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PALAEOLITHIC EUROPE
In this book, Jennifer C. French presents a new synthesis of the archae-
ological, palaeoanthropological, and palaeogenetic records of the
European Palaeolithic, adopting a unique demographic perspective on
theseﬁrst two million years of European prehistory. Unlike prevailing
narratives of demographic stasis, she emphasises the dynamism of
Palaeolithic populations of both our evolutionary ancestors and mem-
bers of our own species across four demographic stages, within a context
of substantial Pleistocene climatic changes. Integrating evolutionary
theory with a socially oriented approach to the Palaeolithic, French
bridges biological and cultural factors, with a focus on women and
children as the drivers of population change. She shows how, within
the physiological constraints on fertility and mortality, social relation-
ships provided the key to enduring demographic success. Through its
demographic focus, French combines a‘big picture’perspective on
human evolution with careful analysis of the day-to-day realities of
European Palaeolithic hunter-gatherer communities–their families,
their children, and their lives.
Jennifer C. French holds a PhD in Archaeology from the University of
Cambridge. Her research on humanity’s early demographic history has
been funded by the AHRC, the Leverhulme Trust, and the Wenner-Gren
Foundation and published inScience,Evolutionary Anthropology,Journal of
Archaeological Science,andPhilosophicalTransactionsoftheRoyalSociety.

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PALAEOLITHIC EUROPE
A Demographic and Social Prehistory
jennifer c. french
University of Liverpool

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NAMES: French, Jennifer,1987–author.
TITLE: Palaeolithic Europe : a demographic and social prehistory / Jennifer French.
DESCRIPTION: Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York, NY : Cambridge University Press,2021.|
Series: Cambridge world archaeology | Includes bibliographical references.
IDENTIFIERS:LCCN2021024924(print) |LCCN2021024925(ebook) |ISBN9781108492065(hard-
back) |ISBN9781108590891(ebook)
SUBJECTS:LCSH: Prehistoric peoples–Europe. | Paleolithic period–Europe. | Human
evolution–Europe. | BISAC: SOCIAL SCIENCE / Archaeology | SOCIAL SCIENCE /
Archaeology
CLASSIFICATION:LCC GN772.2.A1F74 2021(print) |LCC GN772.2.A1(ebook) |DDC936–dc23
LC record available athttps://lccn.loc.gov/2021024924
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accurate or appropriate.

For Paul
and
Dom

CONTENTS
List of Figures ................................................................................. pagex
List of Tables .......................................................................................xii
List of Text Boxes .................................................................................xiv
Preface ................................................................................................xv
Acknowledgements and Permissions .........................................................xviii
1Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory.....................1
2Stones, Bones, and Genes: A Palaeodemographic Database ............19
3Hunter-Gatherer Demography ......................................................49
4Visitation: The First European Populations
(~1.8million–300,000years ago) ...................................................85
5Residency: The Neanderthals and Their Neighbours
(~300,000–40,000years ago) .........................................................133
6Expansion: The Arrival ofHomo sapiensin Europe and the Extinction
of the Neanderthals (~50,000–35,000years ago) ..............................172
7Intensiﬁcation: Mid-to-Late Upper Palaeolithic Population
Dynamics (~35,000–15,000years ago).............................................214
8Palaeolithic Europe: Demography and Society ..............................259
Glossary ..........................................................................................272
References .......................................................................................275
Index .............................................................................................327
ix

FIGURES
1.1Schematic diagram of the inferred age ranges of hominin lineages
mentioned in this book during the last million years, and their phylo-
genetic associations (dotted lines)
page4
2.1The basic theoretical steps linking population size and cultural com-
plexity according to Henrich’s(2004) model
21
2.2Schematic of the basic steps used in the Cologne Protocol to estimate the
number and density of Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers
27
2.3An example of palaeodemographic reconstruction using summed
probability distributions of radiocarbon dates to infer population trends
between18,000and7,500cal BP in Iberia, and their relationships with
palaeoclimatic conditions
30
2.4The representativeness of a skeletal sample and sources of information
loss between the once living population and the palaeodemographic
database
34
2.5The age-sex pyramid for the living population represented by the
skeletal assemblage from the Libben site, Ohio, USA (800–1100AD)
37
2.6The demographic history of two populations represented schematically41
2.7The diﬀerences between the use of single locus and multiple loci in
demographic reconstruction from genetic data
42
3.1Map of recent hunter-gatherer populations 51
3.2Annual probability of death for pre-contact hunter-gatherers and two
recent Western populations
59
3.3Global predictions of hunter-gatherer population densities (people/
100km
2
) under current conditions
62
3.4Schematic of the simpliﬁed physiological relationships between
women’s energy, fertility, infant mortality and population growth/
decline
70
4.1Topographical map of present-day Europe 88
4.2Biogeographical map of present-day Europe 89
4.3Climatic and chronocultural framework for the European Lower
Palaeolithic
91
4.4Prevailing habitats across Europe during the Early and Middle
Pleistocene
92
x

4.5Map showing the distribution of European Early Pleistocene sites
according to their maximum ages
95
4.6Prevalence of carnivores (top) and other large mammal species (bottom)
in Europe during the late Early Pleistocene
103
4.7Map showing the distribution of European Middle Pleistocene sites by
MIS stage: (a) >MIS13; (b) MIS13–12; (c) MIS11–9
109
4.8Chronological and geographical distribution of key European Middle
Pleistocene hominin fossils
115
4.9Age at death distribution of the28Middle Pleistocene hominins from
the site of Sima de los Huesos, Spain
121
5.1Fluctuations in oxygen isotope ratios throughout the Middle
Palaeolithic and their correspondence with Marine Isotope Stages
135
5.2Map showing the key Middle Palaeolithic sites mentioned in Chapter5
and the known Neanderthal range
138
5.3Comparison of the number of archaeological sites/1,000years across the
climatic stages of the Middle Palaeolithic of Germany
142
5.4Spatial distribution of Late Middle Palaeolithic Neanderthal regional
populations
149
5.5Age-at-death distributions for the Krapina Neanderthal fossil assemblage
and the pooled Neanderthal skeletal metapopulation (minus the Krapina
fossils)
156
6.1Map showing the key Middle-to-Upper Palaeolithic sites mentioned in
Chapter6
174
6.2Palaeotemperatureﬂuctuations as recorded in the NGRIP ice core
between50–35kya, with the timing of the onset of Greenland
Interstadials indicated
176
6.3Demographic change across the Middle-to-Upper Palaeolithic transi-
tion as seen in multiple proxies from south-western France
192
6.4Fluctuations in multiple faunal measures (palaeodemographic proxies) across
the Middle-to-Upper Palaeolithic transition at Klissoura cave, Greece
194
7.1Map showing the key Mid-to-Late Upper Palaeolithic sites mentioned
in Chapter7
216
7.2Changes in population size across the European Mid-to-Late Upper
Palaeolithic as estimated using the Cologne Protocol
221
7.3Palaeotemperatureﬂuctuations as recorded in the NGRIP ice core
between35and15kya and their relationship to Mid- and Late Upper
Palaeolithic chronocultural stages
222
7.4Map of Europe showing the maximum extent of the Eurasian ice sheets
and the coastline during the LGM
227
7.5The Willendorf II Gravettian femaleﬁgurine 242
7.6Reconstruction of the mammoth bone structure (‘dwelling1’)atMezhirich247
7.7Examples of theﬂoor plans of Magdalenianstructures latentes250
7.8Environmental proxies for inferred demographic change in (top) the %
of small game in faunal assemblages and (bottom) the size of limpets at
Mid-to-Late Upper Palaeolithic sites in the Mediterranean
256
8.1The‘four-stage model’of the demographic prehistory of Palaeolithic
Europe
260
List of Figures xi

TABLES
1.1Summary of the basic structure of the European Palaeolithic archae-
ological and palaeoanthropological records, their correspondence with
geological and climatic schema and the four demographic stages of the
European Palaeolithic
page3
2.1Summary of key archaeological palaeodemographic proxies applied to
the Palaeolithic (divided here into‘direct’and‘indirect’approaches) and
the main methodological and interpretative considerations of each
24
2.2A comparison of the three main types of palaeodemographic data and
the demographic variables on which they can inform
46
3.1Total fertility rates (TFR) for selected recent hunter-gatherer
populations
54
3.2Infant/child and adult mortality measures for selected recent forager
populations
56
3.3Maternal mortality rates (MMR) of selected recent hunter-gatherer
groups
76
3.4Data on adult homicides in recent hunter-gatherer populations. All are
intragroup violence unless otherwise speciﬁed
78
4.1Details of doubts surrounding European Early Pleistocene sites based on
(a) chronological uncertainties and/or (b) dubious or ambiguous evi-
dence of human presence. Sites in italics are considered dubious enough
to be excluded from consideration in this study and are not included in
Figure4.5
96
4.2Comparison of the number and relative frequency of people with
diﬀerent ages-at-death from Sima de los Huesos and a pooled European
Middle Pleistocene hominin sample
123
5.1Chronology of Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) which fall within the
European Middle Palaeolithic and their correlation with the main
European terrestrial sequences
134
5.2Published estimates of Neanderthal metapopulation size and density
based on archaeological and ethnographic data
145
5.3Composition of the El Sidrón Neanderthal group by age, sex, and
mtDNA lineage
153
xii

5.4Estimates of weaning age (a proxy for interbirth interval) among
Neanderthals
163
5.5Details of known Denisovan individuals 169
6.1Key features of European‘transitional’industries 177
6.2The chronological succession of Aurignacian phases and diagnostic
features of their characteristic assemblages based primarily on the south-
western French sequence
179
6.3Absolute estimates of Aurignacian population size for three regions with
extrapolated estimates of late Neanderthal populations, assuming a
10-fold increase in population size across the Middle-to-Upper
Palaeolithic transition
195
7.1Simpliﬁed chronocultural sequence of the European Mid-to-Late
Upper Palaeolithic
217
7.2Absolute population estimates for the European metapopulation across
the Mid-to-Late Upper Palaeolithic
223
7.3Estimates of the number of people occupying LUP mammoth bone
structures in Eastern Europe
247
List of Tables xiii

TEXT BOXES
1.1Women, demography, and gender archaeology page14
2.1Theoretical and empirical debates surrounding cultural evolutionary
models of demography
22
2.2The Cologne Protocol for palaeodemographic reconstruction26
2.3The evolution of longevity and the‘grandmother hypothesis’ 38
2.4DNA and genes: A primer for archaeologists and palaeoanthropologists40
3.1Culture, optimality and naturalness: Three criticisms of the HBE fra-
mework applied to demography
65
3.2Infanticide in recent foraging populations (and why Palaeolithic
hunter-gatherers did not use infanticide to control population growth)
81
4.1Short and long chronologies of the initial human presence in Europe101
4.2The TD6hominins: Evidence of cannibalistic conﬂict? 104
4.3Cultural transmission in the Lower Palaeolithic? 117
5.1Classifying Neanderthals:Homo neanderthalensisorHomo sapiens
neanderthalensis?
136
5.2Meet the neighbours: the Denisovans 167
6.1Can demography explain cultural changes at the Middle-to-Upper
Palaeolithic transition?
181
6.2Who made the Châtelperronian? 185
6.3The nature of the Neanderthal-Homo sapienstransition: Replacement or
assimilation?
199
7.1Deﬁning the Last Glacial Maximum 226
7.2Gravettian femaleﬁgurines as‘Venuses’ 241
xiv

PREFACE
This book is the culmination of over a decade’s worth of studying, thinking,
and writing about Palaeolithic population trends and the challenges and
opportunities of studying demography in the deep human past. My interest is
this topic was originally piqued by the extinction of the Neanderthals, and the
subsequent realisation that despite this being the most famous demographic
event of the Pleistocene, it was rarely discussed and studied in explicitly
demographic terms; in terms of the imbalance between lives and deaths that
ultimately underlie the disappearance of a species. Since I started work on this
topic back in2008, archaeological interest in demography has grown. Many
factors have contributed to this: the development and reﬁnement of methods to
study long-term demographic change in prehistory (although, sadly, not all
applicable to Palaeolithic datasets); the increase in the use of agent-based and
simulation models to explore the changing birth, death, and migration rates and
patterns underlying these trends; the inclusion of evolutionary frameworks that
link demographic change with other cultural and biological domains into
mainstream archaeological theory; and the growing generation of palaeoge-
netic data. There is no better research environment in which to write a
big-picture, large-scale‘demographic prehistory’than the one that currently
prevails, and the work presented here owes an enormous intellectual debt to
the wider palaeodemographic research community. In the face of some con-
siderable scepticism, the members of this community have demonstrated
successfully both the importance of population histories to our wider under-
standing of past societies, and how data from archaeology and allied disciplines
can be combined to reconstruct and explore these population histories.
At the same time, I have become increasingly aware of the rather detached
attitude to prehistoric populations, and the people they comprised, that often
accompanies prevailing approaches to palaeodemography. I have found myself
unconsciously thinking about Palaeolithic people as‘individuals’who lived in
mixed groups of‘males’and‘females’and who‘mated’or‘bred’to produce
‘oﬀspring’. There is nothing wrong with these words per se. In fact, they are, in
xv

a biological and evolutionary sense, those that most accurately describe these
people and demographic processes. They do, however, strike me as rather odd
phrases to use to discuss some of the most meaningful and intimate relationships
and events that humans experience. These words can also take on a double
meaning when we are discussing archaic hominins (i.e. non-Homo sapiens),
making–intentionally or not–a statement on the perceived humanity of these
people. Let me make my views clear here: while there were obviously diﬀer-
ences (both biological and cognitive) between them, in my opinion all homi-
nins who lived during the European Palaeolithic were‘humans’.
In all human societies, demography and demographic behaviour are struc-
tured by biology but are shaped by culture. While we have uniformitarian
biological principles to help with understanding how the former controlled and
constrained demographic behaviour in prehistory, we have no equivalent to
draw on to understand the latter. Furthermore, the Palaeolithic record is
a palimpsest that is largely silent about the social factors and individual decisions
underlying demography. This is, however, no excuse for ignoring this aspect of
Palaeolithic population histories. We can never reconstruct, for example, the
marriage customs of Palaeolithic groups, or their cultural attitudes towards sex,
but–as I hope this book demonstrates–we can still incorporate social
perspectives into the study of Palaeolithic demography, and avoid reducing
the behaviour of Palaeolithic people to mere biological impulses wrought
against an on-going quest for food. At times my interpretations may stretch
the data somewhat, but these‘leaps of faith’are required to write
a demographic prehistory that doesn’t just populate the Palaeolithic, but also
peoples it.
This book is ultimately the book about Palaeolithic demography that
I wanted to read while conducting my research over the last ten years. I hope
that other members of the community of Palaeolithic students and scholars
want to read it too.
****
The type of analytical synthesis represented by this book stands on the shoulders
of giants, and I am very grateful to those colleagues who provided me with
expertise, information, support, encouragement, and inspiration during the
long period of research and writing.
The majority of the research and writing of this book was undertaken at the
UCL Institute of Archaeology. Several colleagues there were instrumental in
getting this book oﬀthe ground: Corisande Fenwick, Stephen Shennan, and
David Wengrow. I also gained valuable insights and feedback on many of the
ideas that follow from my fellow Palaeolithic archaeologists at the Institute:
Ignacio de la Torre, Matt Pope, Tomos Proﬃtt, James Steele, and especially
Andy Garrard, as well as the members of the weekly Palaeolithic Discussion
Group. Revision, editing, and prooﬁng were undertaken at the Department of
Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology at the University of Liverpool, and I am
xvi Preface

grateful for the support and encouragement that I and this book received in my
new academic home.
For sharing papers, answering email queries, and providing excellent sound-
ing boards for discussions of prehistoric demography, the Palaeolithic, and
book writing in general, I thank the following: Javier Baena Preysler,
Kristian Boote, John Boulton, Katherine Boyle, Stuart Brookes, Laura Buck,
James Cole, Christina Collins, Jill Cook, Fiona Coward, Robin Dennell,
Kevan Edinborough, Becky Farbstein, Javier Fernández-López de Pablo,
Rob Foley, Charlotte Frearson, Andy Gardner, Matt Grove, Sue Hamilton,
Gail Hitchens, Sally Hoare, Bob Kelly, Sarah Lacy, Liisa Loog, Sergi Lozano,
Mario Modesto-Mata, Jay Mogg, Clare McFadden, April Nowell, Sandra
Ostermann, Damien Pesesse, Hazel Reade, Julien Riel-Salvatore, Phil Riris,
Jesús Rodríguez Méndez, Peter Schauer, Isabell Schmidt, Pat Shipman, Daniel
Shultz, Fabio Silva, Andrew Sorensen, Rhiannon Stevens, Alice Stevenson,
Lawrence Straus, Chris Stringer, Miikka Tallavaara, and Mark Thomas.
Particular thanks to those who took the time to read draft chapters and
provided valuable feedback: Taryn Bell, Adam Benton, Tom Booth, Andrew
Chamberlain, Rob Dinnis, Rob Hosﬁeld, Charlotte Houldcroft, Clive
Gamble, Marc Kissel, Andreas Maier, Abbey Page, Marko Porcˇic´, Natasha
Reynolds, Penny Spikins, James Steele, and Suzy White.
In the most literal sense, this book depended on the generosity of several
funding bodies. I am grateful to the Leverhulme Trust and the UCL Institute of
Archaeology for funding the research and writing of this project through
a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship (2016–19; grant number:
ECF-2016–128). Theﬁnal stages of writing were supported by a Hunt
Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Wenner Gren Foundation (grant number:
9862; awarded2018, held2019–20). In addition to paying for my salary during
the period of research and writing, these grants also allowed me to hire the
talents of Stuart Brookes whose excellent illustrations add so much to this book
(along with Phil Riris who kindly producedFigures3.1,5.1,6.2, and7.3, and
Evie Brookes who produced Figures7.5and7.6). I am grateful to all of these
institutions for their support and conﬁdence in this project. Finally, I thank
Norman Yoﬀee and the rest of the editorial board of the Cambridge World
Archaeology Series, my editors at the Cambridge University Press, Beatrice
Rehl, Edgar Mendez, and Mary Bongiovi, and the team who ensured theﬁnal
production of this book (Malini Soupramanian, Ursula Acton).
I dedicate this book to two people. First, to my friend Professor Sir Paul
Mellars, who has been my greatest mentor and champion since we met over ten
years ago. Finally, I dedicate this book to Dominic Walker–the best partner in
life I could ever have hoped for.
Preface xvii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS AND PERMISSIONS
Acknowledgement is due to the following people for permission to reproduce the
listed illustrations:
Figure1.1. Chris Stringer
Figure2.2. Andreas Maier and Andreas Zimmermann
Figure2.3Javier Fernández-López de Pablo
Figure3.3. Miikka Tallavaara
Figure4.6. Jesus Rodríguez
xviii

CHAPTER1
TOWARDS A SOCIAL PALAEODEMOGRAPHY
OF EARLY PREHISTORY
The Palaeolithic–the earliest and longest period of human (pre)history–was
a time of substantial demographic upheaval. Throughout the Palaeolithic, both
our evolutionary ancestors (hominins) and members of our own species (Homo
sapiens) variously lived and died, interbred, migrated, speciated, and became
extinct in a context of frequent and substantial Pleistocene climatic changes.
Palaeolithic populations were dynamic, but this dynamism is rarely acknowl-
edged. The Palaeolithic is a mere footnote in most global overviews of
humanity’s demographic history; overviews that contrast Pleistocene hunter-
gatherers with their more demographically interesting agricultural successors,
and that seldom move beyond brief descriptions of their small population size,
low density, and slow long-term growth rates (e.g.Biraben2003;Livi-Bacci
2017). It was, however, during the Palaeolithic that both the biological and
social foundations of the human propensity for rapid population growth and
range expansion–the former of which continues apace into the twenty-ﬁrst
century–were laid (Kramer2019).
Encompassing ~3million years globally, knowledge of Palaeolithic
demographic variation is vital to understanding both humanity’s long-
term population history and the substantial social and cultural developments
that occurred during this period, including the origins of art and symbolism
and the colonisation of an increasing array of new environments. The
importance of demography to human societies should not be underesti-
mated. Changes in population size and density play key roles in the devel-
opment and variability of material culture, settlement patterns, social
institutions, andlanguages (e.g.Acerbiet al.2017;Bromhamet al.2015;
Kempe & Mesoudi2014). The balance of kin and non-kin in a person’s
social network–a network partially determined by the age and sex
composition of the population–inﬂuences the degree of cooperation and
information exchange among individuals and families, and decisions about
who to marry and have children with (David-Barrett2019;Kramer &
Greaves2011;Miglianoet al.2017). Demographic processes are also central
1

to human evolution. Evolution is driven by the propagation of genes
through a combination of natural selection and genetic drift; variables
that are determined by the survival (mortality), fertility, and dispersal
(migration) of individuals (Gageet al.2012;Metcalf & Pavard2006).
Demographic variation shaped all ofhuman history: the Palaeolithic is no
exception.
This book weaves together archaeological, palaeoanthropological, and
genetic data, interpreting these with reference to ethnographic data on recent
hunter-gatherers and demographic models of extant subsistence-level socie-
ties, to develop a demographic prehistory of European Palaeolithic popula-
tions between1.8million and15,000years ago. Three questions lie behind
this demographic prehistory: (1) What were the key population limiting
factors, and controls and constraints on fertility and mortality experienced
by Palaeolithic populations, and how did they vary chronologically, geogra-
phically, and between hominin species? (2) What is the relationship(s)
between demography, sociocultural change, and climatic/environmental
change in the Palaeolithic? (3) What are the implications of these demo-
graphic patterns for our understanding of Palaeolithic societies and evolu-
tionary transitions?
The demographic prehistory of Palaeolithic Europe comprises four stages:
visitation, residency, expansion, and intensiﬁcation(Table1.1).Itis
a prehistory that is the product of multiple species of humans, all of whom,
with the exception ofHomo sapiens, are extinct by the end of this nearly two-
million-year period(Figure1.1). It is a prehistory that is both biological and
social; one in which, within the physiological constraints on fertility and
mortality, social relationships provided the key for enduring demographic
success. Most importantly, it is a prehistory concerned with the big picture of
human evolution but which isﬁrmly grounded in the day-to-day realities of
Palaeolithic people–their families, their children, the way they lived and
died.
DEMOGRAPHY AND PALAEODEMOGRAPHY
It is important at the outset to be clear as to what exactly demography is.
Throughout this book, I use the term‘demography’in two ways; (1) to refer to
the composition of a particular population (‘the demography of...’), and (2)to
refer to the discipline of demography (‘the scientiﬁc study of human popula-
tions and their change’;Billari2015:S11). Deﬁnitions of key demographic
terms that recur throughout this book are listed in theGlossary.
The main aims of demography are to document, forecast, and explain
changes within, and variations between, the size and structure (composition)
of human populations. The three key demographic variables are fertility,
mortality, and migration. To allow comparison between populations these
2 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

Table
1
.
1
Summary of the basic structure of the European Palaeolithic archaeological and palaeoanthropological records, their correspondence with
geological and climatic schema and the four demographic stages of the European Palaeolithic. Demographic stage
Archaeological subdivisions
Date range (years ago, approximate)
Pleistocene sub- division
Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) (after Lisiecki & Raymo 2005
) Hominin(s) present
Lithic Mode (after
Clark
1969
)
Main archaeological technocomplex(es)
Visitation Lower
Palaeolithic
1
.
8
million
–
300
,
000
Early-
Middle
63
–
9
Homo erectus
;
Homo
georgicus
(?);
Homo
antecessor
;
Homo
heidelbergensis
;
Homo
neanderthalensis
1
,
2
Oldowan; Acheulean
Residency Middle
Palaeolithic
300
,
000
–
40
,
000
Middle-
Late
8
–
3
Homo neanderthalensis
;
Denisovans
3
Mousterian;
Micoquian/ Keilmessergruppen
Expansion Middle-to-
Upper Palaeolithic transition
Early Upper
Palaeolithic
50
,
000
–
35
,
000
Late
3
Homo neanderthalensis
;
Denisovans (?); Homo sapiens
4
Bohunician;
Châtelperronian; Uluzzian; Szeletian; Lincombian- Ranisian- Jerzmanowician; Aurignacian
Intensi
ﬁ
cation Mid-to-Late
Upper Palaeolithic
35
,
000
–
15
,
000
Late
3
–
2
Homo sapiens
4
,
5
Gravettian;
Solutrean; Badegoulian; Epigravettian; Magdalenian; Mezinian

variables are measured as rates; the number of events in a given time period,
divided by the number of people at risk of experiencing that event. Population
change is a result of variation in one or more of the variables of fertility,
mortality, and migration which cause further diﬀerences in population size,
density, and/or growth rate(s). Thus, in order to understand population
changes, demographers need to know about these variables and what causes
them to alter. The relationship between fertility, mortality, and migration
forms the‘basic demographic equation’where populations alter through time
due to a combination of natural increase (the imbalance between the number of
births and deaths) and net migration (the imbalance between the number of
people moving into a population (immigration) and the number of people
moving out (emigration)). The relative importance of the variables of fertility,
Figure1.1Schematic diagram of the inferred age ranges of hominin lineages
mentioned in this book during the last million years, and their phylogenetic
associations (dotted lines) (redrawn and adapted afterGalway-Witham et al.2019:
Figure2)
4 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

mortality, and migration to population change is not constant. For example,
prior to the Industrial Revolution, mortality was the driving force behind
population change. In contrast, fertility is the main driver of population change
in most twenty-ﬁrst-century nation states (Livi-Bacci2015).
‘Palaeodemography’refers to the demographic study of prehistoric popula-
tions (i.e. those societies for which no written records exist;Bocquet-Appel
2008). While palaeodemography and demography have similar aims, diﬀer-
ences in data availability and quality mean that the two research areas contrast in
several key ways.
Detailed information about the demographic variables of fertility, mortal-
ity, and migration is available for most present-day populations through
censuses and vital registration forms, such as birth, death, and marriage
certiﬁcates. From these, demographic parameters, including population
structure, age-speciﬁc fertility and mortality rates, and population growth
rates are calculated. By deﬁnition, no equivalent direct demographic data
exist for non-literate prehistoric populations. Instead, palaeodemographers
derive their data from other sources; sources that only indirectly inform on
past demographic processes and parameters. Palaeodemographic data will
never be as reliable or as complete as demographic data proper and we
should adjust our expectations accordingly. In particular, given this lack of
direct data, palaeodemography typically focuses on the study of long-term
(millennial) relative changes in population size and density in contrast to the
shorter-term (decadal) analysis of the full range of underlying demographic
variables that characterises the present-day discipline.
The palaeodemographic database comprises fragmentary information from
multiple disciplines, including archaeology, biological anthropology, genetics
and palaeogenetics, and ethnography. Most palaeodemographers embrace this
diverse range of data and advocate a multidisciplinary and multi-proxy
approach to prehistoric demography. One reason for this is that no one
disciplinary body of data, or methodological approach, informs on all aspects
of past demography, with diﬀerent datasets varying in the temporal and spatial
scales at which they provide demographic information. A fuller understanding
of demographic processes and behaviours in prehistory thus depends on the
integration of data from multiple sources.
The other key reason for a multi-proxy, multidisciplinary approach is the
indirect nature of palaeodemographic data itself. As these data contain no
inherent demographic information, numerous assumptions and theoretical
leaps about the relationship between the data and the targeted demographic
variables are required. Issues of equiﬁnality also abound, with some proxies
more susceptible than others to alternative, but often equally valid, interpreta-
tions, both demographic and otherwise. The consideration of multiple types of
data provides a form of cross-check, aiding to overcome the limitations of each
proxy and strengthening palaeodemographic interpretations by diﬀerentiating
Demography and palaeodemography 5

between competing explanations for the patterns seen in the data. This multi-
proxy, multidisciplinary approach to palaeodemography is taken in this book,
and how palaeodemographic measures are inferred from archaeological, bio-
logical anthropological (osteological), and genetic data are explained in
Chapter2. The challenges of reconciling diﬀerent proxies, combined with
the fragmentary and indirect nature of palaeodemographic data, should not,
however, be underestimated. Criticism of the methods and results of palaeo-
demographic research is long-standing, both from its practitioners and from
those outside theﬁeld (e.g.Bocquet-Appel & Masset1982;Petersen1975).
PALAEOLITHIC PALAEODEMOGRAPHY: KEY ISSUES
AND A FRAMEWORK FOR STUDY
Palaeolithic palaeodemography has been subject to some especially strong
criticism (e.g.Dogandžic´ & McPherron2013;Kuhn2012:82). Data quality
features heavily in these critiques. Problems with chronological precision and
accuracy that plague all palaeodemographic studies are particularly pronounced
in the Palaeolithic. Furthermore, most established palaeodemographic methods
were developed for the more sedentary societies of later prehistory and are
either unsuitable or require some modiﬁcation to be applied to Pleistocene
contexts and their typically sparser archaeological records (French2016).
As with many other areas of Palaeolithic research, a common response to this
sparse record is to look to the richer corpus of demographic data on extant
hunter-gatherers to inform on Pleistocene demography. Demographic data
from ethnographically documented hunter-gatherer populations are important
tools in Palaeolithic demographic research. Ethnographic data play a key role in
both the development of models of Palaeolithic demography (e.g.Binford
2001) and the generation of absolute estimates of Palaeolithic demographic
variables, including population size, density, and fertility and mortality rates
(e.g.Bocquet-Appelet al.2005;Cucart-Moraet al.2018;Maier &
Zimmermann2017). Most archaeologists are well-versed in the problems and
pitfalls, both methodological and theoretical, of using data from living popula-
tions to inform on past populations (e.g.Wobst1978). Elsewhere, I have
detailed the challenges speciﬁc to their use in palaeodemography (Page &
French2020). Two of these challenges are particularly important for the
demographic prehistory presented in this book, both with regard to the use
of ethnographic data to inform on Palaeolithic populations, and the reconstruc-
tion of Palaeolithic palaeodemography more broadly.
Demographic Uniformitarianism
Demographic uniformitarianism refers to the assumption that demographic
processes, and the mechanisms underlying these, are unchanged between the
6 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

past and the present (for a review of this concept, seeFrench & Chamberlain
2021). Demographic uniformitarianism was deﬁned most clearly by Howell,
who describes it as the premise that:
the human animal has not basically changed in its direct biological response to
the environment in processes of ovulation, spermatogenesis, length of preg-
nancy, degree of helplessness of the young, and rates of maturation and
senility over time...the demographically relevant biological processes of
our species are constant in our genetic composition, subject only to variation
in response to environmental forces, and that the species has not undergone
any signiﬁcant intra-species evolution since itsﬁrst appearance asHomo
sapiens.(Howell1976:26)
Importantly, demographic uniformitarianism does not assume that demo-
graphic behaviours have remained the same throughout history, nor that
speciﬁc parameter values derived from recently observed populations are
directly applicable to the past. Rather, demographic uniformitarianism assumes
that the basic biological processes relating to fertility and mortality are similar
between past and present, that they respond to environmental stimuli in the
same way, and that these similarities act as constraints of, and impose limits on,
demographic behaviours. The relevant biological processes listed by Howell
are more speciﬁcally known aslife historyparameters. Life history parameters
structure the timing of key developmental events in an organism’s lifetime and
are shaped by natural selection. Given their evolutionary constraints, human
life history parameters–and subsequently, patterns of age-speciﬁc fertility and
mortality–vary in predictable and limited ways. As such, the assumption of
demographic uniformitarianism is well accepted.
However, the uniformitarian assumption is only strictly applicable to mem-
bers of our own species,Homo sapiens, who have a distinctive life history pattern
comprising a long gestation period, long childhood, late age atﬁrst reproduc-
tion, and relatively few children–a life history pattern that likely evolved in
response to lowered mortality risks (Smith & Tompkins1995:262–3). The
other–non-sapiensor archaic–Pleistocene hominins who inhabited Europe
during the demographic stages of visitation and residency, exhibited biological
and developmental diﬀerences fromHomo sapiens.The extent of these diﬀer-
ences is subject to ongoing debate and is diﬃcult to quantify, but we can safely
assume that the life history pattern that characterisesHomo sapiensemerged
within theHomoclade (Robson & Wood2008). A key turning point in
hominin life history occurred withHomo erectus, with a shift towards the slow
life history ofHomo sapiens(Antónet al.2014). Later archaic hominins (e.g.
Homo heidelbergensis,Homo neanderthalensis) likely had a pace of development
within theHomo sapiensrange but nonetheless subtly diﬀerent (e.g.Rosaset al.
2017;Thompson & Nelson2011). In addition to their eﬀects on patterns of
Palaeolithic palaeodemography: key issues and a framework for study7

age-speciﬁc fertility and mortality, life history diﬀerences, combined with
other related biological and cognitive diﬀerences (such as body size, energy
expenditure, and brain size), would also have had important implications for
population structure and living group size and composition, with attendant
repercussions for the evolution of social behaviours such as alloparenting and
intergenerational cooperation (Kramer2019).
Demographic uniformitarianism underpins all research into prehistoric
demography. The assumption of uniformity in demographic processes
between past and present provides the methodological basis for ageing and
sexing human fossils and clear theoretical checks on reconstructions and inter-
pretations of past demographic trends and processes. Where palaeodemo-
graphic data do not match up with expectations derived from the
uniformitarian assumption (as is usually the case), the assumption helps us to
identify the reason(s) for this. The non-applicability of a strict principle of
demographic uniformitarianism to the archaic hominins of the Early and
Middle Pleistocene has resulted in someﬁerce and long-standing debates as
to the demographic proﬁles and regimes of these populations. As demographic
uniformitarianism provides the justiﬁcation for the use of estimates of popula-
tion characteristics and model parameters derived from recent populations to
supplement the sparse prehistoric demographic database, it is particularly
important to use these data critically in research on the early inhabitants of
Europe. We return to the challenges of palaeodemographic research in the
absence of the uniformitarian assumption inChapters4and5.
The‘Forager Population Paradox’
As many scholars have noted, there is a stark contrast between the observed
population growth rates of recent hunter-gatherers and those estimated for
Pleistocene hunter-gatherers based on back-projections of known global popula-
tion sizes (Hill & Hurtado1996;Pennington2001). Pleistocene hunter-gatherers
could not have grown at the same rate(s) as those recorded among extant foragers.
Were this the case, the global population would have reached certain sizes at earlier
dates than we know it did. Recent hunter-gatherers have population growth rates
averaging1per cent per annum (Hamiltonet al.2007); if sustained, this growth
rate would result in a population-doubling time of just seventy years, or a ~20,000-
fold increase in size over one millennium. To correspond with known estimates of
global population size, Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers must have had a long-term
growth rate of near zero (stationary populations).Blurton Jones (2016)has termed
the contrast between the growth rates of recent hunter-gatherers and Palaeolithic
foragers the‘forager population paradox’.
A hypothesis of stationary, or near-stationary, Palaeolithic populations
necessitates an explanation as to the fertility and mortality schedules that
made this possible. In the1960s and1970s, prevailing models assumed that
8 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

this near-zero per cent growth was deliberate, with populations exerting
conscious group-level controls on demographic behaviour, regulating growth
to ensure that population size never exceeded the carrying capacity of the local
environment (Birdsell1968;Hassan1975;Hayden1972). Infanticide (the
deliberate killing of babies) was considered to be the primary mechanism
used to curtail prehistoric population growth (Divale1972). Other proposed
solutions to the forager population paradox include very low fertility caused by
a high prevalence in the Pleistocene of fertility-reducing sexually transmitted
infections (Pennington2001) and very high mortality rates due to increased
incidences of violence and warfare (Hillet al.2007).
However, no single factor can adequately account for near-zero long-term
population growth. Furthermore, modelling studies extrapolating from demo-
graphic data on recent hunter-gatherers indicate that long-term population
stationarity requires a combined fertility and mortality schedule outside,
or at the extreme limit of, the known range of human variation, violating
the principle of demographic uniformitarianism (Blurton Jones2016;
Hill & Hurtado1996;Pennington2001). It is possible that Palaeolithic
hunter-gatherers–especially archaic ornon-sapienspopulations–were demo-
graphically diﬀerent from any recorded human population, but the most
parsimonious solution to the forager population paradox, at least as far as past
Homo sapienspopulations are concerned, is much more banal: it is a product of
the contrast between the scales (both spatial and temporal) at which archae-
ological and ethnographic data are calculated and analysed and of assuming that
the uniformitarian assumption applies to demographic parameter values, rather
than mechanisms.
Simulations indicate that multiple phases of sustained population growth, fol-
lowed by sudden population crashes or local extinctions best account for long-term
near-zero population growth rates (Boone2002;Keckler1997). The regularity and
severity of these crashes need not be uniform, but reductions in population size at
intervals of50–100years could result in long-term zero population growth among
populations with demographic proﬁles within the range of extant foragers (Blurton
Jones2016:215). A similar saw-tooth patternof rapid population growth and
decline likely also characterised Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers. This pattern pro-
vides a more plausible explanation for thelong-term trend of near-zero population
growth than steady-state equilibrium achieved by the multigenerational balance of
fertility and mortality. Genetic data support this scenario, indicating several notably
sharp reductions in population size and subsequent population bottlenecks
throughout the Pleistocene (e.g.Posthet al.2016). Peaks and troughs of this
frequency are, however, impossible to document at the chronological resolution
available for the Palaeolithic archaeological record. Prehistoric growth rates calcu-
lated from palaeodemographic data are mean values viewed over millennia,
recording only the longer term and slower time-averaged rate across crash and
recovery cycles. Growth rates of ethnographic foragers represent instantaneous per
Palaeolithic palaeodemography: key issues and a framework for study9

annum measures of population change along this continuum of growth and
decline. It is therefore not surprising thatcalculated Palaeolithic growth rates are
not the same as those of recent foragers; they are not directly comparable nor can
growth rates from recent foragers be taken asrealistic long-term estimates for either
the population from which they deriveor prehistoric hunter-gatherers.
The contrast embodied within the forager population paradox between the
long-term stability and slow growth vs. the shorter-term dynamic population
ﬂuctuations that occurred during the Pleistocene has important implications for
the search for factors that controlled and constrained Palaeolithic populations
(known as population limiting factors). The traditional focus on long-term growth
viewed Palaeolithic populations within the Malthusian paradigm (seeChapter2)in
which populations were kept in balance with the environment, likely through
a combination of moderate mortality and moderate fertility, aided by deliberate
regulation. If we switch the focus to the shorter-term, the possibility of intense
population growth and crashes indicateperiods of much higher fertility and/or
lower mortality, followed by lower fertility and/or higher mortality. The search for
factors controlling and constraining Palaeolithic populations must take these
shorter-termﬂuctuations into account. Palaeolithic population reductions were
likely caused by a combination of stochastic (random) processes (to which small
populations are particularly susceptible) and catastrophic events (Gurven &
Davison2019;Hamilton & Walker2018) that greatly increased mortality and/or
greatly decreased fertility. Within this framework, some little-considered causes of
mortality, such as diseases and accidents, gain signiﬁcance, and with them the
notion of the relative demographic importance of people of diﬀerent ages and sexes
to the long-term persistence of a population. The role of fertility in population
growth is also given greater weight. Earlierassumptions of deliberately maintained
stationary populations paid more attentiontomortalitythantofertilityasameans
of curbing population growth, as the formeriseasiertomanipulatethanthelatter
in the absence of eﬀective contraception. However, the physiology of female
reproduction is an important limiting factor on population growth across mam-
malian species and similarly played a key role in the overall pattern of long-term
low rates of Palaeolithic population growth. This physiology is nonetheless highly
responsive to socio-environmental conditions, and factors including diet, work-
load, and mobility can all have rapid and marked eﬀects on fertility, and subse-
quently, on short-term population growth (Ellison2003).
Human Behavioural Ecology as a Framework for
Palaeolithic Palaeodemography
The reconstruction of Palaeolithic populations and the assessment of the factors
that controlled and constrained fertility and mortality requires the use of multiple
lines of evidence from various sources.Ethnographic data provide a valuable tool
but the direct application of demographic estimates and models from ethnographic
populations to Palaeolithic populations isinadvisable, not least due to the forager
10 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

population paradox, and the eﬀects of diﬀering rates of development and matura-
tion (life history) in archaic hominins on fertility and mortality.
The solution adopted in this book is to work within the framework of
Human Behavioural Ecology(HBE). HBE assumes an underlying principle of
optimality and provides a clear goal for human behaviour: people will behave
in ways that maximise their reproductive success (their own contribution to the
gene pool of future generations) or their inclusiveﬁtness (their own contribu-
tion to the gene pool of future generations, plus the contributions made by
closely related family members) (BorgerhoﬀMulder & Schacht2012;Codding
& Bird2015). HBE is thus grounded in evolutionary theory and provides
a framework for generating and testing hypotheses about human behaviour.
Most demographic studies of ethnographic hunter-gatherers are conducted
within this framework. From an archaeological perspective, this approach has
an additional important merit: it prevents us assuming that past hunter-
gatherers should be exactly like recent hunter-gatherers (and vice-versa) as
what is considered‘optimal’is context speciﬁc(Kelly2013a:39). An HBE
framework allows for ethnographic data on population variables of recent
hunter-gatherers, and the factors controlling and constraining these, to inform
the analysis of Palaeolithic demography, while simultaneously accounting for
diﬀerences in environments, scale, and (when applicable) hominin species.
From there, we can develop hypotheses and expectations about the demogra-
phy of Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers, and how they would have both
responded to, and been inﬂuenced by, changing social and environmental
conditions. For example, following the positive correlation between environ-
mental productivity and population density among recent foragers (Layton &
O’Hara2010), we can hypothesise that a similar relationship characterised
variation in Palaeolithic hunter-gatherer population density, seeking data on
regional environmental conditions and settlement demography to test this.
Most importantly, where the data for such hypotheses are unavailable, the
HBE framework provides a scaﬀolding of theoretically informed suppositions
of what‘should happen’if certain assumptions are met, allowing for the
consideration of both archaeologically visible and invisible population-
limiting factors in early prehistory. We return to both the framework of
HBE and the available demographic data from extant hunter-gatherers in
Chapter3.
DEMOGRAPHY AND SOCIETY
Human Behavioural Ecology emphasises the biological basis of demography.
However, demography and demographic behaviour are also cultural (Roth
2004). Social norms and practices aﬀect decisions related to all demographic
variables, such as residence patterns; when, and with whom, to have children
(and how many children to have); and the degree of care aﬀorded to the young
Demography and society 11

and old, including who provides this care. The demographic prehistory of
Palaeolithic Europe presented here is also a social prehistory–not because it
adheres to the framework of any speciﬁc social theory, but because it is
fundamentally concerned with the most intimate and meaningful events of
human social and family life and the ties that bind people together: childbirth,
parenthood, kinship, sickness, death.
The Palaeolithic record is largely silentabout the social factors and individual
decisions underlying demographic trends. It is primarily a palimpsest of beha-
viours best suited to analysis with reference to other long-term aggregate records,
such as those documenting temporal and spatial variation in climatic and envir-
onmental variables. Occasional glimpses into the demographic lives of speciﬁc
people shine through this palimpsest: a child who ~400,000years ago lived to the
age ofﬁve, despite being born with severe facial and brain deformities (Chapter
4); a girl whose parents belonged to diﬀerent populations (or, depending on the
deﬁnition used, species) within the genusHomo(Chapter5); a man who was
killed in a violent attack ~30,000years ago (Chapter6). It would be unwise,
however, to extrapolate too much from these speciﬁc cases. Conversely, this
does not mean that we should disregard the social element of Palaeolithic
demography, viewing individuals and populations purely as biological entities
responding and adapting only to their environments. Rather, the recognition
that demography is also inﬂuenced by sociocultural variables should always
remain in view, even if the corresponding image is hard to bring into focus.
To help with this, I employ some deliberate lexical choices throughout this
book. Without intending to underplay the substantial biological and likely
cognitive variation seen within the genusHomo,Iuse‘humans’in this book to
describe all hominins, not justHomo sapiens, with the species designation used
when there is a need to diﬀerentiate between diﬀerent types of human; the
vague and value-laden‘modern human’(meaningHomo sapiens) is rejected,
although I retain‘archaic hominin/human’to refer to all non–Homo sapiens.
The terms‘men’and‘women’are preferred to‘male’and‘female’,asare
‘infants/babies’and‘children’to‘juveniles’,‘sub-adults’,or‘oﬀspring’.The
terms‘bred’,‘interbred’,or‘mated’are avoided as far as possible and replaced
with a variant of‘had sexual relations with’or‘had children with’.These
preferred terms have less precise meanings in a biological or evolutionary sense
than those they replace but serve as a continuous reminder of the humanity and
social lives of these deep-time populations, and that it is individualpeople–
making a series of choices (conscious or otherwise)–that lie behind long-term,
archaeologically visible patterns. To further aid this perspective, I convert key
time intervals into number of generations, conveying a greater sense of the
passing of time in human terms, and how this related to the lives and experiences
of Palaeolithic people. Generational time is particularly relevant here, as the
generation (around twenty to thirty years for humans today; calculated through-
out this book for Palaeolithic populations as approximately twenty years) is the
12 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

fundamental timeframe of population dynamics, a fact worth remembering even
as such temporal scales remain beyond the resolution of Pleistocene datasets.
Demography, Women and Children, and‘Small-Scale’Societies
The social prehistory presented in this book focuses on two features of
Palaeolithic societies. Theﬁrst is the role(s) and contribution(s) of women
and children to both Palaeolithic life and the resultant archaeological record.
Women and children comprise the‘demographic core’of any population, and
are the most important members in terms of ensuring population survival. This
is because population size and growth are most responsive to the mortality of
infants and children, followed by the fertility and mortality of women. Men’s
fertility and mortality play a much smaller role in determining long-term
population trends (Low1994). The living conditions and behaviour of
women are key determinants of both their fertility and infant and child
mortality (Chapter3). Women are the drivers of demographic trends.
Following this, as I have argued elsewhere (French2019a), the study of
demography places women and children at the centre of discussion, even if this
is rarely made explicit. Any explanations of population change, past or present,
must ultimately be framed in terms of factors that aﬀect the fertility and
mortality–and subsequently the lives and behaviours–of these two groups
(Box1.1). While the focus on women and children in this book stems from
their demographic importance, it also helps to redress a wider imbalance in the
study of Palaeolithic societies. Traditionally, the Palaeolithic has been suscep-
tible to androcentric interpretations (Conkey & Spector1984:6). Despite the
warnings issued by practitioners of the subﬁelds of gender archaeology and the
archaeology of childhood, the long-standing default position persists that the
archaeological record is the product of men and is formed primarily as a result of
their behaviours, along with the notion that direct‘proof’of the presence of
women and/or children is required to include them in interpretations still
dominated by a‘Man the Hunter’paradigm (Zihlman2013). This is unaccep-
table. These two groups combined constituted ~75per cent of any prehistoric
population and could not have been anything other than active contributors to
Palaeolithic societies and the resultant archaeological record.
The second key feature of Palaeolithic societies is their characterisation as
‘small-scale’. In many ways, this is incontestable. While the data presented in
this book show a general trend of increasing metapopulation size and density
throughout the Palaeolithic, the accompanying absolute estimates indicate that
Palaeolithic populations were small at most times and in most places.
Palaeolithic people lived in smaller populations and at lower densities than
both later prehistoric and historical hunter-gatherers and members of later
agricultural and urban societies. Palaeolithic residential groups were also
small; in many cases smaller than twenty-ﬁve to thirty people–the oft cited
Demography and society 13

average for recent and historical hunter-gatherer groups (Hillet al.2011;
Marlowe2005). The small size and low density of Palaeolithic hunter-
gatherer communities feature heavily in explanations for multiple phenomena
in the archaeological record, including the perceived stasis of Lower
Box1.1Women, demography, and gender archaeology
Using demographic principles as a framework for incorporating women into
archaeological interpretations requires caveats, particularly with regard to
how this approach aligns with gender theory both in archaeology and allied
disciplines. These caveats are detailed inFrench (2019a)and summarised
here.
Firstly, the implicit focus is on women’s reproductive role; an approach that is at
odds with most gender archaeology research. The focus on biological diﬀerences
between men and women, and the prominence accorded to women’s role in
childbirth and childrearing, are hallmarks of earlier androcentric studies in which
these diﬀerences–particularly diﬀerent reproductive roles–were used to justify
interpretations of the past that saw men as active social agents and women as passive
biological agents. However, regardless of its misuse in earlier androcentric studies,
reproduction is an important and unavoidable part of the lives of women in natural
fertility populations, and, on this basis alone, should not be neglected (Whitehouse
2007:34–6).
Secondly, the use of demographic data is particularly susceptible to the‘binary
binds’of interpretation from which gender archaeology has largely moved away
(Ghisleniet al.2016). There are two binaries: the male/female binary and the
nature/culture binary between‘sex’and‘gender’, with sex a biological certainty
and gender a cultural construction. This binary two-sex, two-gender model does
not necessarily reﬂect the full remit of sexes or gender relations in all past societies.
The focus on reproduction within demographic research further presents a limited
view of‘women’as those who are fertile and of childbearing age. Nonetheless, the
demographic approach employed here does not argue that gender is limited to these
two categories, or that biological sex is always an accurate proxy for gender; just that
male and female reproductive roles are generally recognised within gender systems
in some way.
Finally, it is important to remember that the study of women is not the
same as the study of gender. The demographic approach is concerned
primarily with the archaeological visibility of women and the importance
of women to demographic processes, but this does not mean that any
demographic study, archaeological or otherwise, automatically informs on
gender on a societal level. However, gender can be examined from demo-
graphic studies, and many features of women’slivesareaﬀected by wider
societal ideas about gender, includingtheir rights, employment, and well-
being; factors which have clear import to demographic variables, including
fertility and mortality (Riley2005).
14 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

Palaeolithic Acheulean technologies (Hopkinsonet al.2013) and the emer-
gence of so-called‘behavioural modernity’with population increase in the Late
Pleistocene (e.g.Shennan2001). These explanations are based on cultural
evolutionary models that link demography to sociocultural change through
the assumption that population size and density inﬂuence cultural evolution
through their impact on social learning and rate of cultural‘drift’(e.g.Henrich
2004). I use this framework of cultural evolution–calleddual inheritance theory–
throughout this book to assess the role of demography in Palaeolithic socio-
cultural change.
Outside of this framework, the size of Palaeolithic populations commands
less attention. When thinking about the social implications of living in small,
widely dispersed communities, archaeologists living in urbanised nation states
struggle with the change in perspective required to‘think small’(Hull2011:
35). AsBird-David (2018)persuasively argues, an understanding of hunter-
gatherers’social lives and cultures–past and present–cannot be divorced from
the‘miniscule size’(p.305) of their communities, which is fundamental in
shaping their world view and interpersonal relations. There are no easy answers
as to how archaeologists can incorporate this perspective in their work on
Palaeolithic societies. The research presented in this book–which provides
a greater sense of the size of Palaeolithic populations and communities, and of
the factors that prevented sustained population growth and large population
numbers–is my contribution to this endeavour.
Size and scale are not the same, however. While‘small-scale society’is
a common anthropological term, speciﬁcdeﬁnitions vary (Reyes-Garcia
et al.2017). These deﬁnitions usually emphasise the quantitative, basing their
categorisation on the smallsizeof populations and communities, the interre-
lated variables of economic base, settlement patterns, and political organisation,
and their subsequent contrast with larger, urbanised populations. Despite being
inherent in the term, scale–here taken to mean the social reach or networks of
individuals as a function of social organisation–rarely features in deﬁnitions.
The result is a conﬂation of size and scale whereby hunter-gatherers are
assumed to spend their lives in the company of a handful of closely related
people who comprise their small residential communities. There is mounting
evidence, however, that this assumption is incorrect; evidence that recent
hunter-gatherers live in residential groups largely comprised of non-kin; that
membership of these groups isﬂuid rather thanﬁxed; that each person interacts
directly with hundreds, if not thousands, of other people during their lifetime
through large-scale networks of interaction (Dybleet al.2015;Hillet al.2011;
Miglianoet al.2017;Pageet al.2017); in short, that‘foragers do not live in
small-scale societies’(Birdet al.2019).
The key question is whether this was also true of Palaeolithic foragers. Direct
data on Palaeolithic group composition is rare, and evidence of social networks
of prehistoric foragers is notoriously diﬃcult to interpret. Understanding the
Demography and society 15

exact form of Palaeolithic social networks (i.e. a kinship network, a political
alliance) is beyond the capabilities of our data but we can examine the broad
spatial and temporal scales at which they operated (Coward2016:86). In this
book, I argue that while all European Palaeolithic populations were small, they
were not all small-scale. The archaic hominin populations of the Lower and
Middle Palaeolithic were‘small scale’in the truest sense–living in groups
composed primarily of close kin and generally lacking extensive social net-
works (Chapters4,5). In contrast, regionalHomo sapienspopulations were
more interconnected at a wider spatial scale (Chapters6,7).
Hunter-gatherer social networks facilitate the spread and exchange of infor-
mation, ideas, and resources between and within groups and individuals. They
are‘safety nets’in situations of local resource scarcity, providing knowledge
about, and access to, a wider resource pool, and ensuring a friendly reception
during face-to-face interactions with others, as well as functioning as a form of
intergroup and intergenerational information storage (Whallon2006). Social
networks are ultimately a cultural mechanism to cope with environmental
uncertainty, and the temporal and spatial distribution of resources therefore
inﬂuence strongly both the scale and frequency of interactions. Spatially
extensive, well-connected, and robust social networks are particularly impor-
tant to hunter-gatherer groups living in low productivity and highly seasonal
environments such as those that characterised the European high latitudes
throughout the Pleistocene (Fitzhughet al.2011). The creation and, more
crucially, the maintenance of these networks, is, however, harder at these high
latitudes. Low environmental productivity reduces the number of people who
can be supported by the available resources, resulting in foragers living at lower
population densities across larger territories (seeChapter3). At above40°N
random mobility is insuﬃcient to ensure annual encounters between local
groups at the scale of the minimum marriage/mating pool of ~500people
(Pearce2014). To function as reliable safety nets, some deliberate mechanisms
need to be implemented.
At least in broad strokes, these mechanisms are identiﬁable in the Palaeolithic
archaeological record. Some increase face-to-face contact, such as the greater
use of logistical (moving resources to people) rather than residential (moving
people to resources) mobility (e.g.Grove2010, cf.Premo2012) and the
periodic aggregations of groups (e.g.Conkey1980). Others seek to maintain
and enhance relationsin absentiaby transmitting information via‘quality signals’
that symbolise aﬃliations and relationships, in the form of durable, standardi-
sable, and portable material culture such as decorative items and body orna-
ments (e.g.Kuhn & Stiner2007;Osborn & Hitchcock2019), allowing for what
Gamble (1998)terms a‘release from proximity’in social relations.
These latter mechanisms are particularly important as groups get larger and/
or social networks become more extensive. This is because there are clear
trade-oﬀs to be made in terms of balancing the time and energy spent
16 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

cultivating and maintaining good relationships with their possible future ben-
eﬁts–especially with those with whom contact is relatively infrequent and who
are on the periphery (both literally and metaphorically) of an individual or
groups’social network (Pearceet al.2014). At a broader level, the‘scaling up’of
social network size and complexity seen throughout the Palaeolithic, suggests
that their development involved wider trade-oﬀs within the genusHomo.The
social brain hypothesis emphasises the high cognitive costs of establishing and
keeping track of an increasing number of relationships at diﬀerent levels of
intimacy, hypothesising that the cognitive demands of sociality–particularly
keeping track of increasingly fragmented contacts–was a driver of the brain
enlargement that occurs throughout the hominin lineage, which had to be
balanced against other energetic costs (Dunbar2003). The types of material
culture described previously may have functioned as‘cultural scaﬀolding’to
oﬄoad some of the cognitive eﬀort of monitoring these relationships (Coward
& Gamble2008). Cognitive diﬀerences between hominins likely drove the
diﬀerences in the scale of their social relationships across the Palaeolithic, but
neural architecture and socio-cognitive abilities are remarkably plastic, indu-
cing a feedback loop between a hominin’s social environment and the scale of
their social networks; if your social network is not extensive enough to require
‘cultural scaﬀolding’via material culture, this lack of‘cultural scaﬀolding’
might then in turn limit your socio-cognitive abilities and capacity to extend
your social network subsequently (Pearce2018;Pearceet al.2014:371). When
discussing the expected scale of social networks and the frequency of inter-
group interactions of archaic hominins we need, therefore, to consider the
eﬀects of variable brain size, structure, and underlying socio-cognitive capa-
cities in addition to the inﬂuence of the distribution of resources.
The varying scale and strength of social networks during the Palaeolithic
had wide eﬀects. In combination with group size and composition, these
social networks inﬂuenced the evolution of notable social behaviours
within the genusHomoincluding intergroup tolerance and cooperation
and division of labour (e.g.Apicellaet al.2012). The degree of population
interconnectivity aﬀects sociocultural change (e.g.Grove2016;Migliano
et al.2020;Powellet al.2009) and this element of Palaeolithic social
organisation is thus fundamental to explaining the resultant patterning of
material culture in the archaeological record. The demographic eﬀects of
hominin social networks are the most important for present purposes.
Studiesofbothhumansandotherprimatesindicateapositivecorrelation
between the number and quality of social ties and individual reproductive
success (maternal fertility and/or infant survival) and life expectancy
through the safety net these relationships oﬀer when resources are scarce
or their availability is uncertain (e.g.Holt-Lunstadet al.2010;Pageet al.
2017;Silket al.2003). Crucially, the development and maintenance of
strong extended social networks mitigates many of the negative
Demography and society 17

demographic eﬀects intrinsic to small groups that reduce both individual
ﬁtness and threaten the groups’continued survival and long-term viability.
These eﬀects include their increased susceptibility to stochastic (random)
variation in births and deaths, including in the ratio of women to men; their
increased vulnerability to extrinsiccausesofmortality,suchasfamineand
violence; the proportionally larger inﬂuence that the death of a person has
ontheothergroupmembers,includingtheavailabilityofpeopletoprovide
food and the loss of any specialist knowledge; and the smaller available pool
of potential marriage partners which may promote inbreeding–lowering
genetic diversity, reducing disease immunity and resistance, and increasing
theriskofsomeinheriteddiseases(Fareed & Afzal2017;Krameret al.2017;
Lande1993;Lyonset al.2009).
The widening of the scale of social networks by earlyHomo sapiens, and the
better maintenance of these relationships, facilitated a key turning point in the
demographic prehistory of Palaeolithic Europe. This turning point corre-
sponds with the transition between the second and third stages of this demo-
graphic prehistory–from residency to expansion. It is at this juncture that the
Palaeolithic people of Europe broke out of the highly seasonal cycle of life and
death that previously constrained their population growth and started main-
taining viable long-term populations in an increasing array of environments
and conditions. This was possible because of the beneﬁts that the relationships
derived from robust, broad social networks brought individual groups in times
of uncertainty, need, and/or local partner unavailability.
*****
Demography bridges the biological and the social to oﬀer a new perspective on
the prehistory of Palaeolithic Europe. We begin this prehistory by examining
how Palaeolithic demographic data are generated and interpreted.
18 Towards a Social Palaeodemography of Early Prehistory

CHAPTER2
STONES, BONES, AND GENES:
A PALAEODEMOGRAPHIC DATABASE
The triad of stones, bones, and genes provides the core database for Palaeolithic
palaeodemography. Combined, these sources inform on a diverse range of past
demographic parameters and behaviours, including population size, density,
and distribution, causes of death, and interactions between populations.
What do archaeologists gain from the generation and analysis of Palaeolithic
demographic data? The reconstruction of past population histories could be the
ultimate aim but in and of themselves the scope of these reconstructions is
narrow; they tell us little about the questions that drive most archaeological
research, and that lie behind the demographic prehistory presented in this
book–questions about the lives of Palaeolithic people and the nature of
Palaeolithic societies. Palaeodemography is not just a methodological endea-
vour. In order to relate demographic data to these broader research questions,
weﬁrst need to understand the relationship(s) between demography and socio-
cultural variables, and the frameworks that archaeologists use to explore these
relationships.
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DEMOGRAPHY AND CULTURE
IN PALAEOLITHIC ARCHAEOLOGY
The theories ofMalthus (1872) andBoserup (1965) have long dominated
archaeological thinking about the relationship(s) between demography and
sociocultural systems. Both examine the relationship between food produc-
tion, intensiﬁcation, and population growth, and share an assumption of
population pressure against a technological ceiling of resource procurement.
Theﬁrst opportunity for expansion leads to the release of this pressure, and
population growth follows until a new equilibrium is reached (as shown
mathematically byWood1998). In Malthusian theory, population is the
dependent variable in the relationship; population growth occurs when tech-
nological developments permit an increase in the availability of the food
supply. Until such developments occur, increasing mortality and a range of
19

‘checks’limiting fertility prevent population growth. In contrast, Boserupian
theory views population growth as a cause of economic and social change–it is
the independent variable in the relationship. Changes in food-producing
technology and the intensity of agricultural practices occur because of the
need to release pressure on resources caused by an increasing population.
Both Malthusian and Boserupian theory have been heavily employed by
archaeologists in their explanations of the relationship(s) between demography
and sociocultural change. However, due to their focus on food production,
these frameworks are rarely applied explicitly to sociocultural change in the
Palaeolithic record.
Palaeolithic archaeologists, have, however, embraced the evolutionary fra-
mework of dual inheritance theory (or gene-culture coevolution) that dom-
inates current palaeodemographic research into the relationship between
demography and sociocultural change. Dual inheritance theory (DIT) argues
that humans have a second, cultural, inheritance system, in addition to the
biological, genetic, inheritance system (Boyd & Richerson1985). The system
of cultural inheritance is social learning and changes are typically envisioned as
innovations. Cultural change is subject to evolutionary processes, broadly
analogous to those of genetic inheritance, albeit with some key diﬀerences.
For example, while genetic information is transmitted only from parent to
child, cultural transmission can take many forms, cross-cutting generations (i.e.
transmission between peers) and involving multiple people. There are two
main processes that cause variation in cultural traits through social learning: (1)
guided variation, in which individuals modify their socially learnt cultural
adaptations through trial and error; and (2) selective biases in transmission
(seeLycett2015:ﬁg.1). In addition, random processes of cultural drift (broadly
analogous to genetic drift) can occur, with chance variation impacting the
frequency with which cultural practices are copied, irrespective of their inher-
ent properties (for a recent summary, seeCreanzaet al.2017a).
The assumption that demographic variables–particularly population
size, density, and connectedness–inﬂuence both social learning and random
selection processes links cultural evolutionary models to demography. Social
learning and random selection, in turn, aﬀect the retention of cultural traits and
the rate of innovations–a process unique to humans known as cultural
ratcheting or cumulative culture (Tennieet al.2009). Three models have
been particularly inﬂuential.Shennan’s(2001)model indicates both that inno-
vations are more likely to occur in larger populations, and that any innovations
are more likely to be maintained than in smaller populations. Similarly,
Henrich’s(2004)model proposes that the average skill level is higher in larger
populations. As the copying of cultural skills is imperfect, larger populations are
more likely than smaller populations to contain a learner whose skill level is at
least as high as the person from whom they are learning (identiﬁed as the most
skilful member of the previous generation). Henrich’s model is sometimes
20 Stones, Bones, and Genes: A Palaeodemographic Database

referred to as the treadmill model (Kline & Boyd2010:2559). Because errors in
transmission are inevitable, large populations are required to maintain complex
cultural systems, to‘out run’the eﬀect of losses and accumulate innovations
(Figure2.1).Powell and colleagues (2009) extended Henrich’s model to
incorporate population density and encounter rate, showing a positive correla-
tion between both population density and increased migration between sub-
populations, and degree of skill accumulation.
The principles of the DIT framework recur throughout this book, as
I examine their validity as an explanation for key phenomena in the
European Palaeolithic. There are, however, some limitations to the application
of this framework to the Palaeolithic, despite its popularity. It is diﬃcult (but
not impossible:Porcˇic´2015;Premo2014) to identify cultural transmission
processes from the time-averaged data typical of the Palaeolithic. It is also
unclear how exactly to measure and quantify rates of change and innovation in
material culture, and approaches used to analyseﬁner-grained late Pleistocene/
early Holocene records (e.g.Edinborough2009;Garvey2018) have limited
applicability to many Palaeolithic assemblages. Persistent claims for the non-
cultural nature of the lithic technologies of the Lower Palaeolithic (Corbey
et al.2016;Tennieet al.2017), also cast doubt on the relevance of DIT to the
material record of theﬁrst (visitation) stage of the demographic prehistory of
Palaeolithic Europe.
At a wider level, recent research has identiﬁed several issues, both theore-
tical and empirical, with the inﬂuential models that underpin the core
assumptions of the relationship between culture and demography within
DIT(Box2.1). Most relevant for Palaeolithic archaeologists are instances
where model predictions diverge from both archaeological and ethnographic
Parent
population
of N
individuals
Each
parent has
a given
skill level
Offspring
population
of N
individuals
Offspring
attempt
to copy the
most skilled
person in
parent
generation
BUT
Copying is not
always accurate
AND
More complex
skills are harder
to copy
Some
‘children’
are better
at learning
than others
A learner’s
‘error’ drawn
at random
from a
probability
distribution
Importance
of population
size
Big populations =
more likely to
contain a learner
whose error is
from the high end
(i.e. skill level as
high or higher
than parent)
Small populations =
lack of good
learners (i.e. skill
level low or lower
than parent)
Best learner
from offspring
population
becomes
parent for next
generation
Figure2.1The basic theoretical steps linking population size and cultural complexity
according toHenrich’s(2004)model
The relationship between demography and culture in Palaeolithic archaeology21

hunter-gatherer data on toolkit complexity and population size (Collardet al.
2011,2013a,2013b,2016). Despite this, calls to abandon the DIT framework
in Palaeolithic demographic research are premature, particularly as in the
hunter-gatherer case, instances of mismatch may be more apparent than real
(Aoki2018). For Palaeolithic archaeologists, the best course of action is to
bear these criticisms in mind, and focus on the collection and analysis of
palaeodemographic evidence; allowing, as far as is possible, for the
Box2.1Theoretical and empirical debates surrounding cultural
evolutionary models of demography
Debates on the validity of the relationship(s) between demography, innovations,
and cultural complexity within DIT are ongoing and centre on two elements.
One line of debate concerns the premises and assumptions built into the three key
models ofHenrich (2004),Shennan (2001), andPowellet al.(2009). For example,
Vaesen (2012;Vaesenet al.2016) questions both the mathematics of the Henrich
and Powell et al. models, and the deﬁnition of complexity and the cultural learning
strategies and modes of transmission employed.
The second key element of the debate is the extent to which empirical data
validate and meet model predictions. Experimental and metapopulation tests of the
relationship between population size and cultural complexity across a range of
societies, cultural practices, and technologies, produce mixed results (e.g.Acerbi
et al.2017;Bromhamet al.2015;Derexet al.2013;Fayet al.2019;Kempe &
Mesoudi2014;Kline & Boyd2010). However, on balance, the majority support the
predictions of the treadmill model. Three important points emerge from these
studies: (1) that the predicted relationship between population size and cumulative
culture is seen more in experimental studies of small groups than in metapopulation
studies, suggesting that the diﬃculty of deﬁning the spatial limits of populations may
be a factor in conﬂicting results; (2) it is possible that diﬀerences in cultural
transmission between hunter-gatherers and other small-scale societies aﬀect the
relationship between demography and culture predicted by the treadmill model;
and (3) that the nature of the relationship between demography and culture could
be domain dependent.
In sum, population size is not a fail-safe predictor of cultural complexity, but it is
premature to reject some relationship between the two. In fact, it is clear that the
potential of this line of research is still far from fully realised. Recent models show
that features not considered in the Henrich, Shennan, or Powellet al. models–such
as additional diﬀerences in the means of cultural transmission, rate of migration,
population structure, cognitive ability, and environmental variation–aﬀect the
correlation between population size and cultural diversity/technological complex-
ity, and can account for instances of mismatch between theoretical expectations and
empirical datasets (Creanzaet al.2017b;Derexet al.2018;Fogarty & Creanza2017;
Premo2016).
22 Stones, Bones, and Genes: A Palaeodemographic Database

predictions of these cultural evolutionary models to be tested, and the
relevance of demography to Pleistocene social change to be assessed, rather
than assumed.
THE PALAEODEMOGRAPHIC DATABASE
Despite their seemingly disparate natures, stones (archaeological data),
bones, and genes share several common features as sources of Palaeolithic
palaeodemographic data. While most prominent in skeletal palaeodemo-
graphy, the assumption of demographic uniformitarianism underpins all
methods, and the inﬂuence of biological and cognitive diﬀerences must be
considered when applying these measures to archaic hominins. They are
also all susceptible to the‘contemporaneity problem’(Schacht1984). The
contemporaneity problem refers to the practice of treating material dated to
the same general period as contemporary, despite it being unlikely that they
are contemporarysensu stricto.The palimpsest nature of most Palaeolithic
material is partly to blame; the low precision and accuracy of available
dating methods are also responsible.The results of the contemporaneity
problem are that centuries or even millennia of activity are combined into
a single chronological phase, and that occupations and events that occurred
sequentially are treated as simultaneous. From a palaeodemographic per-
spective, this means that (with few exceptions) each‘population’under
study is ultimately a palimpsest of multiple past populations that existed at
a range of spatial and temporal scales (we return to the deﬁnition of
populations at the end of the chapter). The contemporaneity problem also
prevents easily reconciling the coarse-grained Palaeolithic demographic
data and the prevailing evolutionary frameworks in which they are
interpreted.
Stones, bones, and genes are all proxy sources for demographic data. By
deﬁnition, palaeodemography lacks direct demographic data on the popula-
tions under study (Chapter1). The proxy nature of palaeodemographic data has
two important implications: (1) it means that subsequent inferential stages are
required to move from the observed data to meaningful statements about past
demographic variables; and (2) it means that the data contain information about
variables additional to the one of interest. These additional variables obscure
any demographic signature by both providing alternative explanations to the
patterns seen and introducing biases into the data.
Many of the proposed relationships between demography and archaeologi-
cal data come with the caveat‘all other things being equal’(Drennanet al.2015:
16). This condition of equality is rarely met. Of especial relevance to
Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers is the eﬀect of mobility. Variation in mobility
can cause diﬀerences in the archaeological proxies outlined inTable2.1,
independent of demographic change (Attenbrow2006). For example, diﬀerent
The palaeodemographic database 23

Table2.1Summary of key archaeological palaeodemographic proxies applied to the Palaeolithic (divided here into ‘direct’and‘indirect’
approaches) and the main methodological and interpretative considerations of each Demographic proxy
Theoretical
assumption
Archaeological material
utilised
Key methodological
considerations
Key interpretative
considerations
Direct
Site counts Number and
distribution of
archaeological
sites reﬂects the
size, density,
and/or
distribution of
past populations
Numbers of archaeological
sites
How to deﬁne a‘site’
Standardisation to allow
comparison of periods of
diﬀering lengths
Contemporaneity problem and
eﬀect of broad chronological
stages on demographic
signature
Accounting for research/pre-
servation biases in known
site distribution
Impact of mobility on site
numbers and distribution
‘Dates as data’
(summed
probability
distributions of
14
C dates)
Number and
distribution of
radiocarbon
dates reﬂects the
size, density
and/or
distribution of
past populations
Temporal distributions of
radiocarbon dates
Protocols for inclusion of
14
C dates, sampling strat-
egy and sample size
Application of correction
formulae to account for
time-transgressive loss of
material
Incorporation of explicit
model or hypothesis
testing
Exact nature of the relationship
between number of people
and quantities of cultural
carbon
Impact of mobility or other
cultural practices (e.g. burial
practices) on quantities of
cultural carbon
(continued)

Settlement/site size Positive
correlation
between the
area of an
archaeological
site and the
number of
inhabitants
Estimates of the area of sites/
settlements
Accurate estimation of site
area
Identifying occupation epi-
sodes within palimpsests
Exact nature of the relationship
between number of people
and occupation area
Impact of other variables (e.g.
mobility, kinship ties) on the
relationship between group
and/or population size and
space
Accumulations
research
Positive
correlation
between the
amount of
cultural material
deposited at
a site and the
number of
inhabitants
Estimates of the density of
a class of cultural material
(e.g. lithics)
Estimates of the calori ﬁc/
dietary value of faunal
remains
Selection of appropriate cul-
tural material
How to quantify cultural
material (weight/counts)
Representativeness of area/
volume of the quantity of
material culture across
site/settlement as a whole
Possibility of the relationship
between number of people
and material culture quanti-
ties diﬀering between mate-
rial or artefact types
Eﬀect of occupation duration
on quantities of material
culture
Indirect
Environmental
response
Changes in
population
densities and
size can be
inferred from
their impact on
human prey
species and their
environment
Faunal assemblage
composition and diversity;
changes in size and
biomass of prey species
Responsiveness of chosen
proxy to human
predation/exploitation
Diﬀerentiating the impact of
human behaviour from
environmental or ecological
changes

rates of artefact accumulation between sites could reﬂect occupation by groups
of diﬀerent sizes but could also reﬂect varying lengths of occupation; variations
in the number of archaeological sites could reﬂect population growth/decline,
or populations of comparable sizes organising their movement diﬀerently.
Furthermore, these explanations are not necessarily mutually exclusive, and
hunter-gatherer group sizes and population density both inﬂuence each other
and are aﬀected by similar external factors (Binford2001;Grove2009). Results
generated through multiple lines of evidence and multiple palaeodemographic
proxies should be compared and combined to assess the strength of any
interpretation.
STONES (ARCHAEOLOGICAL DATA)
Archaeological data are used to study demography in two main ways. The
ﬁrst assumes a relationship between quantities of archaeological materials
and demographic variables. These methods are particularly susceptible to
the distorting inﬂuence of the time-transgressive nature of destructive
processes, whereby older material isless likely than more recent material
to be preserved. Ideally, some form of correction curve should be applied to
rectify this bias (e.g.Surovell & Brantingham2007;Surovellet al.2009).
The second approach addresses demography via assumptions of the eﬀect of
population changes on the environment(Table2.1). Archaeological demo-
graphic proxies are largely restricted to the analysis of relative temporal and
spatial comparisons of population density, size, and distribution, at scales
ranging from the local (site level) to the metapopulation (continental level).
Studies adopting the‘Cologne Protocol’are notable exceptions. This pro-
tocol is the current gold standard for palaeodemographic reconstruction,
which combines archaeological and ethnographic data to produce absolute
estimates of prehistoric population sizes and densities(Box2.2).
Box2.2The Cologne Protocol for palaeodemographic
reconstruction
The Cologne Protocol is a method for producing absolute estimates of prehistoric population
sizes and densities using a combination of geospatial analysis and ethnographic data. Originally
developed for application to sedentary societies, it has subsequently been adapted for use on
mobile populations and applied to multiple phases within the European Upper Palaeolithic
(Kretschmer2015,2019;Maier2017;Maieret al.2016;Maier & Zimmermann2017;Schmidt
& Zimmermann2019;Schmidtet al.2021).
Maier (2017;Maier & Zimmermann2017) describes the protocol in detail (repre-
sented schematically inFigure2.2). In brief, the protocol follows two main stages.
Firstly, for a given landscape, the size and extent of the‘Core Areas’of hunter-
26 Stones, Bones, and Genes: A Palaeodemographic Database

gatherer activities are determined and distinguished from empty or infrequently used
areas, and raw material catchments are constructed based on lithic raw material
acquisition data. The number of hunter-gatherer groups once present is then calculated
by dividing the size of the Core Area by the size of the raw material catchments. Using
data on the size of ethnographic hunter-gatherer groups fromBinford (2001),popula-
tion density and size estimates are then produced for Core Areas and the Total Area of
Calculation separately based on the estimate of number of groups on the landscape.
The Cologne Protocol has many beneﬁts for palaeodemographic reconstruction.
Most notably, it produces scalable, robust absolute estimates that are less susceptible
to change through the addition or subtraction of individual archaeological sites within
the database (as large-scale changes would have to occur to alter the Core Area). There
are, however, some limitations to the method, notably the requirement for high-
quality data on raw material acquisition and its inapplicability to regions where
known site density is low. Nonetheless, the Cologne Protocol is currently the best
method for generating absolute demographicvariables (although at present it has only
been applied to later stages of the Palaeolithic). Researchers following the protocol
have produced estimates of the size and density of the European Upper Palaeolithic
metapopulation and regional populations spanning from ~40,000years ago until the
end of the Pleistocene, providing an invaluable time series of comparable demographic
data across this period.
Construction of Thiessen Polygons Construction of Largest Empty Circles Interpolating density values
Settlement areas encircled
by the Optimal Isoline
Consulting increase of space to
select the Optimal Isoline
Transfer of density values into isolines
Identifying of raw material catchments Group sizes from ethnography
Number and density
of Palaeolithic
hunter-gatherers
km
2
km
Figure2.2Schematic of the basic steps used in the Cologne Protocol to estimate the number
and density of Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers (fromMaier & Zimmermann2017:ﬁg. S1and
reproduced with permission)
Stones (archaeological data) 27

Site Counts
This demographic proxy assumes that variations in the number and distribution
of archaeological sites reﬂect proportional variations in the relative size, density,
and/or distribution of past populations. Counting the number of archaeologi-
cal sites, and standardising these into a rate of site numbers/unit time allows for
temporal and spatial comparisons of the intensity of human presence on the
landscape. Deﬁnitions of‘site’vary but the most inclusive deﬁnes a site by the
presence of at least one chronologically distinctive artefact type. The use of
typological markers allows this method to be applied to survey data and/or in
the absence of absolute dates. As such, site counts are a particularly useful
demographic tool for the Lower and Middle Palaeolithic–thevisitationand
residencystages of this demographic prehistory of Palaeolithic Europe–for
which radiometric dates are rare and are the most commonly used palaeode-
mographic proxy in Palaeolithic research.
The main limitations of the site-counts method concern the resolution
and representativeness of the resultant palaeodemographic signature. The
contemporaneity problem is particularly pertinent, and the assumption
inherent in this approach that all sites were occupied simultaneously
means that site counts always overestimate the human presence on the
landscape for any given period. Broadchronological groupings also limit
the study of population change to that between periods, obscuring any
intra-periodﬂuctuations. Furthermore, thenumber and distribution of
known sites is not only a product of past behaviour, but also of those factors
aﬀecting the preservation and discovery of archaeological material (e.g.
research history, taphonomy, andﬁeldwork practices). The impact of
regional geology in determining the presence of karst formations is a key
factor governing estimates of site numbers in Palaeolithic contexts. The
increased visibility of caves and rock-shelters and the increased protection
they oﬀer to archaeological deposits relative to open-air sites means that
theyaremorelikelytobediscoveredandexcavated.Thedistinctivenessof
the chronologically diagnostic artefacttypesusedtoidentifysitesanddate
occupations also inﬂuences site visibility. Some artefact types are more
visually distinctive than others. This enhanced visibility may‘inﬂate’the
number of sites for that period–aconcernthatStraus and colleagues
(2000) have voiced with regard to the striking‘Solutrean points’of the
Southwestern European Upper Palaeolithic (Chapter7).
Dates as Data (Summed Probability Distributions of Radiocarbon Dates)
The most popular archaeological demographic proxy is the use of summed
probability distributions (SPDs) of radiocarbon dates (‘dates as data’;Rick
1987). This approach is based on a similar premise to the use of site counts–
28 Stones, Bones, and Genes: A Palaeodemographic Database

that relative temporal changes in the frequency and distribution of
14
C dates
reﬂect corresponding proportional variations in past population sizes and
densities (i.e. more people produce more cultural carbon). The greatest advan-
tage of the use of
14
C dates as a demographic proxy is the increased chron-
ological control it provides, and the subsequent generation of high-resolution
patterns that can be readily correlated with similar continuous datasets (e.g.
long-term climatic records). This palaeodemographic proxy has undergone
rapid methodological developments in the last ten years, including those that
incorporate explicit model testing (Shennanet al.2013;Timpsonet al.2014),
those that calculate population growth rates from SPDs and the related method
of kernel-density estimation (McLaughlin2019;Zahidet al.2016), and those
that consider the spatial distribution of populations (Cremaet al.2017;Grove
2012;Robinsonet al.2019)(Figure2.3).
Key methodological considerations for this palaeodemographic proxy are
the assessment of the inﬂuence of the
14
C calibration curve on the shape of the
resultant SPD, the adoption of protocols for minimum sample size, and for
assessing the accuracy, precision, and representativeness of
14
C determinations
(Becerra-Valdiviaet al.2020;Brown2015;Williams2012). The exact nature
of the relationship between the number of people and the strength of the
14
C signature and possible research biases aﬀecting the availability of dates
across regional and temporal boundaries also need to be assessed (Contreras &
Meadows2014;Freemanet al.2018). Despite the popularity of this palaeo-
demographic method, its application to the Palaeolithic is restricted to the
expansionandintensiﬁcationstages of the demographic prehistory of Palaeolithic
Europe; a result of the chronological upper limit of
14
C dating (currently
~50,000–40,000years ago). Several palaeodemographic studies of the
European Upper Palaeolithic use the‘dates as data’method (e.g.Fernández
López de Pabloet al.2019;French & Collins2015;Gambleet al.2005;
Schmidtet al.2012;Tallavaaraet al.2015), but few of these adhere to the
most recent methodological protocols, and problems with the accuracy of
14
C dates are particularly pronounced in the earlier stages of the European
Upper Palaeolithic (Chapter6).
Settlement/Site Size
The use of settlement/site size as a demographic proxy assumes a positive
correlation between the size of a settlement and the number of inhabitants.
In later periods, overall site size is one of several interrelated settlement vari-
ables–including number and area of dwellings–used to estimate both relative
and absolute group sizes and site population densities (e.g.Birch-Chapman
et al.2017;Porcˇicˇ& Nikolic´2016). The rarity of both dwelling structures and/
or discrete occupation units within Palaeolithic sites limits us (with some
notable exceptions discussed inChapter7) to the use of overall site size to
Stones (archaeological data) 29

Figure2.3An example of palaeodemographic reconstruction using summed prob-
ability distributions of radiocarbon dates to infer population trends between18,000and
7,500cal BP in Iberia, and their relationships with palaeoclimatic conditions
(Fernández-López de Pabloet al.2019:ﬁg.2; reproduced under a CC BY license)
30 Stones, Bones, and Genes: A Palaeodemographic Database

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CHAPTER XIII
THE SECRET CONFERENCE
While Scott finished his supper he planned carefully what he
would do that evening. It would be no simple matter to locate that
meeting place and get near enough to it to see and hear without
being detected. At first he thought it would be best to go early and
wait for the others, but he did not know exactly where it was to be
and he did not know when Jed might get there. If Jed happened to
get there before he did and saw him come snooping along he did
not know exactly what would happen, but he felt pretty sure that he
would not be in at the meeting. No, the safest plan would be to wait
till Dawson had gone down the trail and then follow him.
Scott washed the dishes, finished up his diary and reports and
straightened up the cabin. He glanced at his watch. It was just nine
o’clock. He cast about for something to do, for he did not feel so
nervous when he was busy, but he decided that nerves or no nerves
the thing for him to do was sit quietly down and try to think of every
contingency that might arise.
He pictured the situation as accurately as he could. He planned
how he would try to approach them if they were in the open, or in
the brush. He thought out just what he would say and do if they
discovered him when he was coming down the trail or when he was
eavesdropping on the conversation. He became so absorbed in it
that he forgot all about his nerves.
He looked at his watch once more. Nine-thirty. Dawson might
come along any time now. Suddenly it occurred to him that Dawson
might come by the cabin to make sure that he was there. That
would make it awkward. It would be very hard to get out of the

cabin unnoticed without waiting so long after Dawson left that he
might lose him. He decided to leave at once and wait for Dawson at
the chute where the two trails met. Then he would be sure to see
him whether he came by the cabin or not and it would not be so
hard to follow him.
For a moment Scott looked uncertainly at the revolver hanging on
the wall. He felt that he might need it to-night, but he had never
carried one and he did not like the thing. His father’s coachman, an
ex-prize fighter, had given him innumerable boxing lessons and he
was not afraid of a fist fight with any man, but he did not like the
idea of shooting a man. If he happened to hit a man—the chances
of his doing so were not very good—he knew that he would always
regret it and would keep wondering if it had really been unavoidable.
He decided to leave the revolver.
There were no other preparations to make. He stuffed his
flashlight into his pocket as an after thought, left the lamp burning
as though he had just stepped out for a moment, and walked
casually out of the cabin toward the wood pile. If Dawson were
passing, it would be just as well that he did not see him walking
down the trail. Once in the shadow of the woods he stopped and
listened intently for some minutes. If there was any one else around
he must have been doing the same thing for he could hear nothing.
He circled around by the corral at the risk of a nicker from Jed and
struck the trail once more well below the cabin. He walked carefully,
avoiding the noisy gravel and arrived at the chute without accident.
Scott crawled into a little clump of aspens and settled down to
wait. He had been doing so much of this hiding in the past few days
that he began to feel like a sneak thief. It was a beautifully clear
starlit night and cool as the nights in that high altitude always were.
Scott missed the myriad night noises of the North, especially the
incessant hum of the mosquitoes and other insects. Here there was
not the buzz of a single wing. What few noises there were sounded
strange to his Northern ear. The sharp yap of the coyote replaced
the full throated bass of the timber wolf. He missed the weird cry of

the loon and the sullen squawk of the blue heron. An almost
imperceptible breeze set the aspen leaves to whispering softly.
Scott loved these night noises. Several nights at the cabin he had
sat out in the open and listened to them a while before going to
bed. Now they served to while away the time and break the
monotony of his anxious vigil. He kept a sharp lookout on the
junction of the trails and listened intently for he wanted to make
certain whether Dawson had come by the cabin.
He was listening to the far away barking cry of a pack of coyotes
on the trail of game, probably a rabbit. The sound rose and fell as
the quarry led them up onto a ridge or down behind a hill, and
almost died away altogether when the trail doubled back into some
deep, spruce-filled cañon. He could almost see the chase and could
tell whether they were gaining on their prey or losing ground. They
were gaining now, gaining fast, probably with their victim in plain
sight. The yaps were coming fast and furious and he expected them
momentarily to break off with a snarl of triumph which he probably
could not hear but would know was there.
Suddenly a faint click far up the trail in the direction of the cabin
made him lose all interest in the distant chase. He listened tensely
and caught the sound again. It came again, nearer this time, and
soon he could hear the continuous clatter of steel hoofs of a pacing
horse on the loose gravel of the trail. Dawson was coming and there
was nothing silent or secret about the way he came. There was a
difference between talking conspiracy over a public ’phone and
riding over his own district where he could account for his presence
in a thousand ways. In fact no one had the right to challenge him
there at all. It suited Scott all right. The more noise Dawson made
the easier it would be to follow him.
The horseman passed through the chute and so close to Scott
that he instinctively shrank back although he knew that he could not
be seen. But he had forgotten the horse’s nose in laying his plans.
The animal gave a snort of fear and shied violently. It might have led
a more curious or less preoccupied man to stop and investigate, but
Dawson did not seem to be at all suspicious. Indeed, he seemed to

be so absorbed in his own thought that he hardly noted the actions
of his horse.
Dawson’s apparent indifference reassured Scott. As soon as he
was sure that he could not be seen he slipped from the shadows and
followed as swiftly and noiselessly as he could. When hidden by a
bend in the trail he ran, in the straight stretches he was obliged to
drop farther back. The cañon was steep and the pace was slow
enough to make shadowing rather easy. There did not seem to be
any hesitation on Dawson’s part. He seemed to know exactly where
he was going and Scott gained the impression that there had been
such meetings before in a place well known to both parties. This
impression was strengthened when Dawson reined in so suddenly
that he almost ran onto him at a sharp bend, listened a second, and
rode confidently into the scattered brush beside the road.
Scott listened a moment. He could still hear the horse going so he
ducked into the brush and followed. Yes, it was evidently a well
known meeting place. Dawson could not expect to be found away
back in there except by some one who knew the way. At last the
horse stopped. Scott listened for voices. Probably Jed had not
arrived for he could not hear anything. He thought it safest to circle
the spot and sneak up from the other side; he did not want Jed to
stumble over him.
The experience up the trail with Dawson’s horse had taught him a
lesson. He remembered that a horse has very keen eyesight, could
see in the dark, and could also hear and smell much better than a
man. It would be necessary to steer clear of the horses. He circled
far out to the left and crawled as cautiously as an Indian. A turned
over stone or a slip of any kind might be fatal to the whole
enterprise now. It was slow, tiresome work, but intensely exciting.
When the slope of the ground and the stars told him that he was
about opposite the place where he started he slowly closed in on the
trail. He was moving almost by inches now and stopping every few
feet to listen. There was not a sound to guide him.
Suddenly Dawson struck a match to light his pipe. It was not
more than fifteen feet to one side. It seemed to Scott like a coast

defense search light. He could see Dawson so plainly, sitting
comfortably on the ground with his back against an aspen tree, that
it seemed as though Dawson must see him. He crouched as flat as
he could and would have dug into the ground if he had been a
badger. It never occurred to him that the match had effectually
blinded Dawson to everything around him. It made him shudder to
think that if his direction had been a little more accurate he would
have been right on top of that silent figure before he struck the
match.
Scott started backing up inch by inch to avoid the possibility of
getting in Jed’s path. He had hardly gained what he considered to be
a safe position when he heard the soft thud of unshod hoofs and
saw a dark shadow looming up through the brush in the direction of
the trail. He had become so accustomed to the starlight that he
could see pretty well now. The newcomer rode straight toward the
little tree where Dawson was sitting, dismounted about twenty feet
away and strode over there.
It was Jed Clark, and Scott could see, even in that uncertain light
that he was in an ugly mood.
“Fine night for a party,” Dawson ventured by way of greeting.
Jed answered with a burst of profanity. “Fine mess that saintly
patrolman of yours has gotten us into, too. That fellow is too good
for this world and if I get a good chance I’ll send him up where he
belongs.”
“Pshaw, what are you fussing about. This recount is the best thing
that ever happened. I saw Dugan to-day and he said they had the
sheep hidden as snug as a bug in a rug.”
“They’re hidden, all right,” Jed sneered.
“Then why worry? After the recount we can trot them out again
and we’ll be stronger than ever. Nobody will have the nerve to order
another recount for some time.”
“You may ‘trot out’ some of them after the recount, but there’s
others you won’t.”

The bitter sarcasm in Jed’s tone made Dawson sit up in alarm.
“What’s up?” he asked anxiously.
“A lot you don’t seem to know anything about,” Jed retorted
angrily. “We lost three thousand sheep this afternoon, that’s what
I’m fussing about.”
“Lost them? How?”
“Through that cursed patrolman of yours, that’s how.” Jed was so
angry that he was almost beside himself.
“Didn’t eat ’em did he?” Dawson sneered.
“Can now if he wants to,” Jed raved, “they’re dead enough to
eat.”
“Dead?” Dawson ejaculated.
“Yes, dead! What did you think I meant? Lost in the brush?”
“Don’t be a fool, Jed,” Dawson answered quietly, “you are acting
like a crazy man. If the sheep are dead it cannot be helped now, but
I would like to know how it happened.”
Jed finally told the story of the lost sheep, interrupted at frequent
intervals by uncontrollable bursts of profanity.
Dawson listened calmly. “How do you know this?” he asked.
“Bob left Sancho up there to watch the sheep in the other cañon
and came down to tell me. Nine thousand dollars gone to smash in
one afternoon and all through that—”
“Don’t get to raving again,” Dawson interrupted. “It’s tough luck
but we can both stand it.”
At this confession of partnership Scott’s eyes popped wide open
with amazement. He had already suspected Dawson of levying graft
money for allowing extra sheep on the forest but such a far-reaching
fraud as this had never occurred to him.
“We could stand it, yes, but I’m not going to.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that I am going to own up to running on some extras, let
’em cancel my permit if they want to, and get into some more

profitable game.”
“You talk like a baby,” Dawson answered coldly. “You know how
much we have made out of this thing in the past and how much
more we can make in the future, and you talk about throwing up the
whole thing just for one stroke of bad luck. Now listen to a little
reason. If you give up now, all those sheep, including the twenty-five
hundred in that other cañon, will have to be sold on a losing market.
Nobody knows anything about this except our own men. We’ll put
the recount through to-morrow, clean up all suspicion, and carry the
twenty-five hundred extras through the summer. Then if you still
want to get out we can sell to a good market in the fall. That’s the
sensible way to do it.”
“Have it your way, then,” said Jed sullenly, “but remember this. If
you don’t get rid of that patrolman inside of ten days I’ll blow the
whole thing, so get busy.” He rose as though he had delivered his
ultimatum and was ready to leave.
“I’ll attend to Burton,” Dawson answered quietly. “There will not
be much trouble in getting rid of him after he falls down on that
recount to-morrow. Now we’ll settle those accounts.”
“We’ll settle those after you get rid of that patrolman,” Jed
answered doggedly.
“We’ll settle them now,” Dawson answered coldly.
“Don’t try to bully me,” Jed flared angrily, “if I say the word you
know what they will do to you.”
“Yes,” Dawson answered contemptuously, “I’d lose my little job,
but I doubt if I’d starve. It might be different with you, considering
the mortgage I hold on your ranch. According to my figures you owe
me two thousand dollars on the business of the last six months.”
Jed sullenly handed over some papers. “Don’t be pushing me too
far with that mortgage. It’s not recorded, you know.”
Dawson ignored the threat. He had gained his point and was
ready to smooth down his victim’s feelings. “Well, I did not mean to
rub it in, Jed. You and I have too good a thing in this business to
fight with each other. I’ll attend to this end of the business and I

know from experience that you can handle the other end. I’m going
to have the super up for that recount in the morning and we’ll rub it
into that incorruptible dude in fine shape. Better come up and see
the fun.”
“I’ll be there, all right,” Jed replied, very much mollified. “I
wouldn’t miss seeing him taken down for considerable. I’d pretty
near be willing to drive the other twenty-five hundred sheep over the
cliff to make sure of it.”
They mounted and rode slowly out to the trail, all signs of the
quarrel wiped away by the cunning hand of the ranger.
Scott listened until he heard the hoof beats die away in the
distance and then walked slowly back to the cabin thinking of the
wonderful surprise party he was preparing for those two in the
morning.

CHAPTER XIV
THE RECOUNTING OF THE SHEEP
Scott walked slowly back to the cabin thinking of the tremendous
pow wow there would be when he sprung his discoveries the next
day. He felt sure that neither the supervisor nor any one else outside
of the ring, unless it was the small ranchers who had been using
free range, had ever suspected Dawson. Every one knew that Jed
Clark would beat any one he could, but with Dawson it would be a
different matter. He had the reputation, both in the service and
outside for sterling honesty and for strict enforcement of the
regulations. He would have felt sorry for him if he had not overheard
his cool schemes that night for getting rid of the “Eastern dude.”
Now he looked forward with pleasure to the stir his disclosure would
make.
He approached the cabin as he had left it by way of the corral and
the wood pile, for he thought possibly Dawson had stopped there
again on the way home. He glanced quickly around the cabin. There
was no one there, but there was a piece of paper lying on the table
in a conspicuous place near the lamp. It was a scribbled note from
Dawson.
Dropped in but did not have time to wait for you. We’ll
have the recount to-morrow morning about ten o’clock.
Ramsey is coming up and I’ll be down there. Probably Jed
will be up to count for his side. A recount is rather a
serious matter and I hope for the good of the Service that
you have not made any mistake.
Hastily,
DAWSON

“I hope you have not made any mistake,” Scott repeated with a
grin. “That’s a pretty slick little piece of sarcasm and I’ll bet he
grinned when he wrote it, but if he knew what I know he would
have made it a prayer that I had made a mistake.”
In order to have his records complete he finished up his daily
diary report with a detailed account of the evening’s interview. It
was one o’clock when he blew out the light and rolled into bed. He
was so tired with his long day’s work that he went to sleep before he
had planned out the details for the next day as he had intended.
However, he did not oversleep himself the next morning. He
finished breakfast early and put the cabin in apple pie order in case
he should have any official visitors before the recount. He had an
idea that no one would have much time for the inspection of cabins
after that.
He determined to ride out and see that the herders were bringing
up the sheep according to his orders. He found Jed ready to go as
usual and was soon trotting along gayly through the forest. The sun
was shining brightly and his mood was in keeping with the day. He
felt that his triumph was sure and he had no misgivings. He had not
gone very far when he ran onto one of the bands headed for the
chute.
It was feeding time for the sheep and they were in no hurry to
travel. They moved by jerks, those in front hanging back till they
were pushed on by those behind. Then they would trot a little way
and stop to eat once more. Those in the center kept trying to push
out to the sides where they could find some grass, and it kept the
herder and the dog both busy to keep them moving.
Scott was watching with interest as the parade passed him when
the herder called to him. “Too late to try to count ’em now, sonny.
You ought to have done that before you ordered the recount.”
“Don’t look as big as it did,” Scott replied, frowning at the band
and trying to look worried.
“It’ll look smaller yet when the tail end of it goes through that
chute this morning,” the herder jeered.

“Well, I should worry,” Scott retorted, “Dawson, Ramsey and Jed
will be there to do the counting at ten o’clock. Are the others
coming?”
“You bet, and crazy to get there. You won’t have a very hard time
counting yourself when this thing is over.”
“Think not?” Scott replied teasingly, and he rode back toward the
chute, leaving the herder cursing him for a conceited upstart who
would soon get a proper calling down. He stopped in at the cabin to
get his tally register, and then rode on down to the chute to see that
all was in readiness there. It was still an hour and a half before the
time set for the recount and Scott put in the time examining the
fence on either side of the chute to make sure that there were no
holes.
He had not gone far along the fence on the west side of the chute
when he noticed something which aroused his curiosity. All the
ground between two of the posts had been trampled up by sheep.
Of course the sheep had been crowded pretty close up to the fence
on both sides at the time of the counting, but this was different.
There had been no rain since the sheep came in and the distinct,
continuous trail could be plainly seen between the two posts. The
ground was not trampled up that way between any of the other
posts. Further examination showed that one of the posts was loose
and that all wires had been cut at that point and renailed.
This was a new piece of evidence which Scott had almost missed.
Evidently Dugan had been afraid that Scott would get back from that
fake fire before he had time to get all the sheep through the chute
and had opened up that hole in the fence to hurry things along. He
had a pretty clear idea now of the plan the stockmen had used and
just how they had worked it. He recognized now that Dawson was
the brains of the whole ring and that it was his smooth craft which
had made it work. No detail which could be foreseen had been
overlooked.
There was a rattling of loose stones down the cañon trail and the
supervisor appeared. He greeted Scott cordially. “You seem to have

rounded up these fellows in pretty quick time,” he remarked looking
keenly at Scott.
“Yes,” Scott replied modestly, “I was lucky enough to stumble
onto it.”
“I hope for your own sake and that of the service that you are not
mistaken in your estimate. It takes a good deal of experience to
estimate sheep accurately in the open.”
“That is the reason I had Baxter do it for me,” Scott replied.
“Oh,” exclaimed Mr. Ramsey, evidently relieved, “he knows if any
one does. When did you get him to do it?”
“The day after the sheep came in. I tried to count them and could
not do it, but when I saw the bands in his district they looked so
much smaller than mine that I asked him to come over and estimate
them.”
Just then Dawson rode up. “Well, Burton,” he said when the first
greetings were over, “don’t you feel a little nervous?”
“Not in the least,” Scott replied confidently.
“I never knew before,” said the supervisor, “that it was possible to
get sheep up those little cañons down there.”
“It isn’t,” Scott said quietly, looking straight at Dawson. He
thought that he detected a slight start, but he was not sure.
“Then how did they get in?” persisted the supervisor.
“Here is something here that looks rather suspicious,” Scott said,
leading the way to the trail through the fence.
Both Dawson and Ramsey examined it carefully. Scott called their
attention to the loose post and the cut wires. He watched Dawson
closely but could not detect even a trace of worry in his face. The
ranger was such a good actor that if Scott had not been positive of
his guilt he would have begun to worry himself.
“That is where they went, all right,” Dawson said, “probably ran
them in at night.”
Scott was dumfounded for a minute. He had never thought of
that. Then an idea occurred to him. “Why didn’t they take them

through the chute if they did it at night?” Scott asked. He thought
that he had him this time.
“Probably because they did it the night before the count and did
not want you to see the tracks in the morning,” Dawson answered.
Scott knew that such was not the case but it was a clever
argument. He decided to keep his information till later. He had
shown the supervisor how the sheep went in and that was all he
wanted to do just then. Already they could hear the sheep
approaching and before they reached the chute Jed joined them. He
was sullen and had very little to say to any one. He avoided Scott
altogether.
“We’ll count them as they go out,” Mr. Ramsey suggested. “You
and I will do the counting, Jed.”
“Yes, and I’ll have some damages coming when we are through,”
Jed growled. “I’m not going to have my sheep driven all over the
country for nothing.”
The herders all looked so happy that the supervisor became
worried. “Looks as though they had slipped you some way,” he
whispered to Scott.
Scott only smiled and replied, “We’ll see.”
The first band counted five under the permit, the second band
sixteen under and the third twelve. The worried look deepened on
the supervisor’s face and Jed was growling louder and louder. Every
one was rubbing it into Scott but he only grinned and waited.
The last sheep of the last band was counted and they had all
come well within the limit. Mr. Ramsey turned to Scott and that hard,
steely look was in his eye. Scott caught Dawson’s wink at Jed.
“Where are your extras?” Ramsey asked severely.
“We’ll go count them now,” Scott said. He tried to speak calmly
but a note of triumph stole into his voice in spite of himself. He
noticed a decided look of dismay on Jed’s face, but Dawson’s
showed no sign. Scott led his horse out of the brush.

“Where are you taking us now?” the supervisor asked coldly
before he made a move to mount.
“Down where the sheep are,” Scott retorted a little nettled, “they
are not likely to bring them up here.”
They all mounted and Scott led them up the trail in silence. He
could have taken them directly along the bench at the edge of the
cliff, but he preferred to go around by the ridge trail and keep them
in suspense. He saw that the supervisor thought that he was
bluffing. The farther they went along the ridge trail the more
relieved Jed Clark looked, but when they turned short off the trail to
the south his spirits dropped once more.
Scott rode straight for the cañon now. There was no one in sight
and he did feel a little worried for a minute. What if they had moved
those sheep in spite of Baxter? But he thought of Baxter and the
three thousand sheep down at the foot of the cliff and knew that he
had no reason to be nervous.
As they rode into the mouth of the cañon an astonished herder
jumped from the improvised fence and stared at them wide eyed.
Scott paid no attention to him, but led the others straight up to the
fence. The bleating of hungry sheep had already reached them, but
when Mr. Ramsey saw how many were packed inside the fence he
whistled his amazement.
“We can make a little hole in this fence and count them as they
go out,” Scott explained. He still felt a little grouchy about Ramsey’s
attitude even when he looked at Jed’s beaten face.
“Pretty clever scheme, Jed,” the supervisor said patronizingly, “but
Burton seems to have caught you at it.”
Jed stared at Scott as though he would have liked to tear him to
pieces, but maintained a sullen silence.
“How many are there in there?” Ramsey asked.
“About two thousand as nearly as I could judge,” answered Baxter
who had come up unnoticed.

Every one was too excited to even notice that he was a
newcomer.
“Two thousand!” Mr. Ramsey exclaimed, “That is the most any
one has ever tried to run in on me yet.”
“That’s not half of them,” Scott said.
“What?” Ramsey cried. “Not half of them? Where are the others?
Turn these out to get something to eat. You count them as they go
out, Baxter.”
Scott mounted and rode out of the cañon. The others followed
closely. The silence of the other cañon was oppressive compared
with the noise of the first one.
“Seem to have ‘flued the coop,’” Dawson remarked.
Scott dismounted and tore a hole in the brush fence. He led the
way down to the bottom of the cañon. “They’re down there,” he said
pointing over the edge of the cliff.
The tracks leading into the narrow neck and the trampled shrubs
along the edge of the cliff told the story only too plainly. Mr. Ramsey
walked cautiously to the edge and looked over.
“Gosh,” he exclaimed drawing back quickly. “That’s an awful sight.
How many were there?”
“Somewhere around three thousand,” Scott replied; “I could not
tell exactly.”
“It was a clever scheme, Jed,” Ramsey repeated, “but it did not
work.”
Jed was completely crushed. Scott felt sorry for him, little as he
deserved it.
“It was a clever scheme, all right,” Scott said, “but it was not
Jed’s.”
“Who’s was it, then?” Ramsey asked in astonishment.
Every one listened in strained silence. Baxter had joined the party
contrary to orders to see the fun.
“Dawson’s,” Scott replied, looking straight at the ranger.

Every eye was turned on Dawson in amazement. Scott could not
help but admire the man’s magnificent nerve. The accusation must
have come as a complete surprise to him, but not an eyelash
quivered. He looked at Scott as though in surprised amusement.
“Mine?” he asked smiling. “I guess your success has gone to your
head. How do you make that out?”
“I happen to know,” Scott said looking Dawson calmly in the eye,
“that you are Jed Clark’s partner in the sheep business, that you
recommended Heth as a patrolman on this district knowing him to
be Dugan, a crook, and Jed’s foreman, and that you planned this
whole thing from start to finish.”
There was a gasp of astonishment from every one except
Dawson. Mr. Ramsey looked from Scott to Dawson in utter
bewilderment.
“You are either going crazy or are a most magnificent liar,”
Dawson responded coldly. “You have made some statements here
that you either have to prove or answer to me for.”
A deadly hatred blazed for a moment in the ranger’s face, but he
quickly controlled it. He turned calmly to the supervisor. “I demand
an investigation of this thing from start to finish.”
The supervisor was clearly at a loss. The ranger’s reputation
during his past eight years of service was such that he could not
believe that there was any possible foundation for the charges, and
yet Scott had shown a remarkable skill in unraveling this matter so
far and seemed confident of his charges.
“We shall certainly have to investigate it,” he said. “You
understand, of course, Burton, that you will be obliged to prove fully
all the charges that you have made.”
“I have the proof,” Scott said quietly, “and can produce it
whenever it is needed.”
“Very well, I’ll notify you when the hearing will be held. Jed, your
permits are of course cancelled, but we’ll have to let those sheep
stay on here to keep them from starving till you have a chance to
dispose of them. I want you to come down to the office with me,

Dawson, to clear up some other matters there. You can stay here,
Burton, and look after your district as usual. You have done a
magnificent job in handling this problem so far and I congratulate
you. Come on, fellows.”
Mr. Ramsey was evidently anxious to get Jed and Dawson away
from Scott. He, too, had caught the look of hatred and he was afraid
it might blaze out any minute in open violence. He rode off toward
the chute with the two stockmen and left Scott with Baxter who was
eagerly waiting to hear an account of everything he had missed.

CHAPTER XV
THE MAN HUNT
“Gee,” Baxter exclaimed when he heard the story. “You certainly
are the lucky one. All that doing in your first week. It’s more
excitement than I have had in the past two years.”
“It has been pretty good fun,” Scott admitted, “but I suppose it
will seem slow now that it is all over.”
“Not if I know Jed and Dawson,” Baxter exclaimed, “Jed is yellow
and will never try a fair fight with you, but if I were you I would get
a suit of mail armor for he is likely to try to shoot you in the back
any time. Isn’t old Dawson a smooth one, though? Here he has been
doing that thing for three or four years and yet no one ever so much
as suspected him of it. He will not say or do a thing until he knows
which way this investigation is going. If he finds you have anything
on him that he cannot get out of, then watch out. I did not know he
was crooked but I know that he will not stop at anything to get what
he wants.”
“Sounds as though there might be some interest left in life yet,”
Scott laughed.
“If I were you I would come over to my shack and stay. You can
work your district just as well from there and I can help you. It
would not be so easy for them to pick on the two of us. One man
does not stand much show alone; he has to sleep sometime.”
“And let them think they had run me out,” Scott exclaimed.
“Nothing doing. I’m not afraid of them.”
“There are times when a man has a right to be afraid,” Baxter
urged, “it isn’t cowardice, it’s only decent caution and common

sense.”
He was so earnest about it and so different from his usual
daredevil self that Scott seriously considered his proposition. “Well, I
can’t run away now without any pretext, but if they make it too hot
for me I’ll consider it. If I have to run anywhere it will be to you.”
“Good, I don’t want to seem to croak but I expect to see you
before long. Don’t put off the running too long.”
“By the way,” Scott called just as he was starting back for the
chute to see if the sheep were coming back all right to their allotted
ranges, “have you had lunch? I forgot mine in the excitement and it
is almost three o’clock.”
“Forgot mine, too. Might as well eat together here before you go.”
They brought their lunches from their saddle bags and continued
the investigation discussion. Probably most of the people within fifty
miles would be talking about it in the morning. They had scarcely
swallowed the last sandwich when Scott noticed a distinct column of
smoke rising over the ridge to the north.
“Hello,” he exclaimed, “is that another of Jed’s signal fires?”
Baxter took a long look at it. “No, that’s no brush pile. There is no
wind and yet the smoke seems to be pretty widely scattered. That’s
the trouble with this country; four days of sunshine and then fire will
run in the needles. That cannot be far from the lookout station, but I
suppose we better go up and have a look.”
They mounted and rode up the slope together. As they
approached the ridge it seemed very apparent that it was not a
brush pile burning. The smoke was rising from a considerable area.
From the ridge they could see it plainly. It was a ground fire on the
lower slope just below the lookout station.
“Quickest way will be to ride to the lookout station and get a
couple of shovels from the cache.”
So they galloped up to the station and raided the tool cache.
There was no one there. They grabbed the shovels and ran down

the slope. The first person they saw was the lookout’s wife, dressed
in overalls and swinging a shovel like a ditch digger.
“Where is Benny?” Baxter called to her.
“He’s working on the other end of it,” she replied without turning
from her work.
“Then I’m going over there,” said Baxter with decision. “He’s sent
me out on many a dirty fire and I want the satisfaction of seeing him
work on one himself. Don’t know as I’ll even help him unless it’s
pretty bad.”
Only the needles on the surface were dry and a shovel full of the
moist earth put out the fire wherever it reached it. Scott fell to work
a little bit ahead of the woman and they progressed rapidly. It was
only a few minutes till they met the lookout and Baxter and the fire
was out.
“How did it start, Benny?” Baxter asked. “Throw a cigarette out
the tower window?”
“Looks like it,” Benny admitted. “No, some sheep herder did it. I
happened to pick him up with the glasses away down by the cliffs,
and I caught sight of him from time to time as he came up the
valley, but I could not recognize him. Just about the time he reached
the pass up there I found the smoke. Since then I have been too
busy to think about him.”
“He probably dropped a match,” Scott suggested.
“It was a match all right, but I’ll bet he did not drop it,” Baxter
commented. “Let’s go see what we can find.”
The emergency over, the lookout’s wife had gone quietly back to
her home work. The three men went down into the valley to
investigate. They easily picked up the man’s trail and found where it
touched the edge of the burn. Sure enough, there was plenty of
evidence to show that the match was not dropped carelessly. Pine
needles had been carefully raked together in a long pile which had
apparently been lighted in several places. No efforts had been made
to efface the traces of the work.

“Just what I thought,” Baxter exclaimed, straightening up with a
frown.
“But why in thunder did he set the thing right under my nose?”
asked Benny in an injured tone.
“Probably like the rest of us,” Baxter laughed, “he wanted to see
you work. No, that was just sheer bravado. That fire was set as a
warning to show us what would happen if we pushed this sheep
business and he wanted to put it where it would surely be seen.”
“By the way,” Benny asked with sudden interest, “how did the
recount come out? I called up Dawson, but he was not home.”
When he had heard the story he shook his head sagely. “If that is
the way it stands I would not be surprised if that was what the fire
was for. And I would not be surprised if there were some more of
them in the next few days.”
With this comforting piece of news Scott started back by the way
of the bench to have a look at the sheep before he went home to
supper. He found them all trailing back to the feeding grounds. The
herders were in a sullen mood. Not that it made much difference to
them who owned the sheep, but they felt the failure of the plan as a
personal defeat and they took it out in hating the man who had
frustrated the plan. They hinted darkly at what would happen to the
district and its patrolman.
Their attitude furnished Scott with some food for thought. If these
men who had no financial interests at stake felt as bitter as they did,
he could well imagine the feelings of Dawson, Jed and Dugan. Two
of them he knew to be unscrupulous and Baxter had assured him
that Dawson would be no better. He was beginning to think a little
more seriously of Baxter’s advice. It would be hard for one man to
live alone and protect himself against three others for an indefinite
time.
He had ridden so slowly that it was dusk when he turned Jed into
the corral and went to the lonely cabin to prepare his supper. There
was no evidence that any one had been there in his absence, but he
felt uneasy. These men were not like the men he had known. If they

would come out in the open and fight fairly with their fists he would
not have thought twice about it, but the thought of being shot in the
back with no chance at all seemed horrible. It was one thing to rush
a man in the face of a loaded gun in the flush of excitement, and to
feel hour after hour that the same gun may be aimed at you from
behind a tree or from out of the darkness around the cabin. It was
the unfairness of it all that oppressed him; the feeling that it was
something over which he had no control.
Early in the evening the ’phone rang. He had already become so
nervous that he jumped almost out of his skin at the sound. It was
the supervisor.
“I have only a minute, Burton, and must talk fast. You made a
beautiful clean up of that bunch to-day and from a few things I have
found out since, I believe you are right about all the rest of it. Jed is
crazy. He has loaded up on fire water and is telling every one what
he is going to do to you and the whole service. I want you to keep
out of his way. You are probably no match for him with a gun and
moreover I do not want any fights if I can help it.
“I understand that the big reservoir on the upper plateau is about
full. The snows are melting pretty fast now. I want you to start up
there early to-morrow and watch it. When it reaches the twenty foot
mark open the spillway; it will raise Cain if it overflows. Stop and tell
Baxter to look after your district, but do not tell any one else where
you are going. Do you understand?”
“I think so,” Scott answered.
“I’ll send for you when I want you for that investigation. So long.
Take care of yourself.”
Scott had forgotten his fears while the supervisor was talking, but
with the click of the receiver the old loneliness came over him again.
So Jed was on the war path and Ramsey thought there was danger.
He recognized that his assignment to the reservoir was only an
excuse to get him out of the way. He was glad of the excuse himself
and wondered whether the sensible thing would not be to go to
Baxter’s for the night.

He had a hard time swallowing the idea of running away, even
when he knew that it was the sensible thing to do. The cabin felt like
a trap to him and he wandered out under the stars. He had a show
there, no one could sneak up on him. He sat down on a log at the
edge of the clearing and listened to the night noises as he had done
so many times before. As the distant sounds floated up to him on
the still night air and his trained ear caught the scurrying of tiny feet
in the bushes about him, his confidence came back to him. He felt
safe enough out there. It was just a matter of woodcraft now, and in
that he was not afraid to put himself against any man. That would
be a fair contest.
Far up along the ridge trail to the east a woman was running
desperately. She was keeping to the shadow as much as possible
and looking nervously back over her shoulder. Her breath was
coming in gasps and it seemed as though she must give up, but she
staggered on doggedly. The yapping of the coyotes and the lurking
shadows of the forest trail seemed to have no horrors for her. They
were overshadowed by another horror far more terrible. Her face
wore a look of dread, but it was not the dread of the dangers of the
night. She did not give a thought to her own safety. She was running
a race with death and her only thought was that she might be too
late.
She turned down the little trail to the patrolman’s cabin and made
one more desperate effort. Her strength was failing but the sight of
the light in the cabin seemed to buoy her up and lend wings to her
feet. There was yet time. She staggered uncertainly to the open
door of the cabin. There was no one there. The disappointment was
too much for her and she sank to the step with a sob.
To Scott, sitting quietly in the shadow of the forest’s edge, the
sight of this disheveled woman gliding into the flood of light from
the cabin door had appeared like a specter. He hesitated a moment,
suspicious of every one, but at the sound of that heartbroken sob he
forgot his own danger and hastened to her. He raised the limp form
gently and recognized Mrs. Dawson.

She raised her tired eyes dully, but at the sight of Scott she
started up with unexpected strength.
“Oh, Mr. Burton,” she gasped, “you must get away from here at
once. There are some men coming here to kill you to-night and you
must get away before they come.”
“How do you know this?” Scott asked kindly, trying to help the
exhausted woman to a chair in the cabin.
“No, no, not in there,” she exclaimed in terror. “I must not be
seen here. Why do you make me say how I know? It is bad enough
to have to betray my husband without having to talk about it. But
you saved Marie for me and I had to tell you. He will thank me for it
some day. Now please go. They may come any minute.”
“I must see you safely home first,” Scott replied.
“No, no, they would kill us both. There is no danger for me in the
woods alone. Oh, please go quickly and do not make me make this
awful trip for nothing. Please go; you must.” She began to sob again.
“I cannot tell you how much I appreciate this,” Scott said
earnestly. “They will not find me when they come. Good-by.”
He stepped back into the outdoor shadows. “Will you promise
me,” the woman called after him in a broken voice, “not to shoot
them when they come? I know I have no right to ask it, but won’t
you promise?”
“I don’t even carry a gun,” Scott assured her.
With a little gasp of thankfulness the woman disappeared into the
shadows of the trail.
Scott retreated to his station on the edge of the forest and
listened. There were a few faint clicks from the rolling pebbles on
the trail and all was still once more. Scott had thought his position
was bad enough but it seemed easy when compared with the
dilemma of that poor woman, who had felt herself forced to betray
her husband to keep him from murder, and to save the man who,
she considered, had saved her child. He little thought when he
picked the child up on the trail that day that he was piling up such a

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Palaeolithic Europe A Demographic And Social Prehistory Jennifer C French

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