Planning > By author > Hallett Emily Yuko

Contrebandiers Cave is located in the town of Témara, on the Atlantic coast of Morocco, approximately 250 meters from the current shoreline. The cave was excavated in the 1950s and 1970s by l'Abbé Jean Roche, and was then excavated again from 2007 to 2011 by Harold Dibble and Mohamed El Hajraoui, with total station piece-plotting of artifacts. Contrebandiers Cave contains Middle Stone Age (MSA) Maghrebian Mousterian and Aterian stone tool industries deposited from ~126,000 to ~95,000 years ago during Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) 5e, 5d, and 5c, as well as a Later Stone Age (Iberomaurusian) stone tool industry deposited ~20,000 years ago during MIS 2. Contrebandiers Cave neighbors the archaeological sites of El Harhoura 2 and El Mnasra—both of which contain vertebrate faunal assemblages that were extensively analyzed by Emilie Campmas. Following on the analyses of E. Campmas at El Harhoura 2 and El Mnasra, the research presented here from Contrebandiers Cave analyzed the ~12,000 vertebrate faunal remains from Dibble and El Hajraoui's excavation for taxonomic and taphonomic identification. At Contrebandiers Cave, 67 vertebrate taxa were identified, and taphonomic analyses of bone surface modification and breakage patterns reveal that large, medium, and small-bodied ungulates, carnivores, small mammals, birds, tortoises, snakes and fish were accumulated by both human and carnivore agents—though humans were predominantly the primary accumulators of prey. Skeletal element representation and surface modification of ungulate and tortoise remains suggest that humans had primary access to large, medium, and small-bodied prey, while carnivores had primary access to small-bodied prey and birds. The Contrebandiers Cave vertebrate faunal remains from MIS 5e and 5d indicate that MSA humans were hunting grazers and mixed feeders from open and mixed habitats, while the faunal remains from MIS 5c suggest a shift to prey from more open habitats, or an increasingly open habitat in proximity to the cave. The vertebrate remains from MIS 2 suggest LSA humans foraging in a dry and open habitat. One of the aims of this research was a systematic comparison—in collaboration with E. Campmas—of the vertebrate faunal assemblages from Contrebandiers Cave, El Harhoua 2, and El Mnasra, with the goal of expanding our knowledge of differential site use between neighboring coastal caves in Témara, Morocco during the MSA and LSA.