Hares and rabbits at Regourdou (Montignac-sur-Vézère, Dordogne, France): paleontological and taphonomic studies of two naturally-occurring bone accumulations

• Published in: Paléo
• Main Authors: Pelletier, Maxime, Royer, Aurélien, Holliday, Trenton, Maureille, Bruno
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Musée national de Préhistoire 2018
• Subjects: taphonomie; paléontologie; morphométrie géométrique 2D; mortalité attritionnelle; mortalité accidentelle; Lepus timidus; Oryctolagus cuniculus; Taphonomy; Palaeontology; 2D geometric morphometry; Attritional mortality; Accidental mortality; archeo; envir
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/paleo/3029

Since the end of the nineteenth century, a great deal of work studying subsistence patterns of prehistoric societies in Western Europe has been done. During the Middle Paleolithic, humans were interested in small game, particularly the Leporidae, taxa that were abundant in their territories. However, distinguishing the exact nature of their origin in an archaeological site is not an easy task, given that numerous agents could be responsible for their accumulation (i.e., natural mortality, acquisition by humans and/or other terrestrial carnivores, or even nocturnal or diurnal raptors). In this contribution, we put forth a new taphonomic and paleontological study of the leporids of Regourdou, a Mousterian site that has yielded a Neandertal skeleton. This study suggests that no predators were involved in the accumulation of the hare or rabbit remains, but rather that they are due to natural (accidental) mortality for the former, and natural (attritional) mortality for the latter. Specifically, the evidence suggests that at one point in its history (for the hares), the cavity functioned as a natural pitfall trap, while for the rabbits it appears to show the existence of a warren, which we interpret as having existed during the last occupation of the site during MIS 4 or 3, before the end of the accumulation of sediments in the site. Morphological variation and body size of individuals also allows us to specify the order of paleoenvironmental changes since the site’s functional beginning, confirming the attribution of the inferior levels to the MIS 5 temperate period, and the upper levels to a more recent phase in MIS 4 or 3. Depuis la fin du XIXe siècle, l’Europe occidentale a fait l’objet de très nombreux travaux pour étudier les modes de subsistance des sociétés préhistoriques. À partir du Paléolithique moyen, les Hommes vont alors s’intéresser au petit gibier, tels que les léporidés, taxons relativement abondants sur ce territoire. Or, distinguer l’origine de leur accumulation dans un site archéologique ne ...