On the Methodology of Classifying Cores

Abstract

Cores - i.e., the residual product of the utilization of flint nodules by ancient men to produce tool-blocks - are, as much or even more than these blocks themselves, indicators of the technical skills in flint-flaking which the inhabitants of a given settlement, geographical area or larger geographic region possessed. The importance of cores in this respect has been remarked upon repeatedly by various writers, [1, p. 7; 2] and therefore a careful examination of core-shapes, and the nature of changes in them, both in the process of working and in the course of the natural evolution of technical skills (which occurs parallel to that of man himself) is very important to evaluation of any paleolithic artifact. The most recent work of S. A. Semenov demonstrated convincingly, on the basis of experimental data, that evaluation of any paleolithic artifact must be based primarily on a study of the techniques accessible to the inhabitants of the given settlement. [3] A study of the nature of the technique, which is most vividly manifested specifically in cores and rough tool-blocks, study of the manner in which secondary working is applied to the primary block, and identification on this basis of groups with similar technical traditions constitute the means of investigating any lower paleolithic artifact. However, successful progress in this direction requires firmly developed principles and a unified system of typological characteristics and definitions which would, on the one hand, be thoroughly permeated with this unified technological approach to the material and, on the other hand, would yield a developed scale of names for these forms that would reflect these evolutionary changes in technique. However, the disarray presently existing in terminology, and the imprecision of the methodological principles employed when data are published, often lead to an insufficiently exact idea of the technical features of the artifact. The publication of many archeological sites has resolved itself merely to a generalized, scholastic listing of sets of tools similar in typological or functional forms, considered in isolation from each other. The major shortcoming of this type of publication is the absence of a precise (technical) criterion in typological evaluation of materials.