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The use of bones as retouchers at Unit III of Teixoneres Cave (MIS 3; Moià, Barcelona, Spain)
Abstract
Prehistoric human groups organize their subsistence strategies according to environmental parameters and socio-cultural variables. Functional analysis of artefacts allows researchers to recognize different activities and the characteristics of their utilization and to formulate hypotheses about the duration and the way that sites were occupied. Bones used as tools for the manufacture and maintenance of lithic artefacts have been recognized in multiple archaeological contexts. The Middle Palaeolithic site of the Teixoneres Cave (Moià, Barcelona, Spain) has yielded a small collection of bone fragments which were used as retouchers. The stratigraphic sequence is characterised by an alternation in the hominid and carnivore occupations. The sublevel IIIb (MIS 3) is the unit showing the highest anthropic intensity with lithic tools, human-induced damage on faunal specimens and, specifically, bone retouchers. In this study these bone artefacts have been studied according to the main standardized taphonomical and technological methods. Additionally, experimental protocols with bones used for retouching or re-sharpening quartz and flint flakes were conducted, which showed the different use traces produced on the bone surface. The analysis of the data indicates that these archaeological bone retouchers were obtained and discarded in situ, without any configuration of the blank. Before their abandonment, bone re-touchers were used to occasionally retouch and re-sharpen the lithic implements, especially the local quartz artefacts. This paper aims to explore new types of lithic raw material in experiments with bone retouchers and add data to the multidisciplinary study of the site.
... This information serves us to increase the knowledge regarding subsistence activities and the occupation patterns developed by Neanderthals groups in the Navalmaíllo Rock Shelter. Abrams et al., 2014;Daujeard et al., 2014;Costamagno et al., 2018;Mateo-Lomba et al., 2019;Pérez et al., 2019;Alonso-García et al., 2020;Banda et al., 2020;Martellotta et al., 2020), donde, si bien no son abundantes en términos del número de restos identificados, sí suelen estar presentes en las acumulaciones faunísticas de los conjuntos identificados como campamentos (Daujeard & Moncel, 2010). ...
... Para poder valorar las características métricas de los fragmentos estos han sido medidos y comparados con las dimensiones (ej., largo y ancho máximos) de los retocadores óseos de otros yacimientos tanto achelenses como acheleo-yabrudienses (ej., Quesem) o de Paleolítico Medio (Patou-Mathis, 2002;Rosell et al., 2011;Verna & d'Errico, 2011;Mozota Holgueras, 2012, 2015Blasco et al., 2013;Abrams et al., 2014;Costamagno et al., 2018;Daujeard et al., 2018;Mateo-Lomba et al., 2019;Pérez et al., 2019;Alonso-García et al., 2020;Banda et al., 2020;Kolobova et al., 2020;Martellotta et al., 2020). Para esto se ha realizado un gráfico que confronta ambas medidas y se han incluido las elipses de confianza al 95% de cada uno de los periodos. ...
... Por otro lado, y como complemento a la clasificación realizada con el LDA se han realizado otros dos LDAs en los que la muestra de NV ha sido incluida en el análisis discriminante como un grupo adicional (en el primer caso) al de los retocadores de herramientas de cuarzo y sílex o como grupos independientes dependiendo del retocador analizado. Estas dos aproximaciones se han realizado como complemento al primer LDA, dado el bajo número de materias primas retocadas experimentalmente y el posible sesgo realizado por dicha característica del modelo de Mateo-Lomba et al. (2019). ...
Los retocadores óseos son considerados como parte de la industria ósea de los grupos humanos pleistocenos. Normalmente se caracterizan por ser fragmentos de diáfisis de ungulados empleados para retocar el filo de una herramienta lítica. Estos objetos son relativamente abundantes en contextos del Paleolítico Medio, aunque hay una amplia variabilidad según los diferentes yacimientos.En este trabajo presentamos dos nuevas evidencias de retocadores óseos identificados en el nivel F-D del yacimiento del Paleolítico Medio del Abrigo de Navalmaíllo (Pinilla del Valle, Madrid, España), localizado en la parte central de la Península Ibérica. Este yacimiento forma parte del conjunto de yacimientos del Calvero de la Higuera y ha sido caracterizado como un campamento de caza neandertal.Los retocadores encontrados en el Abrigo de Navalmaíllo se caracterizan por ser fragmentos diafisarios de bovino que además presentan un gran tamaño en comparación con otros especímenes recuperados en yacimientos del periodo. El análisis de los retocadores óseos ha permitido concluir que fueron empleados para retocar herramientas líticas de una materia prima diferente al cuarzo (probablemente sílex). Esto tiene gran interés debido a que el cuarzo es la principal materia prima del yacimiento.Los retocadores analizados aportan una información arqueológica muy interesante sobre las actividades desarrolladas en el yacimiento, sirviendo para incrementar el conocimiento relativo a sus actividades de subsistencia y el tipo de ocupaciones llevadas a cabo en el Abrigo de Navalmaíllo por los grupos humanos.
