Loading...
15 results
Search Results
Now showing 1 - 10 of 15
- Quina retouch does not maintain edge angle over reductionPublication . Lin, Sam C.; Marreiros, JoaoThe Quina scraper features an important role in the discussion of European Middle Palaeolithic variability. Explanations for its characteristic retouch and blank morphology have ranged from economic to functional and cultural considerations. One hypothesis is that Quina retouch maintains the edge angle of the retouched margin, allowing the upkeep of high cutting potential despite repeated resharpening. In this study, we examine this hypothesis by using a sample of scrapers from the Middle Palaeolithic site of Roc de Marsal in southwest France. The results show that, when the influence of reduction intensity and flake thickness are controlled, Quina retouch has no detectable impact on the retouched edge angle. Instead, the overall higher edge angles among Quina scrapers are a product of continuous reduction and the use of thicker blanks. We discuss possible factors underlying the occurrence of Quina retouch with respect to lithic economy and function.
- Evaluating the microscopic effect of brushing stone tools as a cleaning procedurePublication . Pedergnana, Antonella; Calandra, Ivan; Bob, Konstantin; Gneisinger, Walter; Paixão, Eduardo; Schunk, Lisa; Hildebrandt, Andreas; Marreiros, JoaoCleaning stone tool surfaces is a common procedure in lithic studies. The first step widely applied at any archeological site (and/or at field laboratories) is the gross removal of sediment from the surfaces of artifacts. Lithic surface alterations due to mechanical action applied in wet or dry cleaning regimes have never been examined at a microscopic scale. This could have important implications in traceology, as any modern surface modifications inflicted on archeological artifacts might compromise their functional interpretations. The current trend toward quantification of use-wear traces makes the testing even more important, as even slight, apparently invisible surface alterations might be measured. In order to evaluate the impact of common cleaning procedures, we undertook a controlled experiment. The main aim of this experiment was to assess the effects that brushing actions applied for removing sediment particles have on flint and quartzite surfaces. All surfaces were analyzed with confocal microscopy before and after having been brushed to quantify possible changes in the micro-topography. Surface roughness parameters (ISO 25178-2 among others) were applied. Nine parameters changed significantly when mechanical actions were applied to lithic surfaces, meaning that some changes in the surface micro-topography were detected. Therefore, archeologists need to be cautious when applying prolonged mechanical actions for cleaning archeological stone tools.
- Rethinking use-wear analysis and experimentation as applied to the study of past hominin tool usePublication . Marreiros, Joao; Calandra, Ivan; Gneisinger, Walter; Paixão, Eduardo; Pedergnana, Antonella; Schunk, LisaIn prehistoric human populations, technologies played a fundamental role in the acquisition of different resources and are represented in the main daily living activities, such as with bone, wooden, and stone-tipped spears for hunting, and chipped-stone tools for butchering. Considering that paleoanthropologists and archeologists are focused on the study of different processes involved in the evolution of human behavior, investigating how hominins acted in the past through the study of evidence on archeological artifacts is crucial. Thus, investigat ing tool use is of major importance for a comprehensive understanding of all processes that characterize human choices of raw materials, techniques, and tool types. Many functional assumptions of tool use have been based on tool design and morphology according to archeologists’ interpretations and ethnographic observations. Such assumptions are used as baselines when inferring human behavior and have driven an improvement in the methods and techniques employed in functional studies over the past few decades. Here, while arguing that use-wear analysis is a key discipline to assess past hominin tool use and to interpret the organization and variability of artifact types in the archeological record, we aim to review and discuss the current state-of-the-art methods, protocols, and their limitations. In doing so, our discussion focuses on three main topics: (1) the need for fundamental improvements by adopting established methods and techniques from similar research fields, (2) the need to implement and combine different levels of experimentation, and (3) the crucial need to establish standards and protocols in order to improve data quality, standard ization, repeatability, and reproducibility. By adopting this perspective, we believe that studies will increase the reliability and applicability of use-wear methods on tool function. The need for a holistic approach that combines not only use-wear traces but also tool technology, design, curation, durability, and efficiency is also debated and revised. Such a revision is a crucial step if archeologists want to build major inferences on human decision making behavior and biocultural evolution processes.
- A ‘family of wear’: traceological patterns on pebbles used for burnishing pots and processing other plastic mineral mattersPublication . Dubreuil, Laure; Robitaille, Jérôme; Gonzalez-Urquijo, Jesús; Marreiros, Joao; Stroulia, AnnaThe development of technologies related to plastic mineral matters (PMM), including clay, mud, and plaster, represents a major step in cultural evolution because of their important repercussions for food processing, storage, transportation, construction, and symbolic expression in past human societies. This paper aims to illuminate the chaines operatoires employed in the transformation of PMM and highlight early evidence for these technologies in the archaeological record. Our focus is 'ad-hoc' (or non-manufactured) ground stone tools used in finishing operations. Specifically, we discuss pebbles and cobbles employed to regularize, smooth, or burnish clay and mud-based products. Because these tools consist of unmodified rocks, recognizing and understanding the traces developed through use is essential for their identification. This is a pilot study that draws on experiments, ethnographic studies and quantification via confocal microscopy to assess the variability of use-wear developed on mud and clay processors. Extra attention is placed on micro-polish, not only because this type of wear has been seldom described before for such tools, but also because it appears to be highly diagnostic. We suggest that the variability observed can be described as a family of wear, that is, a range of recurrent use-wear characteristics associated with the processing of PMM. We analyze two collections associated with different chrono-cultural contexts: the Late Natufian site of Hilazon Tachtit in the Southern Levant and the Late Neolithic site of Kremasti-Kilada in Greece. At both sites, the identification of processors of PMM provides pivotal data to understand the relevant chaines operatoires, assess the emergence and development of these technologies, and also explore symbolic behaviors.
