Far from flint: Inferring land-use and social networks from Middle and Upper Palaeolithic lithic assemblages (Cardina-Salto do Boi, Côa Valley, Portugal)

Aubry, Thierry; Barbosa, António Fernando; Gameiro, Cristina; Luís, Luís; Santos, André Tomás; Silvestre, Marcelo

doi:10.1016/j.jasrep.2022.103385

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 59 publications

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“…In this study, the chert with high translucency and low surface roughness showed high fracture predictability. In other regions, some chert assemblages are similar to our samples (e.g., Schmidt and Morala, 2018;Aubry et al 2022). In this way, the measurement of the fracture predictability between the chert types may apply to those in other regions.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 61%

Explaining the Increase in “High-quality Chert” in the Early Upper Paleolithic Artifacts in Southern Jordan: Quantitative Examination of Chert Mechanical Properties and Fracture Predictability

Suga,

Tsukada,

Tarawneh

et al. 2023

J Paleo Arch

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In the studies of aked stone tools, the "quality" of lithic raw material has often been assessed from a viewpoint of its suitability to lithic production, and several studies quanti ed such raw material qualities by measuring mechanical properties of several different rocks like obsidian, chert, and basalt. To advance this approach, this study aims to quantify variations in the quality of chert, which is usually based on the difference in grain-size, e.g., ne-grained chert as "high-quality". For this purpose, we measured two types of hardness, i.e., the rebound hardness by Schmidt Hammer and the Rockwell Hardness (HRC), by using chert samples from southern Jordan, where the use of ne-grained chert increased in the Early Upper Paleolithic (Ahmarian) in association with the development of bladelet technology. The results indicate that ne-grained chert has greater fracture predictability and particularly suitable for the production of bladelets. However, ne-grained chert in southern Jordan suffer from abundant internal fractures and was not used as often as medium-grained chert for Levallois products and robust blades in the Late Middle and Initial Upper Paleolithic. Thus, explaining the prehistoric selectivity of lithic raw materials need to consider fracture predictability as well as other factors, such as actual conditions of occurrences and lithic production technology.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 61%

Explaining the Increase in “High-quality Chert” in the Early Upper Paleolithic Artifacts in Southern Jordan: Quantitative Examination of Chert Mechanical Properties and Fracture Predictability

Suga,

Tsukada,

Tarawneh

et al. 2023

J Paleo Arch

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“…The identification of these patterns has been reliant on the great amount of studies that have originated from the archaeological site of Vale Boi [i.e., 22,23,24,25]. A large portion of these studies has focused on lithic technology [26][27][28], and unlike other regions of Portugal [29][30][31][32][33][34][35], archaeological studies focusing on raw materials, and especially chert, have been more scarce, focusing mostly on brief macroscopic results or the differentiation between possibly local and non-local sorts of raw materials. Despite the scarceness of these studies, chert played a significant role in early and later prehistory at Vale Boi [26,27,36], and across most of Prehistory in Southern Portugal [37,38].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In fact, the creation of such a database is a starting point for most raw material-focused studies, independent of the geography or studied chronology [63][64][65][66]. In western Europe, there have been substantial efforts in creating comprehensive knowledge about chert-bearing formations, which resulted in important lithotheques and databases [67][68][69], and multidisciplinary studies of raw material use throughout prehistory [29,[70][71][72][73][74], as early as the 1980s.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Creating frames of reference for chert exploitation during the Late Pleistocene in Southwesternmost Iberia

Belmiro,

Terradas,

Cascalheira

2023

PLoS ONE

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Southwestern Iberia has played a key role in characterizing Late Pleistocene human ecodynamics. Among other aspects of human behavior, chert procurement and management studies in this region have received increasing attention in the past two decades, especially focusing on the sites showing repeated human occupation, such as the case of Vale Boi (Southern Portugal). However, these studies have been very limited in their geographical scope, and mostly focused on brief macroscopic descriptions of the raw materials. To further our knowledge of the relationship between regional availability of raw materials and its impact on human adaptations and mobility, a more detailed approach to characterizing geological sources is needed. This paper characterizes chert raw materials location, diversity, and availability in a geologically well-defined region of southern Portugal ‐ the Algarve. Through macroscopic and petrographic approaches, we provide a detailed characterization of geological chert sources to build a frame of reference for chert exploitation in the region. Our results show that there are four main chert formations in Algarve, and that despite the within-source variability, sufficient differences at macroscopic and petrographic levels are present to allow clear source attribution. These results provide a baseline for raw material studies in archaeological assemblages across southwestern Iberia, that will be essential to further characterize the dynamics of human behavior in some of the most important eco-cultural niches.

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Explaining the increase in “high-quality chert” in the Early Upper Paleolithic artifacts in southern Jordan: Quantitative examination of chert mechanical properties and fracture predictability

Suga,

Tsukada,

Tarawneh

et al. 2023

Preprint

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In the studies of flaked stone tools, the “quality” of lithic raw material has often been assessed from a viewpoint of its suitability to lithic production, and several studies quantified such raw material qualities by measuring mechanical properties of several different rocks like obsidian, chert, and basalt. To advance this approach, this study aims to quantify variations in the quality of chert, which is usually based on the difference in grain-size, e.g., fine-grained chert as “high-quality”. For this purpose, we measured two types of hardness, i.e., the rebound hardness by Schmidt Hammer and the Rockwell Hardness (HRC), by using chert samples from southern Jordan, where the use of fine-grained chert increased in the Early Upper Paleolithic (Ahmarian) in association with the development of bladelet technology. The results indicate that fine-grained chert has greater fracture predictability and particularly suitable for the production of bladelets. However, fine-grained chert in southern Jordan suffer from abundant internal fractures and was not used as often as medium-grained chert for Levallois products and robust blades in the Late Middle and Initial Upper Paleolithic. Thus, explaining the prehistoric selectivity of lithic raw materials need to consider fracture predictability as well as other factors, such as actual conditions of occurrences and lithic production technology.

show abstract

Far from flint: Inferring land-use and social networks from Middle and Upper Palaeolithic lithic assemblages (Cardina-Salto do Boi, Côa Valley, Portugal)

Cited by 3 publications

References 59 publications

Explaining the Increase in “High-quality Chert” in the Early Upper Paleolithic Artifacts in Southern Jordan: Quantitative Examination of Chert Mechanical Properties and Fracture Predictability

Explaining the Increase in “High-quality Chert” in the Early Upper Paleolithic Artifacts in Southern Jordan: Quantitative Examination of Chert Mechanical Properties and Fracture Predictability

Creating frames of reference for chert exploitation during the Late Pleistocene in Southwesternmost Iberia

Explaining the increase in “high-quality chert” in the Early Upper Paleolithic artifacts in southern Jordan: Quantitative examination of chert mechanical properties and fracture predictability

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