New hypotheses concerning two engraved bones from la grotte de Remouchamps, belgium

Dados Bibliográficos

ID5117765
AutoresMichel C Dewez, Michel Dewez (University of Liège, autor correspondente)
Ano1974
Volume5
Fascículo3
Páginas337-345
Data de publicação1974-02-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoWorld Archaeology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0043-8243 • E-ISSN: 1470-1375
EditoraInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00438243.1974.9979578
OpenAlexW2039490735
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas12

Excavations in 1970 in the Ahrensburgian level at the Remouchamps Cave uncovered a second engraved piece of bone to add to an old find made in 1902. The author interprets the engravings on these two pieces, which take the form of lines, strokes, notches and cup‐marks, as graphic representations of numbers from a quinary numerical system. He suggests that the bone objects may have been used in some form of game of chance, probably a fortune‐telling game. Other objects found at Remouchamps also appeared to lie outside the range of normal domestic or utilitarian tools, including a partly polished caprid astragalus bone, which was probably a dice. Selected ethnographic examples of the use of notched rods and astragalus bones in games of chance or divination are briefly mentioned, and the author suggests that certain items of decorated Upper Palaeolithic bonework might prove susceptible to interpretation of a similar kind

Archaeology · Art · Cave · Divination · Interpretation (philosophy · Linguistics · Literature · Archaeology and Rock Art Studies · History · Philosophy · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology