6. Abri Audit culture, marking the transition from late Mousterian to early Aurignacian industry.
5. Late true Mousterian industry. La Quina type of implements with scrapers and bone anvils.
4. Middle Mousterian industry, with a predominance of handsome, large Mousterian points carefully 'retouched' on the edge and sometimes on one side, a 'retouch' at times approaching the superior Solutrean technique.
3. Primitive early Mousterian industry, with a limited inventory of implements.
2. Combe-Capelle stage, with heart-shaped coups de poing and typical Mousterian 'points.' (Arrival of reindeer.)
1. La Micoque culture, transitional from Acheulean to Mousterian times. (No reindeer.)
The flint industry, although very different in its outward appearance, is recognizable as a direct evolution from the Acheulean, with the suppression or decline of certain implements and the improvements of others. It is the product of the same kind of mind at work with the same materials, but under different climatic conditions and with new demands, especially for clothing as protection against the severe weather. We also cannot avoid the feeling that the abandonment of the free, open life of Chellean and early Acheulean times and the crowding of the Neanderthal tribesmen beneath the shelters and in the grottos had a dwarfing effect both upon the physique and upon the industry itself. The Mousterian implements, as compared with the Acheulean, impress one as the work of a less muscular and vigorous race.
In addition to the many fine transitions that one observes[(71)] between the Acheulean and Mousterian industries at St. Acheul, strong evidence is also furnished in favor of a close connection between these cultures by the discoveries at Laussel, on the Vézère, near Les Eyzies. There, broad and deep before this shelter of Laussel, lies the Mousterian layer, and directly beneath it is a true Acheulean layer close to the waters of the valley of the Beune. This proves that in Acheulean times this valley was deepened to the same degree as to-day, and a close union of the Acheulean to the Mousterian is here again evident. In the valley of the Somme near St. Acheul Commont has also observed proofs of a similar close connection between these cultures. With such records in northern and southern France, the Neanderthal race, which is known toward the end of Acheulean times and especially covers the entire period of Mousterian time, comes much nearer to us. If we assign the Mousterian industry to the last glacial period, we give it a duration of some 30,000 years, and this is about the reckoning which thoughtful anatomists have already assigned for the Neanderthal man.
Special Mousterian Implements