Journal of Lithic Studies
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Tool-use experiments to determine the function of an incised ground stone artefact with potential symbolic significance
Get PDFGround stone implements are found across most Australian landscapes and are often regarded as Aboriginal tools that were used for processing or modifying other items such as plant foods, plant fibres, resins, bone points, pigments and ground-stone axes and knives. Less common are ground stones modified for non-utilitarian, symbolic purposes; for example, polished and carved stone ornaments; ritual implements such as cylcons and tjuringa sacred stones; and unused, well-crafted ground-stone axes. In this paper, we report on the function and potential significance of an unusual ground stone artefact from a site near Bannockburn, southwestern Australia. A set of regularly spaced, shallow grooves has been cut into the surface of each side of the stone. Use-wear, residues and experimental replica tools indicate that the grooves were probably made with a stone flake and then used to shape or sharpen wooden implements such as spear points or the edges of boomerangs or other weapons. The microscopic wear outside the grooves indicates contact with soft wood or other plant material, possibly a soft plant fibre bag. We suggest that the Bannockburn artefact primarily functioned as a woodworking tool, but the even spacing of the incisions suggests that they were intentionally placed, perhaps to convey a special meaning, perhaps as a tally system or other form of communication
Red sandstone as raw material of Baden culture (Late Copper Age) grinding stones (Balatonőszöd - Temetői dűlő site, Hungary), with a review of the red sandstone formations of SW Hungary
Get PDFBalatonőszöd - Temetői dűlő is one of the largest excavated and longest-lived sites of the Late Copper Age Baden Culture in Hungary, where 500 lithic finds were registered. In the site finds belonging to the late Middle Copper Age Balaton-Lasinja Culture and the Late Copper Age Boleraz Culture were found too.
This paper presents petrographic and geochemical analyses of stone utensils, mostly of grinding stones, made of red, or discoloured white sandstones.
Almost all sandstone artefacts are upper and lower stones of grinding equipment and polishers, as well as objects whose function is not known, worked and non-worked fragments; boulders of raw material are also in the studied set.
The detailed petrographic and geochemical methods applied here are polarized light microscopy and a distribution study of the framework grains in thin section, and ICP-OES and ICP-MS as bulk rock chemical methods. The results were compared to published petrographic and geochemical data.
Most of the studied artefacts were made of the rocks of the Red Sandstone and Siltstone Member of the Balaton Highland Sandstone Formation, especially from the mature type sandstone in which quartz is predominant, and which is almost free of feldspar. This type is characteristic of the confines of the Southern Balaton Highland and the lower part of the formation in the Northern Balaton Highland.
A minor part of the studied artefacts - red or purple, purplish grey sandstones - originates from the sandstones of the Jakabhegy Sandstone Formation (Western Mecsek mountains)
Estrategias de aprovisionamiento y circulación de obsidiana negra en la costa norte de la provincia de Santa Cruz (Patagonia Argentina): movilidad e interacción humana
No full textIn this article, we examine the strategies behind the acquisition and reduction of black obsidian found in rock shelters and shell middens from the north coast of the Santa Cruz Province, in Argentine Patagonia. Geochemical analyses performed on black obsidian artifacts from this area posit the long-distance circulation of this raw material given its source at Pampa del Asador, located approximately 400 km to the west. In a previous article, we suggested that evidence for the initial knapping of obsidian pebbles, added to the identification of artifacts with high cortex percentage, implied that obtaining pieces of said raw material would have been based on pebble morphologies. Here we expand on this proposal, contending that this was the case at least for Late Holocene occupational contexts.
During the Middle Holocene an exceptionally low representation of very small-sized debris without cortical reserve was observed; cores and tools were not registered. Knapping activities related to intermediate technical steps in the framework of core reduction and blank production were evidenced, including small and very small flakes as well as bifacial preforms. We inferred that obsidian pieces probably entered into these Middle Holocene sites as part of personal toolkits, cores and bifacial artifacts without cortex, within the framework of exploratory incursions into the area.
For the Late Holocene occupations, taking into consideration the presence of obsidian pebbles, of similar dimensions to those registered at the source itself, we suggest that their procurement would have occurred through various mechanisms, such as the establishment and strengthening of social relations within the context of mobility circuits that would have linked the coast to the interior, among other factors.En este artículo, evaluamos las estrategias de aprovisionamiento y reducción de obsidiana negra registradas en refugios rocosos y sitios concheros ubicados en la costa norte de la provincia de Santa Cruz, en la Patagonia argentina. Los análisis geoquímicos realizados en artefactos de obsidiana negra de esta área muestran la circulación a larga distancia de esta materia prima identificada en la fuente Pampa del Asador, ubicada aproximadamente a 400 km al oeste. En un trabajo anterior, propusimos que el registro de evidencias de explotación inicial de guijarros de obsidiana, sumado a la identificación de artefactos con altos porcentajes de corteza, sugeriría que la obtención de piezas de dicha materia prima habría estado bajo morfologías de guijarros. Los resultados de esta presentación refuerzan esa idea, al menos para contextos ocupacionales asignables al Holoceno tardío.
