Pages: 311-332

The paper deals with the question of the existence and intensity of armed violence at different stages of the Palaeolithic. The first two sections provide a review and analysis of the osteological and representational evidence relevant to the question. The third section considers the problem of changes in the frequency of violence and how, or whether, it can be assessed. With this purpose in mind, the author compiles data on the age and character of all the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic human and animal bones with embedded projectiles, which are available in the literature (tabl. 1 and 2). It turns out that while for the time prior to ~ 15 ka only animal bones with imbedded projectiles are known in the Old World (10 bones of 10 animals from 9 sites in Western and Eastern Europe, Western Asia and Siberia), the subsequent period shows a sharp increase in the number of human bones of the kind, which became nearly as numerous (29 bones of 27 persons from 17 sites) as the animal ones. Given that the quantity of excavated faunal remains is several orders of magnitude greater than the quantity of paleoanthropological finds, the parity in the numbers of projectile-pierced remains may signify some important changes in the dynamics of violence (and social life in general) at the end of the Palaeolithic.

Keywords: Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, armed violence, embedded projectiles

Information about author:

Leonid Vishnyatsky (Saint Petersburg, Russia). Doctor of Historical Sciences. Institute for the History of Material Culture of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Dvortsovaya Nab., 18, Saint Petersburg, 191186, Russia
E-mail: [email protected]