What's in a name: The Aurignacian in Romania

The key position held by Romania's territory for the available scenarios regarding the expansion of the Upper Paleolithic cultural package in Europe has been recently reinforced by the finds of the oldest European Homo sapiens sapiens remains in the Oase Cave (Southwestern Romania). However, in spite of its paradigmatic association to the first anatomically modern humans in Europe, the Aurignacian in Romania remained inadequately known and rarely referred to in the European literature. The poor descriptions of the Aurignacian-called lithic industries and their unusually young numerical chronology or geochronological estimations explain this caution. A brief evaluation of the available information regarding these issues is proposed. Based on a comparatively restricted definition of the Aurignacian variability as acknowledged in the recent European literature (e.g. numerical chronology, large retouched blades, bladelet production from carinated forms, bone industry), the present approach dismisses many postulates widely held in Romanian literature: the local origin, the wide occurrence and the late survival of the Aurignacian. However, given the lack of numerical dates and the fragmentary state of most archaeological collections, the precise timing of its emergence and the details of its regional evolution require further research. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved.