Middle Palaeolithic technological adaptation in Montane Southwest Asia: a test of the Zagros Mousterian “Summer adaptation hypothesis”

The Zagros Mousterian techno-complex, known from Middle Palaeolithic high-altitude contexts of the Zagros Mountains of Iraq and Iran, has been argued to be the techno-behavioural expression of exclusively summer-seasonal exploitation by hominins. The “Summer Adaptation Hypothesis” aims to investigate this contention through lithic attribute analysis of Middle Palaeolithic material, and through discussion of relevant environmental data. This thesis analyses and discusses three Zagros Mousterian lithic assemblages, Shanidar Cave Layer D4, Warwasi layers WW and XX, and Houmian Layer 2a, and one Levantine Mousterian assemblage, Ksar Akil layers XXVIIIA, XXVIIA, and XXVIA. This thesis aims to demonstrate that the contention that only summer exploitation was feasible throughout the Pleistocene is not in line with either the lithic or the environmental evidence. The results of the lithic analyses are argued to support the viewpoint that the Zagros Mousterian is not a techno-behavioural expression of exclusively summer-seasonal exploitation of high-altitude environments, and that the Zagros Mousterian is not, in itself, a coherent techno-complex in the first place