Klissoura Cave 1 and the Upper Paleolithic of Southern Greece in cultural and ecological context

Klissoura Cave 1 pre serves a long series of Mid dle Paleolithic, Up per Paleolithic and Mesolithic cultural lay ers, in - ter rupted by at least three sig nif i cant ero sional hia tuses. The sed i men tary fea tures, ar ti facts and an i mal re mains of the Up - per Paleolithic though Mesolithic lay ers tes tify a wide range of on-site ac tiv i ties, with com plex cy cles of fea ture con struc - tion and aban don ment. The in dus try of Layer V closely re sem bles Uluzzian as sem blages from south ern It aly. Its age re - mains un cer tain but almost cer tainly ex ceeds 39 kyrs BP. The most in tense use of the site oc curred dur ing the for ma tion of Aurig na cian lay ers IV and IIIe-g, distin guished by many su per im posed plain and clay-lined hearths, and in Layer IV, the rem nants of a small struc ture en vel op ing a dense con cen tra tion of per fo rated shell beads. Fire places were fed mainly with dicotyledonous wood and bark-pro duc ing plants, whereas grass re mains are con cen trated in other parts of the oc cu pied area. Post-dat ing the Aurig na cian are two non-Aurig na cian lay ers, fol lowed by an ephem eral Epipaleolithic oc cu pa tion and sub stan tial Mesolithic oc cu pa tions. The bo tan i cal, fau nal and geo log i cal data iden tify a grad ual trend to ward cli ma tic cool ing through the Up per Paleolithic se quence. Warmer, wet ter con di tions re turned only well af ter MIS 2, dur ing the Mesolithic. Fau nal data in di cate op por tu nis tic hunt ing of a va ri ety of un gu late spe cies, but mainly fal low deer, one or a few an i mals at a time. The pat terns of small game ex ploi ta tion re veal a trend of in creas ing di etary breadth that be gan in the early Up per Paleolithic and in volved pro gres sively greater use of an i mals such as hares and/or birds with time. Land snail ex ploi ta tion be came im por tant in the later Up per Paleolithic phases and peaked in the Mesolithic. Per fo rated shell or na - ments are pres ent in the Uluzzian layer (V) and in all sub se quent lay ers. The or na ments con sist almost ex clu sively of fin - ished prod ucts, worn from use and lack ing ev i dence of pro duc tion de bris