenging problems in prehistoric archaeology. The duration and frequency of hunter-gatherer camps reflect key aspects of social life and human–environment interactions. However, the time dimension of Palaeolithic contexts is generally inaccurately reconstructed because of the limitations of dating techniques, the impact of disturbing agents on sedimentary deposits and the palimpsest effect. Here we report high-resolution time differences between six Middle Palaeolithic hearths from El Salt Unit X (Spain) obtained through archaeomagnetic and archaeostratigraphic analyses. The set of hearths covers at least around 200–240years with 99% probability, having decade- and century-long intervals between the different hearths. Our results provide a quantitative estimate of the time framework for the human occupation events included in the studied sequence. This is a step forward in Palaeolithic archaeology, a discipline in which human behaviour is usually approached from a temporal scale typical of geological processes, whereas significant change may happen at the smaller scales of human generations. Here we reach a timescale close to a human lifespan.

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07467-0

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07467-0