SLOPE-DEPOSITS EROSION DURING THE MIDDLE NEOLITHIC IN NICE (ALPES-MARITIMES). GRANULOMETRIC INDICATORS AND INFLUENCE OF NATURAL AND ANTHROPOGENIC FACTORS

During the construction of an underground car park, archaeological excavations allowed the study of a Middle Neolithic alluvial soil buried under more than 8 m of sediment in the low alluvial plain of the Paillon river (Nice, Alpes-Maritimes). Chrono-stratigraphic, sedimentological, ceramological and paleo-ecological studies document the depositional conditions and the paleo-environmental context. They confirm the role of Neolithic communities in the degradation of the vegetation cover and the impact of agro-pastoral practices and extreme weather events on slope-deposits erosion. These anthropogenic erosion episodes are characterized by a blurred granulometric signature and the presence of heterometric and heterogeneous inclusions disconnected from the background granulometric signal.