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Chapter 6: The XYZ Layers

Pech IV's layered deposit One of the unusual features of Pech IV, which has been known since François Bordes excavated here in the 1970s, is a thick deposit with numerous hearths at the bottom of the site's stratigraphy. The name "XYZ Layers" comes from Bordes' distinction of three separate layers within this deposit. In our excavation, these make up one layer, layer 8. It is remarkable because it contains a number of very distinct hearth lenses, which are only rarely found at Neandertal sites in France. The more common situation is to have a deposit with charcoal and ashes where separate hearth lenses cannot be distinguished.

We carefully excavated a substantial portion of layer 8, tracing out each individual hearth and digging them separately from the rest of the deposit. In these layers there are very dense concentrations of animal bone and stone artifacts. Many of these are burnt, as well as fragmented. The large quantity of cultural materials suggests a couple of different interpretations. The first is that Neandertals stayed at the cave of Pech IV for long periods of time. For example, once they arrived, they stayed perhaps for several months at a time. This type of interpretation implies that during the period of time represented by layer 8, Neandertals had a settlement pattern that was not highly mobile. If this interpretation is accurate, then it would mean that Neandertals moved to other sites rather infrequently. It is also possible that such long stays at a site occurred over the winter months when more extensive shelter was needed as protection from the elements. Numerous hearths, providing heat and fire for cooking meals, in such a context would lend support to this idea.

Interpretations of archaeological data, however, are often more difficult. A second way of looking at the patterning in layer 8 is to say that the numerous hearths represent many repeated short-term visits to Pech IV. In this case, Neandertals were not necessarily groups who moved from site to site infrequently, but could actually be highly mobile in their settlement pattern. They repeatedly visited Pech IV because it was a favorable spot in the landscape, perhaps for certain types of resources that were nearby. These resources could be something like sources of good quality flint for making stone tools or proximity to herds of animals that could be hunted or scavenged (pop up box on scavenging) for food.


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