Exam 6: Expanding Intellectual Horizons: Arts and Ideas in the Upper Paleolithic and Late Stone Age

Archaeologist Diane Gifford-Gonzalez has shown that modern artists depicting life in the Upper Paleolithic almost always present women:

The most common images in the cave paintings of the European Upper Paleolithic are of:

In Upper Paleolithic burials, it is common to find individuals buried with:

Evidence for a significant focus on marine resources during the Late Stone Age has been found at:

Early evidence of the use of raw materials used in artistic expression has been found at Qafzeh Cave, in Israel, in the form of:

The oldest indirect evidence for the bow and arrow dates to:

Among these technologies or behaviors that characterize the Late Stone Age and Upper Paleolithic are: 1. the reliance on new and improved stone tool technologies, 2. new hunting and weapons technologies, 3. a broadening of the subsistence quest, 4. branching out in raw materials, 5. new uses for plant materials, 6. the acquisition of raw materials from a great distance, 7. larger sites of population aggregation, 8. an abundance of non-utilitarian objects, 9. elaborate burials, and 10. symbolic expression through the production of art. Provide examples of each of these from the archaeological record.

What is the significance of the site of Sungir'? What does this site tell us about life (and death) in the Upper Paleolithic?

Where Middle Paleolithic people were opportunistic foragers, to a far greater degree, Upper Paleolithic people were: