Wilczyce. A Late Magdalenian Winter Hunting Camp in Southern Poland

Do publikacji dołączona jest płyta DVD z filmem: "A Late Magdalenian Hunting Camp in Wilczyce. A Few Scenes of Excavations and Surroundings".



Almost like Pompeii, the debris of the Wilczyce camp was instantaneously sealed before it could start to fall into serious decay. As a result of numerous seasons of excavations, we have learned that the settlement refuse found in the ice wedge cast, in which the debris was buried, most likely represents countless episodes of camping in the very same spots. If not for the erosion and the subsequent plowing the fields of the area, the already impressive number of recovered camp tools, weapons, pieces of art, etc., would have been richly augmented, perhaps making Wilczyce the richest Magdalenian site of all time.



The narrative of the Late Magdalenian winter camp on top of the Wilczyce Hill is the story of many generations of its residents, probable members of extended families inhabiting the lonely chum (hut), who worked, gave birth and amused themselves in the dwelling as well as hunted in the wide Opatówka Valley extending way below the top of the Wilczyce Hill. I sincerely hope that this little, discrete history of a winter camp somewhere in prehistoric, Late Magdalenian Europe anchored in a specific subarctic environment, totally foreign to the region's present inhabitants will be attractive to readers, not only among professional prehistorians, archaeobiologists or geomorphologists.