Use-wear traces and the complexity of an Epigravettian site in the Venetian Prealps.

The functional study of a lithic industry can provide significant contribution to reconstruct the social and economic organization of late-glacial hunters-gatherers, through the recognition of different activities carried out at the sites. Reasoning about the role that variable targets played in the dynamics of the settlement systems, the principal aims of current research in Eastern Italian Alps are the resources exploitation strategies and the logistic organization of epigravettians. From the LGM to the onset of the Holocene many and intense ecological modifications occurred in this region. The main processes - deglaciation and forest expansion - led humans to settle in the Pre-Alpine fringe and in Southern Dolomites. Archaeological and multidisciplinary data extracted from several sites at different locations induced to propose a settlement system model to explain the middle\high- altitude human occurrences at the end of Upper Palaeolithic. Three types of sites were individuated (Broglio, Lanzinger 1990): residential locations downslope in the valleys, middle altitude seasonal camps (commonly settled in the open air, in proximity of peat-bogs, sheets of water or under rockshelters) and seasonal hunting places at middle\high altitude. Most of the mountain camps are in the open air sites. Generally, they underwent to strong post-depositional disturbance, mainly on account of long-term soil formation processes acting on them. Although their archaeological record is rather poor in relation to that one of sites located in a more favourable geomorphological context, their study is equally required in order to fully understand the human ecology in that periods (Angelucci and Peresani, in press). This is the case of one among several middle-altitude seasonal camps occupied during the Allerød, Val Lastari, wich lies in the open air at an altitude of 1.060 m on the Asiago Plateau. Even if post-depositional processes dramatically reduced the archaeological record (no faunal remains have been found), excavations revealed traces of repeated human occupations mainly related with flint workshops and flint caching (Fig. 1). Due to its own ecological context, to their proximity to flint sources and to the archaeological record, Val Lastari can likely be attributed to that category known as temporary and complex camps at middle-altitude. Lithic technology has well demonstrated that toolmaking of local flint was aimed to obtain straight blades, two morphometric categories of bladelets (destined to be shaped into backed pieces) and laminar flakes (Montoya, Peresani, in press). Blanks and tools were used, exported and also introduced onto the site (Broglio et al., 1992). End-scrapers, burins, backed knives and retouched blades are the most numerous among the retouched tools, whereas backed points, backed and backed truncated bladelets are the most representative types among the microliths. Through a functional approach to the lithic tool-set we would like to verify the reliability of the proposed model in the general perspective of more integrated approaches recently applied on Epigravettian contexts, concerning the reconstruction of raw material provisioning systems, lithic technological procedures, their variability, as well as their evolution and their functional significance. Methodology is based on the study of use-wear traces on flint tools, at different magnifications, from low power approach with a stereoscope (up to 50X) to high power approach with metallographic microscope (up to 200-400X) (Keeley, 1980; Vaughan 1985). Analysis were supported, as necessary in a functional approach, by experimental reconstruction, with the aims to stress the attitude of different lithic raw materials exploited in the site and to observe the occurrence and evolution of the traces. Furthermore, recurring to experimental archaeology was necessary to answer to specific questions arose during the analysis of specific categories of archaeological artefacts (such as scrapers, backed bladelets…). Even if specimens are affected by variable alteration (very frequent soil sheen affected surfaces and abrasion damaged edges and dorsal ridges) and the observation of diagnostic microtraces is quite rare, results from the functional study provide some data about the function of the site and open new perspectives about its dynamics. Although the relationship with raw material provisioning is evident and that flint knapping and tool-making were very important targets at this site, neverthless it is now clear that epigravettian hunters also carried out various tasks. The results of the functional study support the interpretation that there was not only a production of weapons implements, but also their utilization in hunting, that probably occurred in the surroundings. Subsistence activities are represented too: carcass treatment and hide processing seem to be very important, suggesting that the site was related to game acquisition and animal resources exploitation. Finally, some general considerations will be made about the settlement system of the region, even by a comparison with previous functional studies on epigravettian sites (Lemorini Rossetti, 2000 and 2004). Even if the results are not necessarily in contrast with the proposed model (Broglio, Lanzinger 1990), they can contribute to enrich the actual perspectives and discussion on human ecology during the Late Glacial in the Pre-Alpine fringe, suggesting a more complex and various settlement system.