Multi-purpose fossils? The reappraisal of an Elephas antiquus molar from El Pirulejo (Magdalenian; Córdoba, Spain)

Fossil gathering by humans has been rarely documented in the Iberian Peninsula. In the present paper, a multidisciplinary approach has been taken to analyze a straight-tusked elephant (Elephas antiquus) molar retrieved in a Magdalenian deposit at the rock shelter of El Pirulejo in southern Spain. The taphonomical analyses revealed a multifarious use of a tooth that had not only been worked into an anvil-sort-of-tool but also used as a core and partly tainted with a composite pigment. The dating and geochemical analyses further evidenced that the molar derived from an animal that had lived in a rather arid landscape with a temperature range between 12.3 and 14.3 °C, coincident with a cold episode within marine isotope stage (MIS) 6.6, and probably fed on herbaceous plants. These analyses evidence the potential fossils from archaeological sites bear for addressing a wide range of issues that include both the cultural and paleoenvironmental realms.

Keywords

Tooth Taphonomy U/Th dating Isotopes Iberian Peninsula Upper Paleolithic Fossil gathering

URI

http://hdl.handle.net/10400.2/19994

Citation

CORTÉS-SANCHEZ, M., MORALES-MUÑIZ, A., JIMÉNEZ-ESPJO, F., ÉVORA, M., SIMÓN-VALLEJO, M. D., GARCÍA-ALIX, A., MARTÍNEZ AGUIRRE, A., RIQUELME-CANTAL, J. A., ODRIOZOLA, C. P., PARRILA GIRÁLDEZ, R., ÁLVAREZ-LAO, D. J., (2016) Multi-purpose fossils? The reappraisal of an Elephas antiquus molar from El Pirulejo (Magdalenian; Córdoba, Spain), Archaeol Anthropol Sci 9, 1287–1303 (2017), Springer - Verlag, DOI 10.1007/s12520-016-0324-1