Blade and bladelet production at Hohle Fels Cave, AH IV in the Swabian Jura and its importance for characterizing the technological variability of the Aurignacian in Central Europe

Abstract

Hohle Fels Cave in the Ach Valley of Southwestern Germany exhibits an Aurignacian sequence of 1 m thickness within geological horizons (GH) 6–8. The deposition of the layers took place during mild and cold phases between at least 42 ka (GI 10) and 36 ka calBP (GI 7). We present below a technological study of blade and bladelet production from AH IV (GH 7) at Hohle Fels. Our analyses show that blade manufacture is relatively constant, while bladelet production displays a high degree of variability in order to obtain different blanks. Knappers used a variety of burins as cores to produce fine bladelets. The results reveal a new variant of the Aurignacian in the Swabian Jura primarily characterized by the production of bladelets and microliths from burin-cores. The artefacts from the Swabian Aurignacian are technologically and functionally more diverse than earlier studies of the Geißenklösterle and Vogelherd sequences have suggested. The technological analyses presented here challenge the claim that the typo-chronological system from Southwestern Europe can be applied to the Central European Aurignacian. Instead, we emphasize the impact of technological and functional variables within the Aurignacian of the Swabian Jura.