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The area of Pléneuf-Val-André, Brittany, France, has delivered several Palaeolithic sites containing palaeontological remains, very rare into this granitic area. In order to precise the stratigraphical framework of the prehistoric human occupations of this zone, an ESR dating program was initiated in the late 1980s and different kinds of materials (mammal bones and teeth, naturally bleached quartz extracted from marine or aeolian sediments and marine mollusc shells) were then sampled for geochronological analyses. The present paper displays the main obtained results on three stratigraphically connected middle Palaeolithic sites: Piégu, Les Vallées and Nantois. The results are consistent with the regional chronostratigraphic framework and permit to suggest palaeoenvironmental reconstruction of the area and the dating of the various archaeological evidences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: A distinctive feature of the Palaeolithic of Western France is that most of the sites are along the present coast line and that the archaeological layers are often partially eroded and contained in very residual Pleistocene silty sediments preserved under the beaches. In the absence of radiometric dating, correlations with local deposits and reference to a regional chronostratigraphic scale allow proposal of a geological age. Where direct radiometric or related dating (i.e. OSL) results exist, sedimentological analysis (i.e. “descriptive” sedimentology) can be used either to confirm the dating or to extend the discussion. This paper is based on examples which have been processed over thirty years but that had never been the subject of an overall methodological presentation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]