Mobility and social identity in the Mid Upper Paleolithic: New personal ornaments from Poiana Cireșului (Piatra Neamț, Romania)

PLoS One. 2019 Apr 24;14(4):e0214932. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0214932. eCollection 2019.

Abstract

Most of the Paleolithic art and ornaments discovered in Romania come from the site of Poiana Cireșului. Four Paleolithic layers have been studied at this site-the oldest one belongs to the Early Gravettian period between 30 ka and 31 ka BP. The ornaments discovered in this layer include perforated shells from three species of mollusks: freshwater Lithoglyphus naticoide and Lithoglyphus apertus as well as Homalopoma sanguineum (an exclusively Mediterranean species). Poiana Cireșului is one of the very few Gravettian sites where perforated Homalopoma sanguineum shells were found, and the importance of this discovery is stressed even more by the very long distance between the site and the nearest source located over 900 km away. This find suggests the connection of communities here with the Mediterranean area as well as a possible movement of populations from the south of the continent to the east of the Carpathians with significant implications in understanding human group mobility and the origin of the Early Gravettian in this area. Furthermore, Poiana Cireșului is the only Gravettian settlement where Lithoglyphus naticoides shells were used. The unique association of perforated shells-not found in any other Gravettian settlement-contributes to the identity of the Paleolithic community of Poiana Cireșului through their ornaments.

Publication types

  • Historical Article
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Archaeology*
  • Culture*
  • History, Ancient
  • Humans
  • Romania
  • Social Identification*

Grants and funding

This work was performed under the project PALEOTECH - Technical and symbolic behavior of the Paleolithic communities from East of the Carpathians (Romania) before and during the Last Glacial Maximum (ID - PN III-P3-ID-PCE-2016- 0614), funded by the Ministry of National Education, Ministry of Research and Innovation, Romania, through UEFISCDI (Executive Agency for Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation Funding), in the framework of PNCDI III, program 4.Fundamental and Frontier Research. The excavations campaigns at Poiana Cireșului were, also, supported by the Romanian Ministry of Culture, through the National Program of Systematic Archaeological Research from Romania. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.