Manufacturing technique and social identity: three cases of ‘manufacture-by-wear’ technique

Abstract

This paper focuses on the identification of changes in the processing of osse- ous materials in the southeast European Neolithic, beginning with three types of production by manufacture wear technique typical for the region: bipartition by abrasion, segmentation with fibre and perforation by wear technique. The processing of osseous materials is strongly conditioned by their natural anatomic shapes which is why only a restricted range of possible transformation variables, with minimum changes through time, would be expected. However, numerous specialists invoke the cultural value conferred by the community as the preeminent element in the selection of raw material more than the limitations of the raw material form. Therefore, there are some examples in which there was little change in raw materials selec- tion across long periods of time, although there was variation in animal species availability. Consequently, the study of the three types of ‘manufacture-by-wear’ technique becomes more interesting. These techniques are not present in all prehistoric times in this region. Some of these techniques appear on worked osseous materials in Romania and neighbouring areas at the beginning of the Neolithic and disappear just as suddenly (bipartition by abrasion) or appear only sporadically (perforation and segmentation with fibre) by the Early Chalcolithic. Based on experimental reconstructions of the three processing techniques and comparing them with archaeological assemblages, our study aims to register all the relevant variables (technological gestures, time required for each operation, tools used etc.), and evaluate if they represented a real innovation in the way which the osseous materials were processed.