The three D71 habitations in locus 2, excavated during the 1990s, were inhabited for a period of time only rarely perceived by prehistorians.
Very close stays
While they belong to three distinct levels of the stratigraphy, these habitations, named D71-1, D71-2 and D71-3, are exactly superposed, separated by only a few centimetres of sediment. This means that the Magdalenians returned three times to exactly the same place and organised their habitat around one same hearth, which they renovated and reused on each visit.
Together these habitations cover a period of several years at most, punctuated by the flooding of the watercourse alongside the site. A short chronology of this type is very rarely apprehended in prehistory. Being able to compare the analyses of three successive habitations allows us to make links between the even shorter histories of season-long occupations studied until now and the slow cultural evolution of the hunter-gatherers during the Tardiglacial.
Maybe a family group
It certainly wasn’t by chance that the Magdalenians returned to make their camp around the hearth D71, as they had during previous visits. Indeed, analysis of the activities carried out at the habitations suggests that it could be one family group that we see returning each time.
