Human Adaptive Responses to Environmental Change During the Pleistocene-Holocene Transition in the Japanese Archipelago

It is well known that environmental conditions from the Late Pleniglacial to the Preboreal fluctuated abruptly. To explain lithic technological and human behavioral change for this period, the influence of environmental changes driven by climatic fluctuation should be addressed. This paper discusses human adaptive responses to environmental change during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition (19,000 ~ 10,000 cal BP) in the Japanese archipelago, compiling radiocarbon ages that have recently accumulated throughout this archipelago and analyzing diachronic and interregional variability of lithic technology, its organizational characteristics, and its role in reflecting human responses to environmental change. Through these analyses, we consider human behavioral variation within the context of paleoenvironmental changes during this transitional period.