... From the end of MIS 9 and the development of the Middle Palaeolithic, bone retouchers become widespread and their frequency increases, at given sites numbering in the hundreds (Auguste 2002; Daujeard et al. 2018;Moigne et al. 2016;Rosell et al. 2015;Tourloukis et al. 2018). During this period, retouchers have been found in France (Costamagno et al. 2018;Daujeard et al. 2014;Mallye et al. 2012;Sévêque, Auguste 2018;Verna, d'Errico 2011), Spain (Barandiarán 1987Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019;Mozota 2009;Pérez et al. 2019), Belgium (Abrams 2018;Abrams et al. 2014;Rougier et al. 2016), Northern Italy (Jéquier et al. 2012;Leonardi 1979;Thun Hohstein et al. 2018), Germany (Conrad, Bolus 2006;Taute 1965;Toniato et al 2018), Czech Republic (Auguste 2002; Neruda et al. 2011;Neruda, Lázničková-Galetová 2018), Slovakia (Neruda, Kaminská 2013); Hungary (Bordes 1968), Slovenia (Turk, Dirjec 1989), Croatia (Ahern et al. 2004;Karavanić, Šokec 2003;Malez 1958;Patou-Mathis 1997), Montenegro (Morin, Soulier 2017), Greece (ref. in Tourloukis et al. 2018), Crimea (Veselsky 2008), the Russian Altai Mountains (Kolobova et al. 2016) and Syria (Griggo et al. 2011), among others. Middle Palaeolithic retouchers are mostly made from long bone shaft fragments and display no or very marginal shaping of the fragment morphology (Patou-Mathis, Schwab 2002). ...
... Another question concerns the recognition of lithic rawmaterials retouched by these tools. In comparative experimental studies, retouchers have been used in retouching flint and quartzite (Karavanić, Šokec 2003;Mallye et al. 2012;Mozota 2013;Rosell et al. 2011) and flint and quartz (Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019). Because the dominant raw-materials in both Veternica and Vindija are quartz and flint, we have considered the findings of Mateo-Lomba et al. (2019) as the most pertinent for our study. ...
... In comparative experimental studies, retouchers have been used in retouching flint and quartzite (Karavanić, Šokec 2003;Mallye et al. 2012;Mozota 2013;Rosell et al. 2011) and flint and quartz (Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019). Because the dominant raw-materials in both Veternica and Vindija are quartz and flint, we have considered the findings of Mateo-Lomba et al. (2019) as the most pertinent for our study. However, they have not commented on any qualitative difference of the same types of use traces when different raw-materials are retouched but have found that there is a different quantitative representation of various use trace types. ...
Bone retouchers are tools used for the tasks of retouching lithics and are usually made from long bone shaft fragments. They are a common feature of many Middle Palaeolithic assemblages throughout Europe and the Near East but are also found during the Late Lower Palaeolithic and the Upper Palaeolithic. This study presents the results of the analysis of bone retouchers from the Middle Palaeolithic contexts of Veternica (MIS 3-5) and the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic contexts of Vindija (MIS 3), Northwestern Croatia. The study is comprised of an examination of site information, taxonomic and anatomical determination, basic taphonomic analysis, morphometric analysis and analysis of the retoucher use traces. The results reveal a fundamental difference between the two retoucher assemblages. In Veternica, the bone retouchers are an important part of stone tool technology, represented by the number of retouchers, preferential selection of faunal species, preparatory scraping, evidence of curation, the sometimes heavy intensity of use and shaping of the morphology through flaking. In Vindija, retouchers represent a more expedient technology, suggested by the low number of finds in individual layers, their small size, low intensity of use and lack of evidence for preparatory measures and curation. Exceptionally, the assemblage from Veternica has provided retouchers made from cave bear bones, which could suggest exploitation of this species by Neanderthals.
... In most archaeological contexts, faunal elements selected for use as retouchers reflect the composition of the whole assemblage, suggesting that they were collected from the food waste available at the sites (Alonso-García et al. 2020;Costamagno et al. 2018;Daujeard et al. 2014Daujeard et al. , 2018Hutson et al. 2018;Mallye et al. 2012;Moigne et al. 2015). The only constraints that seem to have played a role in the selection of bone blanks are linked to functional requirements (Costamagno et al. 2018;Daujeard et al. 2018;Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019;Rosell et al. 2015), such as the need for a comfortable grip on the tool and the resistance to percussion and pressure. The first requirement typically led to the selection of long bone shafts, and the second requirement led to the selection of thick bones and bone fragments. ...
... A possible explanation for this pattern is that bone retouchers possess, compared to bulb retouchers, critical mechanical qualities that enhance their effectiveness. It is indeed suggested that the high elasticity of fresh bone would represent an important advantage for obtaining a fine, flat, invasive retouch (Costamagno et al. 2018;Daujeard et al. 2014;Hutson et al. 2018;Mallye et al. 2012;Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019;Sévêque and Auguste 2018), particularly suited for the resharpening of tool edges. It is thus possible that, whenever raw material was abundant and easily procurable, and a high utility/weight ratio would not be beneficial, bone retouchers might have been preferentially employed. ...
Modifying the form of lithic artifacts through retouch represents a central technological feature of the Middle Palaeolithic, and retouchers made of a variety of materials appear frequently in the archaeological record. Bone and bulb retouchers are the most common types. The first, are often described as ad hoc tools with short use-lives, while researchers have tentatively iden-tified the second as curated artifacts included in the mobile toolkit. Here we present two bulb retouchers from the Middle Palaeolithic layers VIII/VII of Sirgenstein Cave in the Ach Valley of the Swabian Jura, and discuss their general characteristics together with bone retouchers re-covered from the same archaeological layers. The data on bone and bulb retouchers from Sir-genstein support the proposed complementary uses of the two types of retouchers. We suggest that the intrinsic properties of bone and flint, together with other aspects specific to the chaînes operatoires of these two materials, played a major role in determining the retouchers’ suitability within toolkits, and can help to explain the high variability in retouching techniques encountered in the Middle Palaeolithic record. Based on these considerations, our study highlights the im-portance of the organization of technology and the potential of retouchers for reconstructing past mobility and settlement dynamics.
... Meanwhile, it implies to give little interest in discussing other features such as co-occurring or co-related patterns and this may lead to possible conflicting identifications of the same type of artefacts. Occurrence of flake scars or scaling retouch are either recognized as being due to taphonomical events -effects of trampling (Dominguez-Rodrigo et al. 2010) or actions of predators (Villa and Bartram 1996) -or, conversely, damage or intrinsic attrition to the use of the bone as a tool or a retoucher (Bauman et al. 2023;Blasco et al. 2013;Daujeard et al. 2018;Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019). When "retouchers" display additionally point-ended morphologies, as is the case of the archaeological piece that, therefore, is used as an example in this paper ( Fig. 1), the identification of such bone artefact is even more difficult; a point-broken end possibly being perceived as a pointed-shaped product which, as such, is integrated into the category of the bone industry (Iakovleva et al. 2018, p. 55, fig. ...
David É. 2024. On the Polysemic Nature of Traces and Co-occurring Patterns in Anthropized Material-contribution of a "Retoucher" with a Flaked Bone Aspect from Roc-en-Pail (France). Sprawozdania Archeo-logiczne 76/1, 139-158. This article presents a new archaeological material to discuss methodological issues encountered by scientists working both on minimally-modified bones from Mousterian assemblages, to those dealing with the identification of "retouchers" having a flaked bone aspect. The technological approach integrates complementary analytical study-frames in order to assess archaeological information. On the one hand, analogies with similar experimentally produced patterns reduce the functional identification of the archaeological specimen. They do not deal with a single artefact-type in the category of "retouchers", which thus remains generic. On the other hand, the recording of the patterns in their chronological order, combined together with that of modifications relative to the diagenesis of the bone as an artefact, suggests the "retoucher" was reduced in a relatively fresh state by a carnivorous predator also. The evidence of this co-occurrence, if characterizing the successive anthropic-originated bone beds ultimately degraded by predators in situ, would suggest a relatively short period of human occupation generated by the use of the site in a singular cyclical conception "prey-hunter-predator" at regional scale.
