COMPLEXITé DES STRATIGRAPHIES RéGIONALES ET NOUVEAU MODèLE D'APPARITION ET DE DIFFUSION DU PHéNOMèNE ACHEULéEN EN EUROPE DE L'OUEST

摘要

COMPLEXITY OF REGIONAL STRATIGRAPHIES AND NEW MODEL FOR THE APPEARANCE AND DIFFUSION OF THE ACHEULIAN PHENOMENON IN WESTERN EUROPE During Middle Pleistocene, biface appears in Western Europe. This stone tool characterises in particular the Acheulian culture (Lower Palaeolithic). The typological variability of the biface has been shown during the xx~(th) century, but we usually consider the Acheulian of Western Europe as a homogeneous entity when creating models for the peopling of Europe. The study of 36 Acheulian lithic industries in France, Italy, Spain and England, dating between 630 000 to 300 000 years, shows up major technical differences. We especially see the exclusive presence within tool kits of the bifacial piece "as a blank for tools" in North-Western Europe, whereas the bifacial piece "as a tool" is distributed everywhere in Western Europe, together with tools on other blanks (flakes, pebbles, blocks). These differences would make sense once-the industries put in relative chronology. Such a construction requires to consider reliable local and regional stratigraphies, valid at a European scale, but the chronostratigraphical location of the industry is frequently problematic. The interpretation of the stratigraphy varies depending on the authors, the identification of some geological formation is controversial (diamicton, till in primary or secondary contexts, interference of glaciotectonic phenomenon) and stratigraphical hiatuses are not systematically considered. Stratigraphy is difficult to read when continental, marine and volcanic deposits alternate in the sequence, with few chronological markers. Alluvial terraces' interlocking and layers of alterites also make the sections hardly understandable. Critical analysis of lithostratigraphies and chronological attributions allows us to propose a new model for appearance and diffusion of bifacial pieces from North-Western to Southern Europe. This model should be confirmed, as well as generally accepted models (e.g. Out of Africa theory), by getting new reliable stratigraphies.