Archaeologists conducted a spatial analysis of the finds at the Neanderthal site. article about it published in the Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences.
The research was centered around the Navalmayo rock shelter near Madrid. Layer F is dated to 76,000 years ago. Navalmayo served primarily as a hunting camp – that is, people did not live there permanently, stopping to rest and slaughter carcasses.
Abel Moclan and colleagues analyzed the location of finds at this site and identified patterns there. It turned out that mostly stone tools, animal remains and excrement were found near bonfires – the “backbone” of local camps associated with repetitive actions. In addition, many works were collected in two more places. It seems that one of them is dedicated to slaughtering carcasses, and the other has traces of prolonged exposure to water.
According to another inference of the researchers, this site was used occasionally but very heavily. At the same time, different groups of hunters regularly returned to the same place and used it as before.
Earlier archaeologists discovered A “matryoshka” made from the bones of an arctic fox and a Paleolithic mammoth in Siberia.