18 Lower Palaeolithic Culture of Europe

D. K. Bhattacharya

For consideration of prehistoric culture it is convenient to view Europe under four cultural and also ecological zones. The countries lying north of 580 N and going up to 70 0 N are counted as Scandinavian countries. The countries falling between these latitudes are parts of United Kingdom, Norway, Sweden, Ice Land, Finland, and Lapland. Being close to the North Pole these countries have maintained a peri-glacial environment for most of the Pleistocene period. Below 580 N and up to 360 N is a landmass which consists of nearly 200 small and large countries. The conglomerate of U.K. is separated from the continent by the English Channel, a strip of 40 km. Separating Dover in U.K. from Calais in France. River Rhine which takes birth in the Swiss Alps flows towards the north to meet North Sea through Holland. This marks approximately 60 E. The area lying west of this longitude is counted as West Europe. The countries in West Europe are United Kingdom, France, Spain and Portugal, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Luxemburg, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia basically remain kind of in between West Europe and Scandinavia. Countries counted in Central Europe are Poland, Germany, Czech Republic, Austria, Hungary and Italy. The later often tries to disassociate from Central Europe claiming that they are more a Mediterrnean country with Latin culture and hence do not have any similarity with the predominant Gothic strand of Central Europe. Rumania, Ukrania and Belarus constitutes East Europe and finally Bulgaria, Greece, Yugoslavia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Slovenia, Croatia, Albania, and Macedonia, constitutes the Balkans Europe.

In north France V. Commont in 1932 gave the earliest scheme of a geo-chronology on the alluvial deposits of the river Somme. It is the same river from the banks of which Boucher de Perth had earlier made a fabulous collection of handaxes and cleavers. Unfortunately these were not accepted then as human antiquity by scholars of the time. Commont suggested that there are three terraces visible on the river bank. These are designated as High Terrace, Middle Terrace and Low Terrace. The High Terrace according to him, represents the first interglacial, the Middle Terrace represents the second interglacial and the Low Terrace represents the third and the last interglacial. Only few pebble choppers were found from a site named La Montiers situated on the High Terrace. The Middle Terrace yields one of the largest collections of Acheulian tools in this part of the world. Abbeville, Chelle, St. Acheul are some of the famous sites belonging to this level. Subsequently Henri Abbe Breuil proposed a typo-technological chronology of the tools which are new all generally referred to as Acheulian. He suggested the following seven stages.

I. Large cores, crudely finished into handaxes by stone hammer technique, only primary scars are used. Flakes present are not retouched into types.

II Handaxes still remains massive but some secondary scars are visible. The basic technique continues to be stone hammer. Flakes remain unspecific.

III Handaxes become regular. Cylinder hammer technique is introduced. Cleavers as new type is introduced. Levalloise technique appears during the phase.

IV Handaxes and cleavers are regular in shape and includes such types as amygdaloid, lanceolate and ficron. Flake tools become specific in types.

V Handaxes and cleavers become smaller and dainty in shape. Such types as Ovate, triangulare and cordate appears. Flake tools types are of many varieties, such as knives, side scrapers points and borers.

VI This is a stage where handaxes and cleavers do not show any change in techno-morphological features, but they become lesser in frequency. The flake tool types become higher in frequency.

VII This is a late surviving Acheulian which occur after Middle Palaeolithic at a site called La Micoque in south west France.

Breuil suggests that the first two categories can be called Lower Acheulian (I & II); III and IV as Middle Acheulian and V and VI as Upper Acheulian. The VII category is termed late Acheulian. All these stages are believed to occur between Mindle through Riss up to early Eemian. That is, Pre-Mindle evidence in Somme is only restricted to few choppers at La Montiers which cannot be counted as Acheulian. These kinds of cores and flakes have now been excavated from some more sites from the southern region of West Europe. Atapuerca in Spain and Isernia la Pineta in Italy are two such sites which have dates of nearly one million and above years. In French riviera Prof. De Lumley described another find of similar date and nature from La Valonet. Thus, we see that whether in the north or in the south Acheulians do not appear till Mindel or the second glacial. Southern part of the West Europe has two excellent excavated sites. These are described below.

Terra Amata: It is an open air site situated in the French riviera. Prof. Henri de Lumley excavated this site in 1966. Eight identifiable layers have been exposed and ascribed to a time span between early Mindel to Eemian. Tools described basically show choppers, chopping tools and several finished flake tool types. There are two crudely worked specimens which the excavator felt represent a handaxe and a cleaver in a very rudimentary stage. This led De Lumley to designate the industry as Acheulien ancien or preparatory acheulian (not exact translation of the word but of the possible sense the author intended). Non lithic evidences of this site are not only rich but also unique. For instance, ground plan of several huts measuring 8-15 meters in length and 4-6 meters in breadth has been found. Some holes measuring 30 cm. in diameter found around the ground plan may have been used for erecting supporting roof. Each hut shows a fire place. Around the fire place peculiar depressions have been found. It has been argued that these may be impression left by utensils or containers with convex base which might have been used to press on once soft floor to stabilize it. Flat stones which are not normally available at the site have been carried from afar and kept near the fire hearth like a dining table. In one of the huts a deep foot print measuring 24 cm. has been found from this tool-print height of the man has been estimated to be 1.56 meters. Some red ocher has also been found on the floor.

Torralba-Ambrona: It is twin sites known from as early as 1907, but systematically excavated by Clark Howell and Freeman from 1961 to 1963. The site is situated at a height of 1,115 meters above the sea level. There is no source of water found anywhere near the site. It is found littered with animal bones, most of which are of elephants. Since the site is situated on a narrow gorge that links north castile in the north (a very cold zone between Pyranees and Sierra ranges) with new castile in the south (which is warm with Mediterranean climate), it was argued that this narrow gorge was the route of migration of elephants in the winter months. Prehistoric man must have observed this route of seasonal migration and taken advantage of this. They must have come to this narrow gorge at high altitude to shoot the elephants down and then kill them. It has been further argued that this must have been done in a co-operative manner. Thus, co-operation rather than competition in human kind from as early as this age is indicated. Eleven sedimentation units with several sub phases grouped as Lower, Middle and Upper complexes have been described. Of these the lower complex is a scribed to the middle of Mindel glaciation. The cultural remains include a high percentage of handaxes and cleavers. Cleavers are three times more in frequency as compared to handaxes. Besides numerous flake tools are also found. Cleavers are usually found when cylinder hammer technique is evolved. Yet at Torralba such a large number of cleavers occur while the predominate technique remains archaic stone hammer technique. Prof. Francois Bordes felt this is a special development of this region and named it Acheulian meridionalis facies.

Thames Valley: Thames river in England, it has been shown, has changed its course three times in the past gradually changing towards a south easterly direction. The present bed of the river carries the earliest deposits as those of Mindel glaciation. The alluvial deposits of the present course of the river, as such, are taken to belong to Hoxnian interglacial. One of the abandon beds of the river which is naturally taken to belong to a pre-Mindel period yielded the famous Clactonian industry. Two miles stretch of the Thames from Greenhithe to Galley Hill in the district of Kent provides the most abundant evidences of Palaeolithic occupation in Great Britain. Sites are found in various pits such as Globe pit, Ingress vale, Barnfield Pit etc., These are together as a group referred to as Swanscombe group of sites. The typological character of Swanscombe has been summarized as a typical Middle Acheulian industry which is one step forward entering into upper Acheulian. Among the bifaces the most characteristic and frequent form appears to be a wide based lanceolate variety of handaxe, usually about 13 cm. or less in length. Side scrapers predominates the flake tools types. The other types include backed knives, denticulates and burinated flakes. The general features of Swanscombed Acheulian can, as such, be attributed to type IV of Somme sequence.

Clacton-on Sea: This site, is the exposed channel beds of the Thames in eastern Essex. The tools from the site were collected from as early as 1898 by Kenworthy. Subsequently Warren in1951 analysed the Clactonian industry. The industry yields large number of high angled flakes with pronounced bulb of percussion. Besides the stone industry, the site has also yielded a fragment of wooden spear 33 cm. in length. It is a pointed piece of yew wood slightly curved and rather thick (nearly 4 cm.) in cross section. Be that as it may, it will be apparent that Clactonian presents the oldest evidence of human presence in these islands. Pre-Acheulian in West Europe, therefore goes beyond Mindel and presents Mode I culture at both England as also at La Montier and La Valonet in France and Atapuerca in Spain and Isernia La Pineta in Italy.

