Flake Tools Research Articles

Stone Axes and Flake Tools: Evaluations from Two New Guinea Highlands Societies

When Europeans entered the New Guinea Highlands in the 1930s, they discovered peoples using two main kinds of stone implements—polished axes and simple flake tools. The prominence of the axe has been well documented (S. Buhner, 1964; R. and S. Bulmer, 1964; Salisbury, 1962; Tischner, 1939; Vial, 1940 et al.). Crucial to subsistence, it was also used widely in exchanges and payments of all kinds and had a value as a ceremonial object. This seems to have been the case throughout the Highlands. Nevertheless, there were probably variations in the precise range of uses to which the axe was put, and consequently in its ‘value’. This comment is prompted by a consideration of two societies—Hagen in the Western Highlands and Wiru in the Southern Highlands Districts—whose traditional evaluations of the stone axe seem to have had differing emphases. In the past the axe was probably less important as a ceremonial object to the Wiru than it was to the Hageners, and its use as a tool more limited. The situation seems to have been correspondingly reversed in the case of the flake tool, however, which had generally more importance in Wiru.

Problems of the Early Palaeolithic in Japan

Since the first Palaeolithic site (Iwajuku in Honshu) was excavated in Japan twenty one years ago, some five hundred sites between the ages of 30000 and 10000 years BP have been inevestigated. Vertical stratifications of assemblages are present at some twenty of the sites, and thirteen radiocarbon determinations have now been obtained. On the basis of these materials, which are of course by no means sufficient, it is possible to suggest a general outline for the chronological sequence of the Late Palaeolithic cultures in Japan.In this paper, the writer wishes to discuss problems of the human occupation of Japan prior to 30000 BP. A radiocarbon determination in excess of 31900 BP has been obtained for Cultural Horizon 7 of Fukui Cave, and lithic artifacts are being recovered from the Musashino and Shimosueyoshi loam deposits which predate 30000 BP. As an example, Fig. 4 shows some columnar sections at the famous Iwajuku site in Honshu. Two assemblages named Iwajuku I and Iwajuku II were obtained from Locality A during excavation in 1949. The dark zone in which Iwajuku I occured is dated to 24000 BP. Recent re-investigation of the site have revealed the existence of another artifact-bearing horizon at Locality D: the artifacts are made in quarzite and the horizon is clearly below the Hassaki pumice layer. These artifacts, therefore, should predate to be 30000 BP (Fig. 5).These older assemblages include choppers, chopping-tools, pointed tools, proto-handaxes, flakes, cores, and hammer-stones. The ratio of flake tools to core tools is approximately 5:5 or 4:6. Frequently the implements are made on chert, quartz vein or quarzite. It is possible that Lower Palaeolithic peoples of mainland Asia reached Japan during the time of the last major sea transgression, and that, they or their descendants left the assemblages which we are now recovering. As to the feasibility of the entry, some geologists are now suggesting that the area of the Korean Strait was probably dry at the time of the transgression; therefore, human and faunal movements from the Asiatic mainland were not entirely impossible.

Flake Tools in the American Arctic: Some Speculations

AbstractTwo sites, Kogruk (at the summit of Anaktuvuk Pass, Alaska) and Engigstciak (at the head of the Firth River delta, Yukon Territory, Canada), have recently yielded flake-tool assemblages which show striking resemblances to a Eurasiatic flake-blade tradition based on a Levallois-Mousterian stone-chipping technique, and to the Clovis flake-blade tradition of America which appears to be based on a similar chipping technique. It is suggested that these traditions are historically related and that the Arctic sites provide a possible link between the two. The presence of incipient fluting in Siberia and at Engigstciak may prove significant. Dating is discussed in terms of the ecology and geology of the sites and is correlated with the probable periods of availability of the Bering land bridge. An upland-foothills zone is seen to be essentially continuous from central Asia to central North America. It is suggested that this zone provided the only environmentally compatible link between the two continents, and that it was therefore the most probable route of early hunting peoples into the New World.

