Abstract:

The Bianfudong Paleolithic site is located in the middle valley of the Jinshajiang River. Due to early quarrying damage, the roof, entrance and frontal part of the cave were severely destroyed. To accompany basic construction, we conducted a rescue excavation in 2019. The excavation area is approximately 30 m away from the original entrance to the cave. The stratigraphy of the site consists of two parts: cultural deposits and underlying cave fissure deposits. The cultural deposit is 2.3 m in thickness and divided into two cultural stages (upper and lower) comprising ten sub-layers. Some hominin fossils, stone artifacts and plentiful animal fossils have been excavated from the cultural layers, along with some fauna from the natural cave fissure deposits. A large number of stone artifacts were excavated from the lower cultural layer with both core and flake tools identified. In contrast, mainly flake tools were identified from the upper layer. Broken fossil bones excavated from cultural layers are dominated by deer and bovids totalling more than 100 individuals, and some bones preserve artificial marks on the surface. The U-series dating of the site gives the age of the lower cultural layer between 180 kaBP and 140 kaBP, while the top of upper cultural layer is dated to ca. 70 kaBP.

Key words: Bianfudong site, Pleistocene, Homini