Middle Palaeolithic and Early Upper Palaeolithic Subsistence Practices at Vindija Cave, Croatia

Vindija Cave contains important Middle and Early Upper Palaeolithic lithic and faunal assemblages associated with remains of Neandertals that span the period from ca. 45 – 25 ka. The association in level G1 of Neandertal remains (directly radiocarbon dated to ca. 29 ka) and Early Upper Palaeolithic artifacts (e.g. bone points, lithic bifacial point, and other Aurignacian-type lithics) is particularly significant for different models of the Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition, and the artifact and hominin assemblages have been studied in detail in recent years. In this paper we present the first results of new zooarchaeological analyses of Vindija. We focus on the ungulate remains from the F and G Complexes at Vindija, and discuss the significance of our results for palaeoecological reconstructions, taphonomy, and hominin subsistence practices.