Mousterian vegetal food in Kebara Cave, Mt. Carmel

Efraim Lev; Mordechai E. Kislev; Ofer Bar-Yosef

doi:10.1016/j.jas.2004.11.006

Mousterian vegetal food in Kebara Cave, Mt. Carmel

Efraim Lev, Mordechai E. Kislev, Ofer Bar-Yosef

The Mina and Everard Goodman Faculty of Life Sciences

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

162 Scopus citations

Abstract

This paper reconstructs the vegetal diet of the Middle Paleolithic humans in Kebara cave (Mt. Carmel, Israel) on the basis of a large collection of charred seeds and other vegetal food remains uncovered during the excavations. The human choices of mainly legumes reflects the gathering activities during springtime when often the common hunted species (gazelle and fallow deer) were fat depleted. Minor fall activities are indicated by the collection of acorns and pistachio nuts. This vegetal dietary information adds another aspect to the range of subsistence activities of the late Mousterian occupants of Kebara cave, and sheds further light on the semi-sedentary use of the cave as revealed from analysis of animal bones.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	475-484
Number of pages	10
Journal	Journal of Archaeological Science
Volume	32
Issue number	3
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2004.11.006
State	Published - Mar 2005

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The excavations at Kebara cave were funded by the L.S.B. Leakey Foundation, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Israel Exploration Society, and the American School of Prehistoric Research (Peabody Museum, Harvard University). We had the benefit of considerable aid from the Hebrew University and Tel Aviv University through the years. We are grateful to all these institutions, and to all our colleagues who took active part in the excavations and the study of the finds: B. Arensburg, A. Belfer-Cohen, M. Chech, P. Goldberg, the late Henri Laville, Liliane Meignen, Y. Rak, the late Eitan Tchernov, A.M. Tiller, S. Weiner, and B. Vandermeersch. The authors of the paper would like to thank Y. Melamed and M. Marmorstein for their help with the identification process, and J. Langzam for the SEM pictures. Special thanks go to D. Nadel, M. Jones, and in particular to J.D. Speth and E. Weiss, for their helpful comments and editorial suggestions on earlier drafts of this manuscript.

Keywords

Levant
Middle Paleolithic
Mousterian
Neanderthal
Plant remains
Seasonality

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10.1016/j.jas.2004.11.006

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title = "Mousterian vegetal food in Kebara Cave, Mt. Carmel",

abstract = "This paper reconstructs the vegetal diet of the Middle Paleolithic humans in Kebara cave (Mt. Carmel, Israel) on the basis of a large collection of charred seeds and other vegetal food remains uncovered during the excavations. The human choices of mainly legumes reflects the gathering activities during springtime when often the common hunted species (gazelle and fallow deer) were fat depleted. Minor fall activities are indicated by the collection of acorns and pistachio nuts. This vegetal dietary information adds another aspect to the range of subsistence activities of the late Mousterian occupants of Kebara cave, and sheds further light on the semi-sedentary use of the cave as revealed from analysis of animal bones.",

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note = "Funding Information: The excavations at Kebara cave were funded by the L.S.B. Leakey Foundation, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Israel Exploration Society, and the American School of Prehistoric Research (Peabody Museum, Harvard University). We had the benefit of considerable aid from the Hebrew University and Tel Aviv University through the years. We are grateful to all these institutions, and to all our colleagues who took active part in the excavations and the study of the finds: B. Arensburg, A. Belfer-Cohen, M. Chech, P. Goldberg, the late Henri Laville, Liliane Meignen, Y. Rak, the late Eitan Tchernov, A.M. Tiller, S. Weiner, and B. Vandermeersch. The authors of the paper would like to thank Y. Melamed and M. Marmorstein for their help with the identification process, and J. Langzam for the SEM pictures. Special thanks go to D. Nadel, M. Jones, and in particular to J.D. Speth and E. Weiss, for their helpful comments and editorial suggestions on earlier drafts of this manuscript.",

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Mousterian vegetal food in Kebara Cave, Mt. Carmel

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

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