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Pech II
Pech II was discovered by Bordes in 1948, due in part to the fact that some of the talus of this locale had been cut away in the construction of a rail line that runs parallel to the cliff at this point. He excavated there from 1949 to 1951 and then again from 1967-1969. Both outside the mouth of the cave and within the cave itself was an occupational sequence which began with the so-called Meridional Acheulian (now considered by many to be an early Mousterian) followed by a variety of mostly Typical Mousterian industries. Schwartz and Blackwell published two U-series dates from Pech II and two from Pech I, and Grün et al. published a series of ESR dates based on 29 teeth from Pech II. Both sets of dates give a consistent picture, though the ESR dates provide more detail. They indicate that Pech II was occupied between oxygen-isotope stages 6 and 3, with a break in the sequence between the lower layers 5-9 (stage 6) and the upper layers, 2-4, which seem to span from middle stage 5 until stage 3.
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