Cantabria and Vascongadas, 21,000-17,000 B.P.: Toward a Solutrean Settlement Pattern
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195 MUNIBE Sociedad de Ciencias Naturales ARANZADI San Sebastián Año XXXI - Numere 3-4- 1979 Páginas 195-202 Cantabria and vascongadas, 21,000-17,000 B.P.: Toward a solutrean settlement pattern. LAWRENCE GUY STRAUS* Introduction been «site-catchment analysis», developed by Higgs, Vita-Finzi and others to attempt Our knowledge of Paleolithic adaptations assessment of the role of particular sites has been based principally on the study of with regard to potentially exploitable resour- artifacts and, increasingly, of faunal remains ces located within fixed radii from the sites recovered from archeological deposits. The- (see for example, Vita-Finzi and Higgs 1970). re is, however, a third class of evidence which The model has been criticized for its rigidity, can provide valuable insights into the opera- although provisions have been added to ac- tion of past cultural systems: site location. count for walking times in different types of In a little-known, pioneering work published terrain. More seriously, the model implies in 1908, R. P. Lorenzo Sierra presented «No- rather simple, single-minded procurement tas para el mapa paletnográfico de la Provin- strategies on the part of mobile hunter-ga- cia de Santander» to the 1.er Congreso de therer societies, and does not take into ac- Naturalistas Españoles in Zaragoza. Since count the very likely possibility of elaborate those early days, Paleolithic prehistory tur- «logistical strategies» with multi-purpose task ned increasing toward a focal emphasis on «embedding» under certain evironmental cir- typology as the sine qua non of what was be- cumstances (see Binford 1978; n.d.). Despi- lieved to be a developing scientific discipline. te its mechanistic weaknesses, however, the The meritorious practices of increasingly site catchment notion is useful because it complete artifact retrieval, classification and focuses attention on the roles of sites as loci statistical comparison have often had, howe- of human activities and occupation in rela- ver, the unfortunate effect of equating sites tionship to surrounding terrain and potential with artifact mines. The treatment (theoreti- resources of use in the maintenance of so- cally, if not practically) of archeological si- ciety and individual lives. tes like paleontological localities in this sen- Not controlling their food supplies, Paleo- se utilizes only part of the information which lithic groups could assure their existence sites can provide, no matter how meticulous through the development of strategies for and complete the recovery and recording me- the exploitation of regional resources. Given thods used. finite resources and a growing human popu- To balance the influence of the French lation (see Straus 1977; Cohen 1977), Upper school of «typological prehistory», recent Paleolithic groups, such as those of the So- years have seen the development of a British lutrean period (c.21,000-17,000B.P.) in north- school of economic prehistory which places coastal Spain (Cantabria - Vascongadas), de- emphasis on faunal remains (and other evi- veloped elaborate compound technologies of dence of subsistence activities), and on the stone, antler (? cordage and wood) for the geographical locations of sites within lands- procurement of an increasingly diversified capes. A major technique of this school has spectrum of animals (including riverine. es- tuarine, littoral and marine species). Many * University of New Mexico. Albuquerque. N. M. sites contain indications of the use of mass (U.S.A.) hunting techniques (drives, surrounds) in 196 L. G. STRAUS the procurement of red deer (Cervus elaphus) Analyses at the sites of La Riera (Posada de and ibex (Capra pyrenaica). Small but con- Llanes, Asturias) conducted by Dr. J. Altuna sistent numbers of choppers and grinding sto- and Dr. N. J. Shackleton, and El Juyo (Igollo nes in Solutrean collections may attest to de Camargo, Santander) by Dr. R. G. Klein, increasing utilization of plant foods such as for example, are directed at attempting to de- nuts, berries and roots. In addition to the termine the seasonality of long series of oc- technological developments, changes in the cupations of caves to test ideas concerning division of labor and in social organization the yearly rounds of Upper Paleolithic-Meso- are implied from the direct subsistence evi- lithic groups under varying environmental dence. Under conditions of relatively high po- (and demographic?) conditions. At the mo- pulation density and highly variegated terrain, ment, however, indications of Solutrean sea- territorial organization and sophisticated ac- sonality are most scanty and unreliable. What tivity scheduling would seem inevitable in or- is required is a large number of similarly der to assure adequate wild food supplies analyzed occupations from penecontempora- throughout the year. Hunting success de- neous sites located at different elevations pends on accurate information on resource and in different topographic settings. location and condition; such information can One set of