The Neolithic Stone Industry of the North Karnataka Region

Neolithic sites of the North Karnataka region produce artifacts belonging to two distinct industries.1 The first comprises mainly blade and ‘geometric’ tools manufactured from a series of siliceous rocks. Their manufacture entails a definite tradition of core preparation and striking of bladeflakes.2 The second industry comprises core and flake tools manufactured from a group of igneous and metamorphic rocks. Their manufacture entails different techniques based upon flaking, grinding, and pecking. The artifacts to be studied here belong to the second industry.

Neanderthal Remains from Hither Asia

THE current number of Antiquity as usual contains several important papers. These include among others an article on “The Viking Taste in Pre–Conquest England” with excellent illustrations, and an account of “A Datable Ritual Barrow in Glamorganshire” by Sir Cyril Fox. But perhaps the most important information appears under the “Notes and News” and concerns a prehistoric find in Uzbekistan of flake tool industries associated with the remains of a Neanderthal child. Those who would like more details than this excellent précis can give should consult Asia (July and August, 1940) where A. P. Okladnikov has published two interim reports. The discovery itself was made in an immense rock–shelter called Teshik–Tash high up in the side of the Zautolosh Darya gorge not far from Tashkent and the Soviet–Afghan frontier. The rock–shelter is 61 ft. wide and 64 ft. deep; it is above the contour–levels frequented by shepherds and herds, and so has remained undisturbed by modern intruders. On the other hand, the plentiful remains of wild mountain goats found in the deposits evoke no surprise. There were four black archæological levels separated by clay–like sterile ones, but the industries from bottom to top showed no great culture–change.

Exploration of Kharga Oasis, 1932–33

A SUMMARY report of the expedition of the Royal Anthropological Institute to Kharga in 1932-33 appears in Man of November. This report covers the third and final season's work of the expedition as originally planned. Miss Caton-Thompson did not accompany the expedition on this occasion and Miss Gardner's attention was devoted mainly to the further geological exploration of the oasis and also to clearing up certain points from previous year's work. More than two hundred miles were carefully surveyed and in addition comparative studies were made in the Nile Valley from three bases. One of the most important of the results in relation to the main object of the expedition was the dating of the top tufa terrace at Refuf both by advanced Acheulean hand-axes in a scree deposit beneath the tufa and by core and flake tools without hand-axes inter-bedded in the tufa itself. This is the first time that implements have been found in such a situation. A number of shells new to Kharga were collected. An unmapped pass was discovered in lat. 25-5°. In a note commenting on the work of the expedition and the results, Miss Caton-Thompson directs attention once more to the difficulties attendant on archaeological work in Egypt owing to the unsatisfactory state of the antiquities laws. In this instance, the difficulty arises from the fact that the Egyptian Department of Antiquities has enforced on an expedition for geological and prehistoric research conditions which were framed to meet the requirements of dynastic and predynastic excavation. The Kharga expedition has provided unprecedented material for the typological study of early palaeolithic industries, but as Miss Caton-Thompson points out, their scientific value is entirely destroyed if picked specimens from a series forming a related whole are selected for retention in Egypt. She urges the immediate introduction of fresh regulations permitting the temporary export for purposes of study of such series, unmutilated by capricious selection.

A Workshop Site of Primitive Culture at Two-Mile-Bottom, Thetford

I think all agree that arrow tips would first have been made of (a) hard wood or bone ground to a sharp point (as used to-day in East Africa), later by (b) sharp-pointed unworked splinters or flakes of stone or flint, followed by (c) flakes worked diagonally at one end to a sharp point, and the other end inserted in the arrow shaft.As the worker's skill improved, these worked flake arrow tips would be superseded by (d) the beautifully flaked barbed and leaf arrows of the Neolithic and Bronze periods.The whole prehistoric world would obviously not have been at any one time in the same stage of culture. At all periods, and in all districts, tribes would have existed side by side in various stages of culture, the work of the “᾽prentice” hand alongside that of the “master worker.”It is therefore highly dangerous to assign an age to a worked flint solely by roughness of workmanship.This communication is to record a prehistoric workshop site at Two-Mile-Bottom Common, near Thetford, Norfolk, containing worked flake tools of a very definite culture.