... Meanwhile, it implies to give little interest in discussing other features such as co-occurring or co-related patterns and this may lead to possible conflicting identifications of the same type of artefacts. Occurrence of flake scars or scaling retouch are either recognized as being due to taphonomical events -effects of trampling (Dominguez-Rodrigo et al. 2010) or actions of predators (Villa and Bartram 1996) -or, conversely, damage or intrinsic attrition to the use of the bone as a tool or a retoucher (Bauman et al. 2023;Blasco et al. 2013;Daujeard et al. 2018;Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019). When "retouchers" display additionally point-ended morphologies, as is the case of the archaeological piece that, therefore, is used as an example in this paper ( Fig. 1), the identification of such bone artefact is even more difficult; a point-broken end possibly being perceived as a pointed-shaped product which, as such, is integrated into the category of the bone industry (Iakovleva et al. 2018, p. 55, fig. ...
This article presents a new archaeological material to discuss methodological issues encountered by scientists working both on minimally-modified bones from Mousterian assemblages, to those dealing with the identification of “retouchers” having a flaked bone aspect. The technological approach integrates complementary analytical study-frames in order to assess archaeological information. On the one hand, analogies with similar experimentally produced patterns reduce the functional identification of the archaeological specimen. They do not deal with a single artefact-type in the category of “retouchers”, which thus remains generic. On the other hand, the recording of the patterns in their chronological order, combined together with that of modifications relative to the diagenesis of the bone as an artefact, suggests the “retoucher” was reduced in a relatively fresh state by a carnivorous predator also. The evidence of this co-occurrence, if characterizing the successive anthropic-originated bone beds ultimately degraded by predators in situ, would suggest a relatively short period of human occupation generated by the use of the site in a singular cyclical conception “prey-hunter-predator” at regional scale.
... Bones of red deer (Cervus elaphus) were used in this experiment based on several zooarchaeological studies that have indicated a preference for Cervidae as a source of bone retouchers (e.g. Giacobini and Malerba 1998;Patou-Mathis 2002;Jéquier et al. 2012;Mallye et al. 2012;Blasco et al. 2013a;Daujeard et al. 2014Daujeard et al. , 2018Rosell et al. 2015;Moigne et al. 2016;Costamagno et al. 2018;Thun Hohenstein et al. 2018;Alonso-García et al. 2020;Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019;Martellotta et al. 2020Martellotta et al. , 2021. The experiment involved the breaking of 25 long bones extracted from Cervus elaphus carcasses (Table 1). ...
Bone retouchers, while often underrated, stand out as widespread tools throughout the Palaeolithic, typically linked to breaking bones for marrow extraction. Although bone retouchers are commonly considered a by-product of butchering activities, the possibility of intentional manufacturing has been rarely considered but should not be dismissed. In our experimental protocol, we explore decision-making processes involved in manufacturing bone retouchers, focusing on how these decisions are guided by intentional production rather than solely marrow extraction. The results indicate that individuals employ specific techniques and make technological decisions, rapidly acquiring experience in retoucher manufacturing that extends beyond mere intuition. The choice of bone-breaking technique(s) reflects the intention behind either marrow extraction or producing suitable bone fragments for retouchers. This decision-making process is heavily influenced by the morphology of the bone, presenting challenges that individuals learn to overcome during the experiment. The analysis of the experimental percussion marks suggests that certain marks on specific skeletal elements indicate intentional bone retoucher manufacturing. We then propose a likelihood grid to assess the reliability of traces on each skeletal element in inferring intentional manufacturing. Given the abundance of bone retouchers in Middle Palaeolithic contexts, a thorough investigation into the intentionality behind their manufacturing processes could significantly impact their relevance within other Palaeolithic bone industries.
... Retouchers are particularly numerous in European Mousterian contexts (e.g. [48,[56][57][58][59][60]). As an example, the bone assemblage from the Quina Mousterian levels within the collapsed rock shelter at Chez-Pinaud (Charente-Maratime, France) provides a useful illustration of the characteristics of Mousterian knapping tools [61]. ...
The use of bone tools by early humans has provided valuable insights into their technology, behaviour and cognitive abilities. However, identifying minimally modified or unshaped Palaeolithic osseous tools can be challenging, particularly when they are mixed with bones altered by natural taphonomic processes. This has hampered the study of key technical innovations, such as the use of bones, antlers and teeth as hammers or pressure-flakers to work (knap) stone tools. Bones chewed by carnivores can resemble osseous knapping tools and have sometimes been mistaken for them. In this paper, we review recent advances in the study of osseous knapping tools with a focus on two Palaeolithic sites in the UK, the Acheulean Horse Butchery Site at Boxgrove and the Magdalenian site of Gough's Cave, where knapping tools were mis-attributed to carnivore chewing. These osseous knapping tools are investigated using microscopy, high-resolution imaging and comparisons with experimental knapping tools. This allows for new insights into human behaviour at these sites and opens fresh avenues for future research.
