Definition: The Upper Paleolithic site of Wilczyce is located on the top of a hill near the town of Sandomierz, in northeastern Poland. The archaeological materials found within the site include abundant faunal remains (horse, woolly rhinocerus, arctic fox, and hare, with some birds such as grouse, herring-gull and lesser black-backed gull. A large number of bone and antler tools were also recovered. The site represents the fill from an ice wedge, a geological feature that forms in permafrost.
Today, Wilczyce has no permafrost, but when the site was formed, during the Late Magdalenian of 14,000 to 16,000 years ago, the glacier covered this area, retreating only in summers, when the ice wedges provided a water source. Researchers believe that human hunter-gatherers camped next to the melted ice wedge and used it for refuse disposal several times over the course of the 2,000 years before the glaciers retreated.
Wilczyce is known for the recovery of several Lalinde/Gönnersdorf figurines, a class of Venus figurine, including a range of worked flint objects.
Today, Wilczyce has no permafrost, but when the site was formed, during the Late Magdalenian of 14,000 to 16,000 years ago, the glacier covered this area, retreating only in summers, when the ice wedges provided a water source. Researchers believe that human hunter-gatherers camped next to the melted ice wedge and used it for refuse disposal several times over the course of the 2,000 years before the glaciers retreated.
Wilczyce is known for the recovery of several Lalinde/Gönnersdorf figurines, a class of Venus figurine, including a range of worked flint objects.
Sources
Fiedorczuk, Jan, Bodil Bratlund, Else Kolstrup, and Romuald Schild. 2007. Late Magdalenian feminine flint plaquettes from Poland. Antiquity 81:97-105.
