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Abstract: Before the 90s, data on Paleolithic human occupation of southern Portugal was very scarce. During the last decade, the knowledge of the Upper Paleolithic of Algarve increased substantially due to the work of a research team based at the University of Algarve. The present paper is a report on the recent results from Algarve, focusing specially on the site of Vale Boi. It will present the chronology and stratigraphy of different human occupations from the early Upper Paleolithic up to the early Neolithic. It will focus on aspects of zooarchaeology and the exploitation of large and medium mammals as well as on marine fauna. In addition, we will present new data on stone and bone tools. Finally, we will also refer to the social and symbolic aspects present at the site, base on shell and teeth pendants and to an engraved plaquette with animal motifs. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Little is known about the final Upper Paleolithic from west of Gibraltar and south of the Tagus Valley. In contrast, data from Boreal and Atlantic times are fairly common and suggest highly diverse cultural, economic, and technological systems. Thus, there is an important hiatus for the Tardiglacial phase of human occupation in southwestern Iberia. This paper will focus on two main aspects of the Early Holocene in Iberia: the settlement and subsistence dynamics during the Mesolithic and early Neolithic of southwestern Portugal, and explanatory models for the occupational hiatus and lack of sites in the Tardiglacial and early Holocene. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the anthropological study which aims to determine the end of the Paleolithic and the Mesolithic period in Portugal. With basis of the gathered data from excavated sites, it has been found that the technology and diet of prehistoric hunter-gatherers remained the same from 16,000-8,000 years before the present. It stresses that the stable and long-lasting final Paleolithic technology and settlement system has started sometime during the magadlenian times. A punctuated human demographic expansion has occurred during the final Paleolithic and Mesolithic period which have resulted from the establishment of settlements and technological change.