COMBUSTION FEATURES AND PERIGLACIAL STRUCTURES:
a new taphonomic analysis of mousterian combustion features
at Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue (50)

Bertrand MASSON

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Abstract

The Mousterian site of Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue (Manche), excavated by Gérard Fosse in the early 1980’s, has yielded around thirty combustion features. These features were excavated, described and interpreted without sufficient consideration of the periglacial processes that occurred during and after the human occupations. Based on observations of modern periglacial processes in active contexts, archaeological examples from sites in the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region and experiments conducted at high altitudes by A. Pissart (1973 to 1987) and researchers in the ACR program “Taphonomy of Middle Palaeolithic assemblages in periglacial contexts” and “The Palaeolithic in the Quercy” (2004-2007), we reveal evidence of formal convergences between the periglacial structures and the forms and functions of the combustion features attributed to the Mousterian at Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue.

Keywords

Cryoturbation, cryoexpulsion, gelifluction (periglacial solifluction), Mousterian, periglacial,
cryostatic pressure, solifluction, polygonal ground, combustion feature, taphonomy.