Determining Stone Tool Use: Chemical and Morphological Analyses of Residues on Experimentally Manufactured Stone Tools

Abstract

We report on experimental and chemical investigation of bamboo and bone residues on used and unused modern stone tools. Flakes used were manufactured from a chert nodule and employed in three ways: splitting of bamboo, scraping and splintering of bone; others were left unused. Specimens were examined using light microscopy, SEM, and EDS elemental analysis. Tools used to process bamboo and bone exhibited chemically and morphologically distinct bamboo and bone residues. Similarity in morphology between isolated bamboo mineral and residue on stone tools used to process bamboo indicates the bamboo mineral material adheres to tool surfaces. All residue morphologies persisted through a treatment designed to simulate diagenesis, suggesting that processing residues may persist on ancient tools. The elemental signatures of the residues were slightly altered by the diagenesis treatment, but remained distinctly different from one another. EDS elemental analysis and SEM examination, when used in conjunction with the chemical signature and morphology of suspected residue sources, has potential to yield definitive answers to questions of ancient tool use.