En el Holoceno medio se observa una representación muy baja de productos de talla de tamaño muy pequeño sin reserva cortical, no se registran núcleos ni artefactos formatizados. Se evidencian actividades de talla relacionadas con estadio técnicos intermedios en el marco de la reducción del núcleo y la producción en nódulos, probablemente con tamaños pequeños o muy pequeños, y preformas bifaciales. Se infiere el probable ingreso a los sitios de piezas como parte de equipos de herramientas personales, núcleos y artefactos bifaciales sin corteza, en el marco de los momentos de exploración.
Para las ocupaciones del Holoceno tardío, en función del hallazgo de guijarros de obsidiana que poseen dimensiones similares a las registradas en la propia fuente, interpretamos que su adquisición se habría producido a través de varios mecanismos vinculados, entre otros factores, con el establecimiento y fortalecimiento de relaciones sociales en el marco de circuitos de movilidad que unirían la costa y el interior
Kimberley points of Western Australia: Pressure flaking, projections and prestige
Get PDFKimberley points are pressure flaked bifaces with marginal projections, produced within the last millennium, in north Western Australia. These points were hafted for hunting and fighting in recent times, although there is some suggestion that smaller points tended to be hafted for use in favour of larger points, which were reserved for trade and exchange. Kimberley Points are imbued with strong social signalling and prestige qualities, known from Historic times. This paper examines whether these qualities are reflected archaeologically in their marginal projections produced with pressure flaking; and their morphology and production. Multiple sources of Kimberley Point archaeology, ethnography, and production are critically reviewed. As prestige items, the marginal projections are found to very likely relate to their social value, rather than functional drive, which this study investigates using morphological approaches. Samples from both ethnographic collections and archaeological surface assemblages are analysed. The study finds that biface elongation, length and perimeter length each greatly influenced the number of and size of marginal projections, regardless of raw material. This aspect of production probably reflects the value and social prestige for large serrated points, likely produced by the knapper before an audience in virtuoso displays of pressure flaking. It is conceivable that these complex social practices emerged around 1,000 years ago. This study provides a rare glimpse into the social values of stone tool produces, and links archaeological data to social values in the past
On the reconstruction of prehistoric social territories: The La Désirade lithic workshops and the distribution of La Désirade chert (French West Indies)
Get PDFThe widespread presence of raw materials suitable for the production of stone tools on the south-eastern part of La Désirade, a small island east of Guadeloupe (French West Indies), is an interesting feature as these materials cannot be obtained on most of the neighbouring limestone islands. Small amounts of lithic off-site material have been found all over the south-eastern part of La Désirade, indicating that this area was incidentally used for the exploitation of local raw materials for the production of lithic artefacts. Concentrated and repeated activity, related to the exploitation of La Désirade chert, took place at four lithic workshops.
This paper aims to reconstruct social and economic patterns, which may shed a light on prehistoric Amerindian territoriality and mobility, based on the exploitation and distribution of this local raw material. An inventory was made of sites where La Désirade chert was exploited and worked and of sites where this material showed up in the form of worked items.
The La Désirade chert has been found in several prehistoric site assemblages outside La Désirade itself. However, it turns out to have a very restricted distribution, not exceeding 30 km distances from the raw material occurrences. The authors concluded that exploiting these sources may have been embedded in the general procurement strategy of the seafaring communities involved and that the observed distribution may demonstrate the extent of the territory of closely related communities that exploited a similar catchment area
A Great Step Forward. Lithic Raw Material Procurement and Management among Palaeolithic Hunter-Gatherers in the Basque Crossroads
Get PDFThis paper is divided into three sections. The first section describes the historiographic evolution of the study of prehistoric lithic raw materials in the Basque Crossroads (in the north of the Iberian Peninsula) during the last three decades. The second section explains the currently available information about geological outcrops of flint in the eastern end of the Cantabrian Mountain range (the Basque-Cantabrian Basin), the upper Ebro valley and both sides of the western Pyrenees, in the central part of the northern Iberian Peninsula, as that was the main raw material used by hunter-gatherer groups in the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic. Finally, the last section describes the way in which progress in both aspects of research have enabled the introduction of new concepts and perspectives in the reconstruction of the social and economic dynamics of Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers. This has given rise to an innovative methodology that is able to address and solve important issues, particularly regarding mobility and territoriality patterns of those human groups, allowing the proposal of mobility and territoriality models that, while they will not match exactly the systems used by Upper Palaeolithic communities, represent significant progress in understanding the social and economic dynamics of hunter-gatherer groups
Ground stone tools from the copper production site Al-Khashbah, Sultanate of Oman
