1SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE ANIMAL ENGRAVINGS FROM GLOZEL

Excavations at the site of Glozel between 1924 and 1936 unearthed many bone and stone artifacts en-graved and sculptured with images of various animals including cervids. Some of these resemble rein-deer and are accompanied by alphabetic symbols similar to those on many ceramic tablets from Glozel. In order to verify the species identification, photographs of ten bone and stone artifacts with engraved or sculptured cervids were sent to a curator at the Zoological Museum in Bergen, Norway, who identified all of them as reindeer Although the alphabetic symbols accompanying the reindeer suggest that the artifacts are the same age as the ceramic tablets, firmly dated by thermoluminescence to Gallo-Roman times, the reindeer on bone are apparently much more recent. Three bones with animal engravings (horses and reindeer) have recently been dated by AMS C-14 to the 13th century AD, and nitrogen measure-ments on a large number of other bone objects suggest a similar age. Although we cannot date the animal engravings on stone, several of them have excellent provenance and may date to the earlier period. We raise the question o f possible survival of a relict population of reindeer in the Bois Noirs, perhaps to the Celtic period. The authors also discuss preliminary results of a new study of the engraved galets and bone objects using the scanning electron microscope (SEM). Examination of the highly magnified SE