Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T06:08:58.906Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Lower Magdalenian secondary human burial in El Mirón Cave, Cantabria, Spain

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 November 2011

Lawrence Guy Straus ,
Manuel R. González Morales  and
Jose Miguel Carretero
Lawrence Guy Straus
Affiliation:
1Department of Anthropology MSC01 1040, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131-0001, USA (Email: lstraus@unm.edu) 2Instituto Internacional de Investigaciones Prehistóricas, Universidad de Cantabria, 39005 Santander, Spain
Manuel R. González Morales
Affiliation:
2Instituto Internacional de Investigaciones Prehistóricas, Universidad de Cantabria, 39005 Santander, Spain
Jose Miguel Carretero
Affiliation:
3Laboratorio de Evolución Humana, Departamento de Ciencias Históricas y Geografía, Universidad de Burgos, 09001 Burgos, Spain
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The authors describe the discovery of the first human burial of Magdalenian age to be found in the Iberian Peninsula—the partial skeleton of a young adult whose bones were stained with red ochre. The burial was well stratified in a sequence at the vestibule rear running from the Mousterian to the Mesolithic, and was adjacent to a large block that had fallen from the cave roof and been subsequently engraved. A preliminary AMS radiocarbon date on associated faunal remains from the ochre-stained, galena speckled burial layer yielded a date of 15700 BP, while a hearth directly above the burial is dated to 15 100 BP, placing the interment of this individual in the Lower Cantabrian Magdalenian, the period of most intensive human occupation of El Mirón Cave during the Upper Palaeolithic.

Keywords

El Mirón CaveCantabrian SpainLower MagdalenianUpper Palaeolithichuman burial
Type
Research article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 85 , Issue 330 , December 2011 , pp. 1151 - 1164
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Barandiarán, I. 1988. Datación C14 de l'art mobilier Magdalénien cantabrique. Bulletin de la Société Préhistorique de l'Ariège 43: 63–84.Google Scholar
Breuil, H. & Obermaier, H.. 1912. Les premiers travaux de l'Institut de Paléontologie Humaine. L'Anthropologie 23: 1–27.Google Scholar
Cabrera, V. 1984. El Yacimiento de la Cueva de ‘El Castillo’ (Bibliotheca Praehistorica Hispana 22). Madrid: CSIC.Google Scholar
Garcia Diez, M., Gonzalez Morales, M. & Straus, L.G. In press. Datación estratigráfica del grafismo rupestre paleol´?tico de la Cueva de El Mirón. Trabajos de Prehistoria.Google Scholar
Gonzalez Morales, M. & Straus, L.G. 2005. The Magdalenian sequence of El Mirón Cave (Cantabria, Spain): an approach to the problem of definition of the Lower Magdalenian in Cantabrian Spain, in Dujardin, V. (ed.) Industrie osseuse et parures du Solutréen au Magdalénien en Europe (Mémoires de la Société Préhistorique Française 39): 209–219. Paris: Société Préhistorique Française.Google Scholar
Gonzalez Morales, M. 2009. Extraordinary Early Magdalenian finds from El Mirón Cave, Cantabria (Spain). Antiquity 83: 267–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gonzalez Morales, M.In press. Colgante decorado en una cabeza de caballo en el Magdaleniense Inicial de la Cueva del Mirón (Ramales de la Victoria, Cantabria), in De la Rasilla, M. (ed.) Miscelánea en homenaje a Javier Fortea. Oviedo: Universidad de Oviedo.Google Scholar
Gonzalez Morales, M., Straus, L.G. & Marín, A.B.. 2007. Los omóplatos decorados Magdalenienses de la Cueva del Mirón y su relación con las cuevas del Castillo, Altamira y El Juyo, in Maillo, J.M. & Baquedano, E. (ed.) Miscelánea en homenaje a Vitoria Cabrera, I (Zona Arqueológica 7): 482–94. Alcalá de Henares: Museo Arqueológico Regional de Arqueología.Google Scholar
Marín, A.B. 2010. Arqueozoología en el Cantábrico Oriental durante la transición Pleistoceno-Holoceno. La Cueva del Mirón. Santander: Universidad de Cantabria.Google Scholar
Obermaier, H. 1925. Fossil Man in Spain. New Haven (CT): Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Straus, L.G. & Gonzalez Morales, M.. 2003. El Mirón Cave and the 14C chronology of Cantabrian Spain. Radiocarbon 45: 41–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Straus, L.G. 2007a. Further radiocarbon dates for the Upper Paleolithic of El Mirón Cave. Radiocarbon 49: 1205–1214.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Straus, L.G. 2007b. El Magdaleniense de la Cueva del Mirón: observaciones preliminares, in Bicho, N. (ed.) O Paleolítico: Actas do IV Congreso de Arqueología Peninsular (Promontoria Monográfica 2): 49–62. Faro: Universidade do Algarve.Google Scholar
Straus, L.G. 2008. Addendum and correction to ‘Early Magdalenian variability: new evidence from El Mirón Cave, Cantabria, Spain’. Journal of Field Archaeology 33: 367–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Straus, L.G. 2010. The radiocarbon chronology of El Mirón Cave (Cantabria, Spain): new dates for the initial Magdalenian occupations. Radiocarbon 52: 33–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Straus, L.G., Gonzalez Morales, M. & Stewart, E.. 2008. Early Magdalenian variability: new evidence from El Mirón Cave, Cantabria, Spain. Journal of Field Archaeology 33: 197–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vallois, H.V. & Delmas, L.. 1976. Los frontales de la Cueva de El Castillo. Trabajos de Prehistoria 33: 113–20.Google Scholar