Making impact: Towards discovering early projectile technology in Island South East Asian archaeology

The effect of edge serration on the performance of stone-tip projectiles: an experimental case study of the Maros Point from Holocene South Sulawesi

“…The unserrated, hollow-based Lompoa point (Perston et al 2021b) that occurs in the Toalean thus may either represent unfinished Maros points, or be used for different prey types. To clarify these issues, detailed traceology studies are urgently needed to verify the function of these Toalean points (Maloney et al 2022). To this end, our use-wear observations here provide an important point of reference for the identification of projectile use among serrated point types like the Maros point and the Mallindrung point.…”

“…This target allows us to isolate the effect of animal skin or hide on arrow performance. Pig was chosen for this experiment because the remains of Sulawesi warty pigs (Sus celebensis) are often associated with Toalean artefacts (Clason 1989;Suryatman et al 2019;Brumm et al 2018;Saiful and Hakim 2016;Fakhri 2017;Fakhri et al 202) and hence represents a possible prey for which Maros points were used to hunt (see Perston et al 2021a;Maloney et al 2022). The third target consisted of the ballistic gel with fresh pig rib bones inserted within.…”

“…As noted earlier, there is a general assumption in the archaeology literature that the Maros point of South Sulawesi represents the tip of projectile armature such as arrows. It is important to make clear that this assumption remains a hypothesis that needs to be tested against the archaeological record (Maloney et al 2022;Perston et al 2021a). However, if the Maros points were indeed used as arrowheads, the experimental findings here suggest the possibility that the serrated edge design was adopted for functional reasons in the mid-Holocene.…”

“…As mentioned already, the Toalean stone points are commonly assumed to represent projectile tips, specifically arrowheads (Bulbeck et al 2000). It is important to point out that this assertion remains a hypothesis that has yet to be tested on archaeological data through use-wear analysis (Maloney et al 2022). Yet it is important to note that painted rock art in the region does depict hunting scenes involving the probable use of projectile technologies like spear thrower as well as bow and arrow (Aubert et al 2018;Leihitu and Permana 2018).…”

“…In this vein, the small and thin profile and the triangular form of the Maros points may support the possibility that these serrated points functioned as arrowheads rather than tips of thrown darts. However, the identification of weapon velocity and projection system among archaeological stone points remains a contentious matter (Hutchings 2016;Newman and Moore 2013), and further studies are needed to clarify the delivery system associated with the Maros points of Sulawesi through multiple lines of evidence (Coppe et al 2022;Maloney et al 2022).…”