Microblade–Based Societies in North China at the End of the Ice Age

Meng Zhang

doi:10.3390/quat3030020

Abstract

One of the most prominent cultural changes during the end of Ice Age in northeastern Asia was the adoption of microblade technology by prehistoric hunter–gatherers to deal with the challenge brought by the climate deterioration and oscillation during and post the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). The Pleistocene to Holocene transition in North China witnessed the rise of broader spectrum subsistence alongside a series of cultural changes, including adoption of food production, highly mobile lifeways being replaced by sedentism, and the formation of new social organization based on their agricultural land–use patterns. From the perspective of technological change, this project aims to build a socio–ecological framework to examine the cultural change of prehistoric microblade–based societies. In contrast to previous studies, the present research employs a macroecological approach based on Binford’s Constructing Frames of Reference (2001) to reconstruct the behaviors and demography of prehistoric foraging groups, under both modern and LGM climate conditions. Three case studies are conducted to show cultural and technological changes among microblade–based societies in North China during the Pleistocene–Holocene transition.

Highlights

During the Pleistocene to Holocene transition, northern China witnessed a broad spectrum revolution, intensification, and food production, and saw the increasing use of durable stone tools linked to a terrestrial plant–dependent economy and the fading of microblade technology linked to highly mobile hunting–dominated lifeways
Archaeological records suggest that the early Neolithic sites and sites with cultivation dated to the terminal Pleistocene are both located in relatively small habitats in basins, valleys and foothills of forest–steppe ecotones in the zone between the terrestrial plant threshold and the storage threshold in Lewis Binford’s system [3]
This project only focuses on the relationship between the rise of food production and the decline of microblade–based societies, within the time range from the Last Glacial Maximum to early Holocene

Summary

Introduction

During the Pleistocene to Holocene transition, northern China witnessed a broad spectrum revolution, intensification, and food production, and saw the increasing use of durable stone tools linked to a terrestrial plant–dependent economy and the fading of microblade technology linked to highly mobile hunting–dominated lifeways This process is generalized by Chen and Yu [1,2]. Most early sites associated with cultivation, ground stone tools, and microblade assemblages are located along the boundary of the gathering–fishing–dominated subsistence line, suggesting that prehistoric foraging societies might have been practicing a mixed economy This project only focuses on the relationship between the rise of food production and the decline of microblade–based societies, within the time range from the Last Glacial Maximum to early Holocene. In the following three sub–topics concerning Northern China, I apply the macroecological approach to study the development and decline of microblade–based societies under the background of the PNT, with the time range from the LGM to the early Holocene

Methodology

Archaeological Sites Associated with Microblade Technology in North China

Method

Microblade–Based

Archaeological sitesChina datedunder to theLGM

The Demise of Holocene