data which is however availa- be maximized and game can be successfully ble concerns the geographical location and «managed» through a territorially-based dis- topographic setting of 33 known Solutrean tribution of hunters. Within territories indi- sites in the region, all but 2 of which have vidual families or bands may have foraged been visited by the author. Typical Solutrean independently part of the year and yet con- artifacts from all but 7 can be found in Spa- gregated at established or opportune times nish museums and other institutions. Solu- to best take advantage of aggregated resour- trean points are said, in various early publi- ces (by means of communal drives of animal cations, to have been found in the caves of herds, for example), to conduct ceremonies Caranceja, Fuente del Francés, Bona, Haza, (initiation, fertility and hunting magic, etc.), Mirón and Sel (=Cueva del Agua? =Cueva to exchange mates, etc. The survival of Last de la Peña?), and although the collections Glacial hunter-gatherer groups could well ha- could not be located, these descriptions are, ve depended on their territorially-based coo- to varying degrees, taken as credible since perative abilities to exploit the full wild re- Solutrean points are such distinctive diag- sources of well-known local environments. nostics (see Straus [1975a] for details). A The precise placement of sites would have Solutrean point found in disturbed circums- been part of the repertoire of adaptive skills tances during the 1974 excavations at Ras- possessed by these groups. caño (Mirones, Santander) may actually ha- Given the mobility of the main Solutrean ve come from the adjacent cave of Bona, food resources —medium and large-size un- which was apparently being dug at the same gulates— (and variability in the condition time as Rascaño by R. P. Sierra (see Straus and availability of these and other resources n.d.). Various reports of Solutrean materials such as shellfish, fish, plants, etc.), hunter- at Atxurra, Lezetxiki and Lumentxa have been gatherers had to respond through patterns positively demonstrated to be erroneous of mobility of their own, both seasonally and (Straus 1975a). Distributed over an area so- circumstantially. In recent years various stu- me 350 km. long by about 30 km. wide, the dents of prehistoric Cantabria have sugges- 33 Solutrean sites, pertaining to a 4000 year ted patterns of strategic site placement and period (Straus et al. 1978), can provide va- transhumant movements between the coast luable locational information, adding to our and mountainous interior as key elements in knowledge of Solutrean settlement-subsisten- the subsistence strategies of Upper Paleoli- ce sytems. thic - Mesolithic hunter - gatherers (Freeman 1973; Bailey 1973, n. d.; Straus 1975, 1976a, Problems and Qualifications 1976b, 1977; Davidson 1976). (Notable con- cern for site location is also expressed, for Various problems must first be conside- example, by Altuna [1972], in his thesis). red. First of all -aswe are trying to con- CANTABRIA AND VASCONGADAS, 21.000 - 17.000 B. P. 197 trol for at La Riera by detailed paleoclimatic ques can liberate us from the dangers reconstruction-is the problem of variable and circularity of dating by artifacts. In any climatic conditions, since the Cantabrian So- event, the notion of «archeological cultures» lutrean spanned at least the «Laugerie» In- is at best only a heuristic classificatory de- terstadial and the Würm IV stadial phase just vice. prior to «Laugerie», as well as probably part All caveats considered, the information of the last Würm III cold phase and the very presented in Table 1 nonetheless gives us an beginning of the «Laugerie» Interstadial (La- impression of where Solutrean hunter-gathe- ville and Leroi-Gourhan personal communica- rers chose to locate at least some of their tions and m. s.). In short, environmental con- sites. ditions and, therefore, behavioral responses must have varied somewhat during even this relatively short period. Patterns of settlement Elements of the Solutrean Settlement and movement established under interstadial Pattern conditions would no doubt have been modi- The sites have been grouped by river sys- fied during stadials. Secondly, all the sites tems, as it is our belief that, logically, the we know of are caves; all the open air Solu- major rivers of Cantabria provided the prin- trean sites which no doubt once existed ha- cipal means of access between the coastal ve been either deeply buried or destroyed by plain and interior (as they do today). The erosion. Over one hundred years of prospec- alignment of Solutrean sites along such sys- tion in Cantabria have failed to locate a sin- tems is striking (see Figure 1). Such linear gle one -notsurprising in light of the steep coast-Cordillera arrangements of sites are gradients between the Cordillera and coast, most clear in the cases of the Rios Nalón, substantial rainfall and vegetation. Thus we Sella (plus Ríos Cabras and Gueña), Saja- are obviously lacking a major source of in- Besaya, Pas and Miera-Bahía de Santander. formation about Solutrean (and other) sys- The four paired central Vizcayan sites (San- tems.