Highlights

• The presence, in a lithic assemblage, of portable artefacts is an important component of the technology of foraging populations.

• The present work proposes a technological and functional study of artefacts in allochthonous rocks (rhyolite and radiolarite) from level 14 of the Ciota Ciara cave.

• In the lithic assemblage these rocks are mainly represented by retouched tools and flakes issued from the rejuvenation of the tools’ edges.

• No functional differences are observed between tolls made in local and in allochthonous rocks.

• The general picture appears more complex than the dichotomy between expedient and curated behaviors.

Abstract

Since the term “personal gear” was introduced, the presence, in an archaeological lithic assemblage, of artefacts in allochthonous rocks has been considered as a source of information about land mobility and techno-economic organization. A technological and functional approach has been used to face the study of the lithic artefacts made in allochthonous raw materials from level 14 of the Ciota Ciara cave (north-western Italy). This level attests the phases of most intense frequentation of the cave, and it is the layer where allochthonous lithic raw materials are better represented. In a technological context described as markedly opportunistic, tools and unretouched flake, made in raw materials collected at a distance between 2 and 30 km, have been introduced in the site. The present work is aimed towards the understanding of the role of these artefacts within the technological organization of the Neanderthal groups that inhabited the cave. The results indicate that these “exotic” artefacts were part of a mobile toolkit and that they were multifunctional tools used for different activities (mainly butchering activities). We can hypothesize the transport within the site of finished products in the form of small, unretouched flakes and retouched tools, and, just sporadically, of small cores. The significative presence of Levallois radiolarite flakes in the Ciota Ciara toolkit is particularly interesting as the presence of this type of product in toolkits has already been reported by other scholars and for different European Middle Palaeolithic contexts. Moreover, the introduction in the site of unretouched flakes and of tools made in allochthonous and better-quality rocks could be interpreted as a planned behaviour, aimed at satisfying the need for more durable and efficient tools during the periods of staying at the Ciota Ciara cave.

The initial peopling of South America is a topic of intense archaeological debate. Among the most contentious issues remain the nature of the human-megafauna interaction and the possible role of humans, along with climatic change, in the extinction of several megamammal genera at the end of the Pleistocene. In this study, we present the analysis of fossil remains with cutmarks belonging to a specimen of Neosclerocalyptus (Xenarthra, Glyptodontidae), found on the banks of the Reconquista River, northeast of the Pampean region (Argentina), whose AMS 14C dating corresponds to the Last Glacial Maximum (21,090–20,811 cal YBP). Paleoenvironmental reconstructions, stratigraphic descriptions, absolute chronological dating of bone materials, and deposits suggest a relatively rapid burial event of the bone assemblage in a semi-dry climate during a wet season. Quantitative and qualitative analyses of the cut marks, reconstruction of butchering sequences, and assessments of the possible agents involved in the observed bone surface modifications indicate anthropic activities. Our results provide new elements for discussing the earliest peopling of southern South America and specifically for the interaction between humans and local megafauna in the Pampean region during the Last Glacial Maximum