Social Intimacy, Artefact Visibility and Acculturation Models of Neanderthal–Modern Human Interaction

(Bordes 2003; Zilhão & d’Errico 1999; 2003; Conard & Bolus 2003), a wealth of ethnographic and historic examples of culture contact demonstrate cultural proc­ esses which undermine the current chronostratigraph­ ic arguments used to assess the Bow Wave Model. For instance, d’Errico and colleagues (1998, S11–12) argue that differences in the techniques of manufacturing bone tools and personal ornaments in Châtelperronian and Aurignacian contexts disprove any technological diffusion from Aurignacian to Châtelperronian arti­ sans in neighbouring sites or regions. This data does indeed argue against the diffusion of techniques but does not refute the long recognized phenomenon of stimulus diffusion, the spread of the idea of an object, rather than the specific techniques of its manufacture (Kroeber 1940). While Mellars has also neglected to utilize the anthropological concept of stimulus diffusion in his ‘impossible coincidence’ argument (2005), his citation of ethnographic examples of long distance contact (Mellars 2005, 21–2; Mulvaney 1976; Murdock 1960) clearly shows that he recognizes that such contact can be as much an impetus to culture change as face to face interaction. This is an integral part of the stimulus diffusion concept defined by Kroeber. The ethnographic examples Kroeber uses to illustrate the concept demonstrate that instances of stimulus diffusion tend to occur as a result of either greater cultural distance (i.e. resistance to change or incomplete knowledge) or greater geographical distance between the affected and affecting societies when compared to instances of full diffusion. It is known that hunter-gatherers can be affected by mate­ rial culture diffusing as far as 1200km away from the source of the behaviour (Mulvaney 1976, map 3). In such a case, Neanderthals in the Dordogne could be affected by modern human populations in the Lower Danube even though only individual Neanderthals in the Lower Danube would be in direct contact with the moderns. Thus, although unacknowledged to date, the Gilbert B. Tostevin