- Aurignacian dynamics in Southeastern Europe based on spatial analysis, sediment geochemistry, raw materials, lithic analysis, and use-wear from Românești-DumbrăvițaPublication . Chu, Wei; McLin, Scott; Wöstehoff, Luisa; Ciornei, Alexandru; Gennai, Jacopo; Marreiros, Joao; Doboș, AdrianThe Aurignacian is one of the first cultural-technological traditions commonly associated with the expansion of Homo sapiens in Europe. Early Homo sapiens demographics across the continent are therefore typically inferred using the distribution of Aurignacian assemblages. Western Romania has been used as a tie-point to connect the well-researched lithic assemblages from the eastern Mediterranean and Western Europe through its early Homo sapiens fossils. However, Romania's archeological record remains underexplored thereby hindering our ability to directly connect better understood regions through time and space. Here we report on excavations from the open-air Middle/Upper Paleolithic site of Romanesti-Dumbravista I in southwestern Romania. Three stratified Paleolithic assemblages were extensively excavated within a 1-m-thick eolian-deposited sequence. Spatial, geochemical, raw material, techno-typological, and use-wear analysis of the site reveal patterns of artifact configuration, resource exploitation, fire history, knapping objectives, and functionality. Taken together, Romanesti-Dumbravista I is the first well-contextualized archeological site in close spatiotemporal proximity to many early, well-preserved human fossils and in East-Central Europe.
- Archaeology of the Pleistocene-Holocene transition in Portugal: synthesis and prospectsPublication . Gameiro, Cristina; Aubry, Thierry; Almeida, Francisco; Dimuccio, Luca; Gabriel, Sónia; Gaspar, Rita; Gomes, Sérgio; Valcarce, Ramón Fábregas; Figueiredo, Sofia; Manzano, Carmen; Marreiros, Joao; Oliveira, Cláudia; Santos, André Tomás; Silva, Maria João; Tereso, João Pedro; Xavier, PedroThe Tardiglacial of Portugal has been associated with the Magdalenian culture and lithic industries characterized by tool miniaturization, a diversity of microlith types, and the absence of a intentional blade production. The technological characterization, the chronology and the phasing of the Portuguese Magdalenian have been defined based on data recovered from open-air sites of the Estremadura region (Central Portugal). This paper presents an overview of the research undertaken over the last twenty-five years, including results from research and preventive archaeology fieldwork outside this region, namely in the Côa, Sabor and Vouga Valleys (northern Portugal), as well as in the Guadiana Valley and Algarve regions (southern Portugal). Our chronological boundaries are the Greenland Stadial 2-1b and the 8.2 ka event, from Early Magdalenian to Early Mesolithic. Regarding vegetation, deciduous Quercus underwent expansion during the warm phases of the Tardiglacial and retracted during cold ones, when pines increased. After the Solutrean, the faunal assemblages show a decrease in the variability of the represented species and an increase in fish, birds, small mammals and rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus). Concerning the cultural sequence, the Middle Magdalenian remains uncharacterised. After the Upper Magdalenian, and thenceforward, the use of local raw materials and of cores-on-flakes (burin or carinated endscraper type) for bladelet production gradually increased. In terms of lithic armatures typology, a four-stage sequence can be discerned: 1) Upper Magdalenian with axial points rather than backed bladelets, quite common in previous phases; 2) Final Magdalenian with an increase in the diversity of armature types; 3) Azilian with geometric microliths, curved backed points (Azilian points) and Malaurie points, and 4) Early Mesolithic without retouched bladelet tools or at best a persistence of Azilian armature types. There were some changes in the Palaeolithic rock art of the Douro basin between phase 3 (Final Magdalenian) and phase 4 (Late Azilian): figurative animal representations give place to animal depictions characterized by their geometrical bodies, often filled-in, and red deer becomes the best-represented animal.