Central Europe: This is an area which lies naked to the cold currents of North Pole in the north and the chilly winds of glaciers of Alps in the south. In Germany a rich collection of Lower Palaeolithic tools were made by Grahmann from the deposits of the river Pleisse near Leipzig. Several sites were surveyed by Grahmann and it was demonstrated that like Thames Pleisse also represents a Hoxnian deposit. The tools were collected from a deposit which was identified as early Riss. A total of 3,152 artifacts have been analysed from several localities along the river. These are referred to as Markkleeberg group of sites. The most important feature that emerges from this is that the entire industry shows rare occurrence of handaxes. The bulk is formed by a fairly good percentage of large Clactonian flakes, some Levalloisian flakes without any evidence of a prepared platform and big flake cores. The longest of the specimens described is a handaxes, of 15 cm length with fine retouchings carried out all over the tool. Grahmann Compared this industry with West European Acheulian and British Clactonian. It was not found to be similar to either of these two traditions. It was, therefore, decided to be called simply as Lower Palaeolithic variety of central Europe. Varieties of large flakes retouched into points and few handaxes which are exceedingly well prepared seem to be forming the main characteristics of this tradition.

VertesszÖlÖs: This is a rock shelter situated about 50 km North West of Budapest. This was excavated by Kretzoi and Vertes during 1963-65. The excavation revealed a 15 meter thick deposit. The lower deposit, on the basis of associated flora and fauna was designated to upper Biharian stage (The period between Gunz/Mindel interglacial to the end of Mindel glacial is designated in Hungary as Biharian). The tools described are made on quartz, quartzite, flint, chert, lime stone and radiolite. The tool types are chopper, chopping tools and flakes retouched into side scrapers, notch, denticulate and borer. One of the most significant features of this industry is the extreme diminutive size of these tools. The average length of the tools is 24 mm and the largest among them measures only 62 mm. More than 2 thousand specimens have been collected but only 20 percent of these seem to be retouched into finished tool types. Vertes felt that this represents an industry which is similar to an evolved Oldowan. Besides the cultural remains VertesszÖlÖs has also yielded an occipital fragment of a Middle Pleistocene Homo erectus.

It is important at this juncture to remember that such diminutive pebble tools somehow does not seem to be of much use to early Homo erectus who had still not developed full maneuverability of the palm and wrist. Consequently many eye brows were raised about authenticity of this culture. Subsequently Vertes undertook a survey of the valley of the river Buda and described the Buda industry which was found to be also diminutive. Thus it remains an enigmatic development of Lower Palaeolithic in the south eastern part of the Central Europe.

To sum up, it appears that man must have entered Europe fairly late in date when compared with its date of emergence in Africa. The initial dispersal in Europe of the Pre-Mindel period appears to be of pebble tools and Clactonian flakes. Both West Europe and Central Europe share these features. It is around Mindel that the Acheulians develope in West Europe and continue to show progressive refinement for almost 300,000 years (i.e. from 400,000 to 100,000 years). Central Europe had a fringe effect of this in the form of rare occurrence of a handaxe here and a levalloise flakes there. Otherwise this region shows no marked change from its Pre-Mindel chopper/Flake culture.

References and Suggested readings

• Palaeolithic Europe. Netherland: Humanities press. Bhattacharya, D.K. (1977).
• People of the Earth: An Introduction to World Prehistory. New Jersey: Pearson Education. Fagan B. M. (2004).
• Frameworks for dating Fossil man.London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. Oakley, K.P. (1966).
• The Explanation of culture change: Models in prehistory. London. Duckworth. Renfrew, C. (ed.). (1973).
• Man the Hunter. Chicago: Aldine Publishing Company. Lee, R.B and I. Devore (Eds.).( 1977).
• An Introduction to Prehistoric Archaeology. New York: Hold, Rinehart and Winston, INC. Hole, H. and R.F. Heizer. (1969)