Abstract
During almost ten years, an archaeological survey has been carried out in Molène Archipelago by a multidisciplinary team. The area appears to be particularly rich in Neolithic and Bronze Age remains and an exceptional concentration of megaliths has been brought to light. Several settlments are confirmed by dry-stone structures like in Beg ar Loued or by shell middens harbouring large quantities of bones and artefacts. These data give precious indications on the occupation chronology of the area. Moreover they allow for the first time in Brittany to reconstruct the everyday life during the late Prehistory. A prerequisite to this reconstruction was a better understanding of the environment evolution during this period, which locally implies a better knowledge of sea level fluctuations and its effects on landscapes as well as on vegetal and faunal resources.Results obtained via the paleogeographic reconstructions show that the archipelago during the Middle Neolithic II was already disconnected from the mainland by the Four channel which required boats to be crossed. Very well preserved, the megalithic monuments have therefore been erected and used by islanders being present on the archipelago for a long period time, starting from the middle of the Vth millenium BC, and spreading through the IV, III and IInd millenia. The distribution of the megalithic tombs reveals landscape occupation strategies which answer both cultural choices and natural constraints in a territory that undergoes a progressive fragmentation due to the dynamic of erosion linked to the rise of the sea level.Throughout the entire Neolithic and Bronze Age, geographic isolation has continued to increase, but in the meantime it did not imply specific cultural aspects, technical and artistic innovations having reached these island societies. Nevertheless, the increasing remoteness of the islands has fostered the search for livelihoods based on the intense exploitation of coastal ressources, through the gathering of seashells and shellfishes, fishing and coastal hunting. Although facing the sea, these people did not neglect what the land areas could offer as evidenced by the earl agro-pastoral practices in the archipelago.