- Controlled experiments in lithic technology and functionPublication . Marreiros, Joao; Pereira, Telmo; Iovita, RaduFrom the earliest manifestations of tool production, technologies have played a fundamental role in the acquisition of different resources and are representative of daily activities in the lives of ancient humans, such as hunting (stone-tipped spears) and meat processing (chipped stone tools) (Lombard 2005; McPherron et al. 2010; Lombard and Phillipson 2010; Brown et al. 2012; Wilkins et al. 2012; Sahle et al. 2013; Joordens et al. 2015; Ambrose 2001; Stout 2001). Yet many questions remain, such as how and why technological changes took place in earlier populations, and how technological traditions, innovations, and novelties enabled hominins to survive and disperse across the globe (Klein 2000; McBrearty and Brooks 2000; Henshilwood et al. 2001; Marean et al. 2007; Brown et al. 2012; Režek et al. 2018).
- Editorial paper special issue “Contact materials: the ‘Other’ in experimental use-wear studies”Publication . Marreiros, Joao; Thaler, Ulrich; Macdonald, Danielle A.Archaeological research focuses on a comprehensive understanding of when, how, and why past human populations changed their behav iour over time. Understanding these processes is fundamental to rec ognising the origins and character of behavioural choices that fashioned cultural and social variability, and consequently shaped our current society (Ambrose, 2010; d’Errico and Stringer, 2011; Stout, 2011). Among these processes, technological changes are known to reflect and impact human decision-making processes, illuminating the emergence and shifts of key human behavioural traits. From the earliest production of sharp-edge stone tools to modern material culture, changes and in novations in technological toolkits are associated with the social, cul tural, and behavioural dynamics of human populations (Ambrose, 2001; Foley and Lahr, 2003; Kuhn, 2020). Although the earliest technologies persisted for thousands of years, and sometimes millions of years, there is regional and chronological variability within typological categories. Even if major technological changes can be identified in the archaeo logical record (both in time and space), the meaning of these changes in the context of early human behavioural dynamics is not always easy to assess. In archaeological research, identifying variability in the archaeo logical record helps us decode and reconstruct past human actions. To do so, archaeologists build concepts, definitions, and interpretations using middle-range theory, including analysis of ethnographic obser vations or hypothesis testing. Hence, when studying the archaeological record, experimental replication of potential past human activities is used to make inferences about how technology was used in the past, allowing archaeologists to reconstruct human behavioural processes (Ascher, 1961; Carrell, 1992; Coles, 1979; Ferguson and Neeley, 2010; Outram, 2008). In other words, experimentation in archaeological research has been used as a crucial method to evaluate hypotheses and assumptions based on researchers’ initial observations and interpretations.
- Late Pleistocene Landscape and Settlement Dynamics of Portuguese EstremaduraPublication . Haws, Jonathan; Benedetti, Michael; Funk, Caroline L.; Bicho, Nuno; Pereira, Telmo; Marreiros, Joao; Daniels, J. Michael; Forman, Steven L.; Minckley, Thomas A.; Denniston, Rhawn F.Here we report the results of an integrated geoarchaeological survey to study Palaeolithic human settlement dynamics in the coastal region of Portuguese Estremadura. The region has been an important focus of human occupation across multiple glacial-interglacial cycles, including periods of well-documented abrupt climate instability during MIS 3 and 2. The pedestrian survey covered a roughly 10 km wide strip of land between Sao Pedro de Muel and Peniche. The survey intensively targeted three landscape settings with Pleistocene-age surfaces and sediments: the coastal bluffs with exposed aeolian, fluvial, and colluvial sands; the Caldas da Rainha diapiric valley and associated fluvial/estuarine fills; and, Cretaceous chert-rich limestone uplands that bound the inland margin of the study area. We discovered dozens of new Palaeolithic sites, analyzed numerous Pleistocene sedimentary sections, and applied widespread OSL-dating to establish age control that allowed us to build a regional geomorphic history to contextualize Late Pleistocene human settlement across the region.
- The role of artificial contact materials in experimental use-wear studies: A controlled proxy to understand use-wear polish formationPublication . Schunk, Lisa; Gneisinger, Walter; Calandra, Ivan; Marreiros, JoaoTraceological studies aim at the recognition and the identification of use-wear traces on artefacts to gain a functional interpretation of past human technologies. However, the development of use-wear traces is known to be dependent on different mechanics involved, such as those related to the contact materials, but also to the tool raw material and morphology, the use intensity and the performed task. Therefore, an understanding of the fundamental mechanics affecting wear formation is necessary to build reliable interpretations based on causation. The cause-effect relationship between individual variables and the formation of use-wear can only be inves-tigated by conducting controlled, second-generation experiments. To test individual variables, others have to be standardised. This applies, for instance, to the contact material. The here presented sequential second-generation experiment tested for differences between soft and hard contact materials. Simultaneously, this experiment aimed to validate the comparability of artificial and natural contact material as a standardised substitute, but also as an ethically more acceptable choice. Combined with qualitative and quantitative use-wear analyses, the data generated throughout the experiment did not only provide insights into the development of use-wear, but also into abrasion processes within the experimental setup. Concerning these aspects, no significant difference between the natural and artificial contact materials could be observed. Consequently, while not used as direct proxies to interpret wear on archaeological artefacts, the use of standardised contact materials can be an advantageous choice in controlled experimental setups. Moreover, the experiment highlights the relevance of use intensity and duration in the context of wear formation.