1,721,396 research outputs found
Handaxe typology and Lower Palaeolithic cultural development: ficrons, cleavers and two giant handaxes from Cuxton
No full textOne small test pit dug off Rochester Road, Cuxton in August 2005 produced over twenty handaxes, including two of exceptional size and quality. This volume in honour of RJ MacRae, properly known of course as Mac, provides the ideal opportunity to report briefly on the circumstances of their discovery and not only to indulge in their aesthetic qualities, but also to consider some of their wider implications. It is now clear that throughout the Lower Palaeolithic, there is a trend for handaxe shapes to become both more varied and increasingly recognisable as intentionally executed types. The Lower Palaeolithic is perhaps not, therefore, the period of stasis that is often suggested, but incorporates a trajectory of cultural, cognitive and behavioural development that is continued into, and through, the Middle Palaeolithic
Smith, Francis Joseph, [No Service Number]
No full textThis record was harvested from a previous catalogue system and will be withdrawn in 2025. Information in this record may be superseded or incomplete. Visit this record in UMA's new catalogue at: https://archives.library.unimelb.edu.au/nodes/view/417685Surname: SMITH. Given Name(s) or Initials: FRANCIS JOSEPH. Military Service Number or Last Known Location: [No Registration Number]. Missing, Wounded and Prisoner of War Enquiry Card Index Number: 27915.240620
Item: [2016.0049.49946] "Smith, Francis Joseph, [No Service Number]
Neanderthals in Britain: flint finds open new era in prehistory
No full textArchaeologists in Kent have found the earliest evidence of Neanderthals in Britain: two flint scrapers, found lying on a land-surface c.100,000 years old, have pushed back the presence of Neanderthals in Britain by 40,000 years. Dr Francis wenban-Smith explains the evidence
The palaeolithic archaeology of Baker's Hole : a case study for focus in lithic analysis
No full textM25 roadworks reveal earliest UK Neanderthal occupation at Dartford
No full textAs anyone travelling on the roads of southeast England between 2006 and 2008 has probably been aware, major improvements have recently been made at the junction of the M25 and A2 motorways, south of the main Dartford crossing of the River Thames (Fig. 1). The roadworks, funded by the UK Highways Agency, with the main contractors Jacobs Babtie and Costain, were accompanied by archaeological investigations carried out by Oxford Archaeology between 2003 and 2006. The archaeological programme had a major Palaeolithic/Pleistocene element under my direction (Fig. 2) that has produced evidence of Neanderthal occupation early in the last glaciation (the Devensian, which lasted from 115 000 to 10 000 bp), during a period when Britain had until now, been thought to have been entirely deserted
Bringing behaviour into focus: archaic landscapes and lithic technology
No full textThis paper focuses on moving beyond characterization of the Lower and Middle Palaeolithic in terms of thetechnology and typology of lithic artefacts, to address the behaviour and cognitive capabilities of theArchaic hominid communities of which the lithic evidence is the most abundant trace. Although undisturbedevidence from short-lived episodes of activity has previously been emphasized for its potential for behaviouralreconstruction, it is suggested here that the excavation of palimpsests representing the conflated evidencefrom repeated episodes of activity may, paradoxically, give a clearer view of the behaviour of Archaichominids and, in particular, their capacity for a modern style of adaptation. This approach is exploredthrough a case-study at the site of Red Barns, Hampshire, where the lithic evidence reveals a clear patternof handaxe manufacture and removal, suggesting use of the site as a tooling-up base and implying thecapacity for Archaic hominids to anticipate future tool needs and equip in advance accordingly
Alien Registration- Smith, Francis M. (Fort Kent, Aroostook County)
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The Lower Palaeolithic site at Red Barns, Portchester: bifacial technology, raw material quality, and the organisation of archaic behaviour
No full textThe site at Red Barns was excavated in 1975, but the large lithic collection remained unstudied following preliminary examination. This paper reports on further analysis of the lithic material from the site, together with a reappraisal of the faunal remains and original mineralogical analyses, and the results of processing sediment samples from the 1975 excavation. An abundant molluscan assemblage was recovered from the deposits covering the main archaeological horizon, allowing climatic/environmental reconstruction and amino acid dating. The synthesis of these data indicates the site to be older than previously thought, dating to between 425,000 and 200,000 BP.Analysis of the lithic material has suggested that the site is an undisturbed palimpsest of flint tools and debitage. The poor, severely frost-fractured nature of the raw material used for knapping, together with the location of the site on a Chalk outcrop, have enabled investigation of some assumptions about the influences upon knapping technology of i) poor quality raw material and ii) local availability of flint fresh from Chalk bedrock. The persistent manufacture of finely worked plano-convex handaxes suggests that, even in an area where fresh Chalk flint must have been abundant, the immediately available poor quality flint source was not a bar to formation of an assemblage dominated by handaxe production. Secondly, the emphasis on carefully shaped pointed plano-convex handaxes suggests that this shape was both deliberately imposed and not dictated by a lack of local availability of flint fresh from the Chalk. Behaviour at the site was investigated by analysis of the organisation of the lithic production and it was demonstrated that, while some handaxes and flake-tools were abandoned at the site and some flake core reduction also took place there, the dominant pattern was for handaxes to be made at the site and then removed and abandoned elsewhere
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