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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Lièvre et lapin à Regourdou (Montignac-sur-Vézère, Dordogne, France) : études paléontologique et taphonomique de deux accumulations osseuses d’origine naturelle.

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Since the end of the nineteenth century, a great deal of work studyingsubsistence patterns of prehistoric societies in Western Europe has been done. During the Middle Paleolithic, humanswere interested in small game, particularly the Leporidae, taxa that were abundant in their territories. However,distinguishing the exact nature of their origin in an archaeological site is not an easy task, given that numerous agentscould be responsible for their accumulation (i.e., natural mortality, acquisition by humans and/or other terrestrialcarnivores, or even nocturnal or diurnal raptors). In this contribution, we put forth a new taphonomic and paleontologicalstudy of the leporids of Regourdou, a Mousterian site that has yielded a Neandertal skeleton. This study suggests thatno predators were involved in the accumulation of the hare or rabbit remains, but rather that they are due to natural (accidental) mortality for the former, and natural (attritional) mortality for the latter. Specifically, the evidence suggests thatat one point in its history (for the hares), the cavity functioned as a natural pitfall trap, while for the rabbits it appears toshow the existence of a warren, which we interpret as having existed during the last occupation of the site during MIS 4or 3, before the end of the accumulation of sediments in the site. Morphological variation and body size of individuals alsoallows us to specify the order of paleoenvironmental changes since the site’s functional beginning, confirming theattribution of the inferior levels to the MIS 5 temperate period, and the upper levels to a more recent phase in MIS 4 or 3.