Get PDFArchaeological research at Al-Khashbah, Sultanate of Oman, conducted by the University of Tübingen, revealed a large Early Bronze Age (3rd millennium BCE) site. During the intensive surface survey and excavations, several ground stone tools were found. Most of them came from the vicinity of monumental stone and mud-brick structures, so-called towers, and are clearly connected to copper-processing waste such as slag, furnace fragments and prills, i.e., droplets of molten copper. Therefore, it is assumed that these ground stone tools were used within the operational procedures of copper-processing. Interestingly, only the monumental towers from the first half of the 3rd millennium BCE, i.e., the Hafit period, feature larger quantities of ground stone tools as well as copper processing waste. Towers from the second half of the 3rd millennium BCE, i.e., the Umm an-Nar period, have none. Within the scope of this paper, the distribution of the different types of ground stone tools in Al-Khashbah as well as their find context will be presented. They are illustrated with drawings generated from 3D models created using digital photography processed with the software Agisoft Photoscan. Comparisons with other 3rd millennium BCE sites in Eastern Arabia show that there as well, copper-processing remains are often associated with ground stone tools. The overall variety of types seems to be rather homogeneous in the region
Objectifying processes: The use of geometric morphometrics and multivariate analyses on Acheulean tools
Get PDFNowadays, the fruitful discussion regarding the morphological variability of handaxes during the Middle Pleistocene has reached a decisive moment with the use of more accurate statistical methods, such as geometric morphometrics (GM) and multivariate analyses (MA). This paper presents a preliminary methodological approach for checking the utility of these new approaches on the analysis of the tools’ shape. It goes beyond the simple description of morphology and isolates the variables which define the final morphology of a tool. We compared two Middle Pleistocene sites, Boxgrove and Swanscombe, which are morphologically very different. Then, we applied the GM analysis on 1) 2D images, with two semi-landmark distributions: 28 semi-landmarks, specially concentrated on the tip and butt, and 60 equally spaced points; and 2) on 3D models using new software (AGMT3-D Software) including 5000 semi-landmarks. The more points used to define the tool’s outline, the more accurate will be the interpretation of the variables affecting shape. On the other hand, if the semi-landmarks are localized on specific sectors of the tool, a bias is created, by concentrating on those sectors, rather than the general tool shape. The 3D models offer a new dimension on the shape analysis, as their results mean the combination of plan-shape, profile-shape and the tool’s topography
Chert procurement in Corsica during the Neolithic: Inferring social territories in the Tyrrhenian islands
Get PDFFrom the Neolithic, foreign siliceous materials were imported into Corsica as the island lacks local chert and obsidian. Such a context constitutes a real opportunity to investigate the relationship of the island with surrounding areas, in perspective with cultural evolutions. For 20 years, chert sourcing studies were carried out. We took into account 26 sites, dating from the Ancient Neolithic to the Final Neolithic. The work is based on non-destructive petro-archaeological observations of the artefacts. and on the survey and characterization of Sardinian sources (320 samples collected and 60 different lithotypes characterized).
The study aims to better understand the place of chert among the lithic assemblages throughout time and identify the provenance of most of the chert material introduced into Corsica. It reveals procurement evolution in terms of preferred facies and of stages of introduction, depending on the chronology and geographical situation of the sites. The results confirm connections with Sardinia, among which Perfugas basin constitutes a major source of raw material for Corsica. It also shows relations with the Italian Peninsula for some Middle Neolithic sites in Northern Corsica. Comparisons with data from Sardinia show the affinities and differences between the two islands and open further avenues for research
The Piney Branch site (District of Columbia, U.S.A.) and the significance of the quarry-refuse model for the interpretation of lithics sites
Get PDFIn the 1870s the amateur archaeologist Dr Charles Abbott discovered roughly-flaked bifacial artefacts that he called “paleoliths” near Trenton, New Jersey, which he claimed were artefact types similar to Lower Palaeolithic handaxes being found in western Europe at that time. This interpretation gave rise to what has been called the Great Palaeolithic War, a debate in the United States about the existence of an “American Palaeolithic” that only ended in 1890 when the archaeologist William H. Holmes from the Smithsonian Institution excavated the Piney Branch lithics site in Washington D.C.. On the basis of the bifacial reduction sequence that he reconstructed from the lithics excavated at Piney Branch, Holmes argued that any resemblance of paleoliths to Lower Palaeolithic handaxes was accidental. Holmes believed that paleoliths were discarded elements from the sequential reduction of stone nodules (which he called the “Progressive Series”) by recent American Indian knappers during the manufacture of projectile points. In other words, the Trenton paleoliths, and by implication similar roughly-flaked bifaces, were nothing more than quarry refuse (or “waste”). Since Holmes’ day the quarry-refuse model for the interpretation of large roughly-flaked bifacial implements as “waste” and not artefact types used in other activities, particularly for lithics sties in the arid western regions of the US, has been applied at times without adequate bridging arguments. A review of Holmes’ interpretation of the Piney Branch evidence suggests that his quarry-refuse model, even when applied to Piney Branch, required numerous untested assumptions, and that the model may inadvertently obscure a range of other prehistoric activities not strictly related to quarrying and knapping. As a consequence, the application of the quarry-refuse model today to lithics sites found in North America without careful examination may also fail to identify the complete range of cultural activity at those sites, and should be applied to lithics sites only with due caution and the testing of alternative hypotheses