Human Remains from the Moravian Gravettian: Morphology and Taphonomy of Isolated Elements from the Dolnı́ Věstonice II Site

The excavation and palaeoanthropological analysis of the early Upper Palaeolithic site of Dolnı́ Věstonice II has yielded a series of incomplete and isolated human remains, comprising cranial vaults, teeth (including a series from an infant), ribs, arm bones, hand phalanges, leg bones, tarsals, metatarsals and pedal phalanges. Morphologically and morphometrically the elements are similar to those from buried individuals at Dolnı́ Věstonice I and II and Pavlov I, as well as to other European early Upper Palaeolithic human remains. They differ principally in the high percentage of cortical areas of the distal humerus and femur. The Dolnı́ Věstonice 36 infant's teeth may well derive from an undisturbed burial with in situ bone destruction. Geological processes are unlikely to have produced the taphonomic patterns observed, and the preservation and damage patterns of the elements (other than Dolnı́ Věstonice 36) suggest that the original bodies were processed by some combination of scavenging agents. Moreover, the original number of burials at Dolnı́ Věstonice II may have been greater than the four currently known.