Grotte du Lazaret

Excavations in the Grotte du Lazaret

The Grotte du military hospital (district Alpes- Maritimes, France) is part of the Middle Palaeolithic Neanderthals and served as accommodation during hunting expeditions. Because of bone and stone tool finds, the colonization of the cave can be dated to a period of prior 190000-130000 years. The Grotte du military hospital was declared by decree already on 21 March 1963 Monument Historique.

Location

The cave is located east of Nice, on the western slopes of Mont Boron. It lies 100 m above sea level, in the calcareous dolomite rocks of the Jura. The cave has a length of 35 m, a width of 4 m - 14 m and a height of 26m. Not far from the cave stood a Mediterranean forest, with pistachio and olive trees, tree branches in the hordes of wild animals.

Discovery

The cave was first mentioned in writing in 1826. 1842 took place the first excavations by Alexis Naudot, Inspector of mineral waters in the province. On 18 December 1842, the Academy of Sciences in Turin was presented a dossier of him that is just his findings. Among other things mentioned there: " a strange fragment, apparently derived from a human skeletons, the lower end of a femur " close by " remnants of a large quadruped ".

1851 to 1852 the brothers Frédéric Alexandre and Louis Jacques Le Fèvre have made extensive excavations in the center of the cave and could numerous bones and tools gather. During the 20th century, various, methodical excavations were undertaken at the site, especially in the 1950s by François Charles Ernest Octobon, 1962. Under his direction by Professor Henry de Lumley

Importance

The grotto is a key finding place for investigations of the transition from the Acheulean to Mousterian culture in the Middle Pleistocene. In addition, she is with her in some places 8 m thick sediment layer, an interesting locality in order to understand the climate change in general and the climatic conditions of the region after the last glacial can, which were colder and wetter than they are today.

Finds

Let the traces of hearths and bone recognize that the cave has been used repeatedly over the course of 60,000 years as a dwelling.

Fauna

From large mammals extensive and varied discoveries were made, approximately 20,000 skeletal remains of plants and predators. The herbivores represent remnants of the food of prehistoric man. The dominant race is the red deer, followed by ibex, aurochs, bison and horses. In smaller amounts were found remains of the rhinoceros, woolly rhinoceros and elephant early. In carnivores, the finds from wolves, foxes, lynxes Pantern and dominate. The animals examined in the course of colonization by people repeatedly affect the cave, and left there, worn teeth and excrement. Sometimes the skins of the animals could be earned by man.

In addition, 33 species of small mammals were in the cave are identified as 15 species of rodents, insectivores and few finds of bats.

Tools

In the Grotte du Lazaret a large amount was found on stone materials that testify to human use.

In the lower strata of the cave numerous bifaces were found, the characteristic tool of people of the Acheulian culture. Along with this, other stone tools were found, small tools into splinters form, for chopping, cutting, scraping or grinding, choppers and chopping tools, often with signs of use. In the upper layers of soil, the bifaces are gradually disappearing, in favor of smaller splinter tools, among which dominates the scraper blade.

Coarse tools are made mainly from local pebble -like rocks as calcareous marl. Finer tools were made ​​of fine-grained rock of good quality, like the flint, although the natural locality of this type of stone, and jasper, fine quartzite and rhyolite are further away.

The shapes of the tools are both disc-shaped and rectangular. The Levallois is rarely found, but then implemented precisely. Complete stones show signs of use of impact tools. Small, flat stones have grooves on their surfaces, which indicates that they were used for fine grinding of tools.

Human remains

Under the excavation area UA26, dated to approximately 160,000 years six traces of human remains were found equal to:

There have been finds tooth of men, women and children, which demonstrates that the cave was inhabited by entire families. Due to the forms that people can be assigned to the European Homo erectus or early Neanderthals.

A portion of the right frontal lobe of a child points to a vasoconstriction and a change of Hirnhautaterie, suggesting a deadly brain tumor.

Furthermore, it was found by the same two parts of the femur, with a fresh fracture, which refers to an intentional fracture, is likely to reach the marrow. In an overlying layer of earth a burnt upper arm bone of a woman was found also to replace with fresh break and cut marks on muscles. These remains appear to testify to cannibalism.

Hunting behavior

The Neanderthals hunted this area, especially in the immediate vicinity of the cave. The game was first brought to the camp before it was dismantled. On the bone, there are numerous scratches that were caused by flint tools and show that the butchery skills were very well developed. The recovery of the animal body was maximal, it involved the use of meat, marrow, skin / skins and tendons.

Dwelling

Signs of colonization are hearths, flint - processing sites near the entrance and left after a meal along the side walls and the back of the cave.

The excavations on an area of ​​90 m and about 1.60 m in depth have revealed about twenty superimposed colonization floor surfaces. The oldest bottom surfaces have only short colonization periods of one to two seasons (fall, winter). Show Younger floor surfaces that people inhabited the cave for longer periods, sometimes over a year.