Site Structure at the Abri Castanet

在美国国家科学基金会（National Science Foundation）的支持下，兰德尔·怀特（Randall White）博士和一个由同事组成的国际团队将在法国阿布里·卡斯塔内（Abri Castanet） 34000年前的遗址进行为期三年的挖掘，这是了解现代人类及其奥里尼亚期文化最初向欧亚大陆西部扩散的关键遗址之一。Castanet的发掘提供了有关现代人在5万到3万年前从非洲迁徙的宝贵信息。在这一时期，尼安德特人和他们的莫斯特文化被身体上的现代人所取代，他们的奥里尼亚纪文化表现出了地球上罕见的创新。Abri Castanet是欧洲发现这些新行为证据的重要地点之一：雕刻/绘画、骨武器和工具、个人装饰品和外来原材料。Abri Castanet的工作为以下方面提供了可靠的数据：1)穆斯特/奥里尼亚期在更替范围内的相互作用；2)更替的文化过程；3)相关社会内部运作的差异。怀特博士组建的团队由来自6个不同国家的19所大学和实验室的20名研究科学家组成。从2007年到2009年，Castanet挖掘将在大约25平方米的连续职业表面上探索人类活动的组织。最初的Aurignacian居住者直接移动到一个裸露的基岩平台上，允许Castanet团队绘制基岩表面，并记录其不均匀，复杂的形态条件，并对其进行修改以适应Aurignacian活动的方式。特别的重点将放在一个巨大的火灾特征的挖掘上，延伸到几乎所有剩下的有待挖掘的地区。自20世纪五六十年代由美国国家科学基金会资助的Abri Pataud项目以来，这种类型的奥里尼亚壁炉就没有在法国西南部出土过。从那时起，考古科学取得了相当大的进步，包括：沉积物的薄切片分析，以确定火灾温度和重新点燃的次数；。从工具和武器制造中提取微小残留物，包括植物残骸和碎片；。炭化植物残体的研究在最先进的挖掘背景下，这些方法和其他方法的应用，对集中在这些特征周围的古代人类行为产生了重要的见解。Castanet项目的智力价值将是进行富有想象力和严谨的国际合作，结合不同国家古人类学传统的各种优势。它结合了地质学家、人类学家、史前学家、植物学家和地理学家，为一个被国际科学界公认的重要目标而努力。它应用考古挖掘和分析的创新方法来解决一个具有挑战性的科学问题。Castanet的工作更广泛的影响是，它为未来几代科学家提供了重要的数据和研究收集，并为早期现代人的几个问题提供了现代质量的数据，包括年代学、原材料供应、季节性、动物和植物开发、技术组织、艺术和个人装饰。同样重要的是，Castanet的发掘为美国人和欧洲人之间的研究人员和学生参与者之间的国际理解创造了一个论坛。年轻的美国研究人员和学生在Castanet的科学和文化经验为专业关系和研究，合作和理解的新途径奠定了基础。

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Randall White and an international team of colleagues will conduct three years of excavation at the 34,000 year-old site of Abri Castanet, France, one of the key sites for understanding the initial dispersal of modern humans and their Aurignacian culture into Western Eurasia. The Castanet excavations provide precious information concerning the dispersal of moderns from Africa between 50,000 and 30,000 years ago. In this period, the Neandertals and their Mousterian culture were replaced by physically modern humans whose Aurignacian culture showed innovations rarely before seen on earth. Abri Castanet is one of the key European sites to have yielded evidence of these new behaviors : engravings/ paintings, bone weapons and tools, personal ornaments and exotic raw materials. The work at Abri Castanet contributes robust data to an understanding of 1) Mousterian/Aurignacian interactions across the replacement range, 2) of the cultural processes of replacement, and 3) of differences in the internal workings of the societies concerned.The team assembled by Dr. White is composed of twenty research scientists representing 19 universities and laboratories from 6 different countries. From 2007 through 2009, the Castanet excavations will explore the organization of human activities across approximately 25 contiguous square meters of occupational surface. The initial Aurignacian occupants moved directly onto a bare bedrock platform, allowing the Castanet team to map this bedrock surface and to document the ways in which its uneven, complicated morphology conditioned, and was modified to accommodate, Aurignacian activities. Particular emphasis will be placed on the excavation of on an enormous fire feature, extending over almost all of the remaining area to be excavated. Aurignacian fireplaces of this type have not been excavated in SW France since the NSF-funded Abri Pataud project of the 1950's and 1960's. Since that time, there have been considerable advances in archaeological science, including : . thin-section analysis of sediments to determine fire temperature and number of re-lightings; . extraction of microscopic residues including plant remains and debris from tool and weapon manufacture; . study of carbonized plant remains; The application of these and other methods, in the context of a state-of-the-art excavations, yields important insights into ancient human behavior concentrated around such fire features. The intellectual merit of the Castanet project will be to undertake an imaginative and rigorous international collaboration combining diverse strengths of different national traditions in paleoanthropology. It combines geologists, anthropologists, prehistorians, botanists, and geographers, working toward a single goal recognized as important by the international scientific community. It applies innovative methods of archaeological excavation and analysis to the resolution of a challenging scientific problem.The broader impacts of the work at Castanet are that it provides important data and research collections for future generations of scientists and contributes modern quality data to several questions about early modern humans including chronology, raw material provisioning, seasonality, animal and plant exploitation, technological organization, art and personal adornment. Just as importantly, the Castanet excavation creates a forum for improving international understanding between Americans and Europeans, both among researchers and among student participants. The scientific and cultural experience of young American researchers and students at Castanet establishes a foundation for professional relationships and for new avenues of research, collaboration and understanding.