Late Pleistocene Crocuta crocuta spelaea (Goldfuss, 1823) clans as prezewalski horse hunters and woolly rhinoceros scavengers at the open air commuting den and contemporary Neanderthal camp site Westeregeln (central Germany)
- 作者：C.G. Diedrich cdiedri@gmx.net
- 关键词：Crocuta crocuta spelaea ; Open air gypsum karst commuting den ; Bone accumulation ; Overlapping Neanderthal camp site ; Hyena palaeoecology ; Early/middle late Pleistocene ; Central Germany (Europe)
- 刊名：Journal of Archaeological Science
- 出版年：2012
- 期刊代码：137_03054403
- 类别：soc
- 出版时间：June, 2012
- 卷：39
- 期：6
- 页码：1749-1767
- 文件大小：4856 K
摘要
Late Pleistocene Ice Age Crocuta crocuta spelaea () hyenas from the open-air gypsum karst site Westeregeln (Saxony-Anhalt, central Germany) is dated into the early to middle Late Pleistocene. Hyena clans apparently used the karst for food storage and as 鈥渃ommuting den鈥? where typical high amounts (15%of the NISP) of hyena remains appear, also faecal pellets in concentrations for den marking purposes. Additionally small carnivores Meles, Vulpes and Mustela appear to have used some cavities as聽dens. Several hundreds of lowland 鈥渕ammoth steppe fauna鈥?bones (NISP聽=聽572) must have been accumulated primarily by hyenas, and not by Neanderthals at the contemporary hyena/human camp site. Abundant caballoid horse remains of 鈥?em>E.聽germanicus 鈥?are revised by the holotype and original material to the small E.聽c. przewalskii horse. Woolly rhinoceros Coelodonta antiquitatis remains are also abundant, and were left in several cases with typical hyena scavenging damages. Rangifer tarandus (11%) is mainly represented by numerous fragments of shed female antlers that were apparently gathered by humans, and antler bases from male animals that were collected and chewed in few cases (only large male antlers) by hyenas. The large quantities of small reindeer antlers must have been the result of collection by humans; their stratigraphic context is unclear but such large quantities most probably resulted from schamanic activities. The hyena site overlaps with a Middle Palaeolithic Neanderthal camp, as well as possibly with a later human Magdal茅nian site.