Cold-climate toolkits: firemaking, lithic recycling and assemblage formation in the Magdalenian of Hohle Fels Cave

Equipment used for fire-making must have formed an integral part of the toolkits of Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers, especially during cold periods and in regions where caves were exploited. Yet evidence of the use of flint in fire-making only becomes abundant towards the end of the Palaeolithic period. We present here a number of newly identified strike-a-lights from the Magdalenian occupation of Hohle Fels Cave (Swabian Jura, Germany), dated to between 16,300 and 14,700 cal BP. The artefacts are interpreted as strike-a-lights on the basis of relatively heavy rounding, scarring and linear features located at their extremities. Two of them also have deposits of red mineral residue that were deemed the possible degraded remains of sulphuric iron and further analysed with SEM-EDS. All the potential strike-a-lights presented here are recycled tools originally used for other activities. We use them as a basis for discussing the use of lithic raw material in hunter-gatherer toolkits in the younger part of the Upper Palaeolithic sequence of Hohle Fels