The British Final Magdalenian: Society, settlement and raw material movements revealed through LA-ICP-MS trace element analysis of diagnostic artefacts

Raw material movements and group mobility in the British Final Magdalenian is poorly understood. Following a review of the British Final Magdalenian (Creswellian), this paper presents preliminary results of a major LA-ICP-MS trace elemental characterization of British bedrock flint regions, and compare to these characterizations of artefacts from three assemblages from the first half of the Late Glacial Interstadial (the Meiendorf) classed as Final Magdalenian. The results successfully distinguish between major bedrock flint regions, and artefacts can be linked to these with confidence. The results reveal the importance of East Anglia, the Lincolnshire Wolds and the Salisbury Plain as lithic sources for artefacts from Farndon Fields (Nottinghamshire), Bradgate Park (Leicestershire) and Wey Manor Farm (Surrey), to which some flints were transported over distances ranging from the local to >200 km. The results are reviewed in the context of continental raw material movements.