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20170070_0003

© Nicoas NAUDINOT / F. BLANCHET / CEPAM / PLOS ONE / CNRS Images

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20170070_0003

Outillage lithique découvert sur le site du Rocher de l’Impératrice

Lithic tools discovered at the Rocher de l’Impératrice site in Plougastel-Daoulas, Finistère. This rock shelter, where digging began in 2013, was mainly occupied at the start of the Azilian, around 14,500 years ago. It was used for short periods by hunters visiting the valley that is now under the sea. Flint tools have been found there, as well as engraved schist tablets. Here, figures 1 to 5 are flat retouched blades; figures 6 to 8 are burins used to work various materials; figures 9 and 10 are scrapers; and figure 11 is a borer. Other tools have also been found, including knives and projectile points. These valuable remains provide information about the economy of the first Azilian societies, currently little documented, which developed after the Ice Age and the Magdalenian culture (Lascaux, Niaux, Font-de-Gaume, etc.). (Naudinot N, Bourdier C, Laforge M, Paris C, Bellot-Gurlet L, Beyries S, et al. (2017) Divergence in the evolution of Paleolithic symbolic and technological systems: The shining bull and engraved tablets of Rocher de l'Impératrice. PLoS ONE 12(3): e0173037.)

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