... The most ancient recorded bone retoucher appeared in the MIS 9 site of the Gran Dolina of Atapuerca (Level TD10-1) (Burgos, Spain) (Rosell et al., 2011(Rosell et al., , 2015. However, Middle Palaeolithic retouchers are best known, since they appear in a good number of sites in the Iberian Peninsula, including Peña Miel (La Rioja), Covalejos (Cantabria), Morín (Cantabria), Axlor (Vizcaya), Prado Vargas (Burgos), Teixoneres (Cataluña), and El Salt (Alicante), among others (Alonso-García et al., 2020;Barandiarán, 1987;Mateo-Lomba et al., 2019;Mozota, 2015;Pérez et al., 2019). ...
Bone retouchers are a technological appliance used to perfect lithic tools efficiently. They are most frequently found in Middle Palaeolithic contexts. In this paper, we present a group of bone retouchers from the Mousterian Level XV of the Sopeña rock shelter (Asturias, Spain). The bone part preferred was the middle part of the shaft of long bones: Most of them are on metacarpals, followed by metatarsals, femurs, and tibias. The most used animal species is adult red deer. These retouchers have either one, two, or three active areas, with a central disposition. The impact marks are close together; oval pits are common, as well as straight, sinuous, and irregular grooves. The surfaces on these marks appear pitted and scaled. There are indications that the bones employed were relatively fresh. The length, width, and thickness of those bone fragments seem to be the determining factor when choosing them to be used as retouchers in the process of finishing lithic tools. The formats documented in Sopeña Level XV are similar to those found in other Mousterian sites in Iberia, although there is a certain variability regarding their width. The Neanderthals of Sopeña acquired the raw material for these retouchers from the faunal remains generated in the process of butchering and eating the animals. These retouchers were used as implements to perfect lithic tools made mainly on quartzite, and they were used repeatedly and maybe for a long time.
... Morphometry. Retouchers are the most frequently found bone tools in Middle Paleolithic contexts (S1 Text) [36,37,60,138,[140][141][142][143][144][145]. US22 already had yielded nearly 510 during previous excavations; these retouchers were described and analyzed (Airvaux excavations: 202 specimens [146], Jaubert-Hublin excavations: 307 specimens [147]). ...
Did Neanderthal produce a bone industry? The recent discovery of a large bone tool assemblage at the Neanderthal site of Chagyrskaya (Altai, Siberia, Russia) and the increasing discoveries of isolated finds of bone tools in various Mousterian sites across Eurasia stimulate the debate. Assuming that the isolate finds may be the tip of the iceberg and that the Siberian occurrence did not result from a local adaptation of easternmost Neanderthals, we looked for evidence of a similar industry in the Western side of their spread area. We assessed the bone tool potential of the Quina bone-bed level currently under excavation at chez Pinaud site (Jonzac, Charente-Maritime, France) and found as many bone tools as flint ones: not only the well-known retouchers but also beveled tools, retouched artifacts and a smooth-ended rib. Their diversity opens a window on a range of activities not expected in a butchering site and not documented by the flint tools, all involved in the carcass processing. The re-use of 20% of the bone blanks, which are mainly from large ungulates among faunal remains largely dominated by reindeer, raises the question of blank procurement and management. From the Altai to the Atlantic shore, through a multitude of sites where only a few objects have been reported so far, evidence of a Neanderthal bone industry is emerging which provides new insights on Middle Paleolithic subsistence strategies.
... Simultaneously, since at least the beginning of the 20th century and the work of L. Henri Martin (1906), the production of retouchers from bones directly collected from butchered prey is demonstrated in numerous deposits, sometimes in very large quantities (Niven et al., 2012;Mallye et al., 2012;Daujeard et al., 2014;Costamagno et al., 2015;Mateo-Lomba et al., 2019). Retouchers are bone elements (sometimes teeth) used in the process of shaping and sharpening lithic tools with the main objective being to modify the active part of stone artefacts. ...
... Most taphonomic damage, whether it is from insects (Backwell et al. 2012;Holden et al. 2013), butchery (Bello et al. 2011), trampling (Reynard 2013) or the dissolution of the bone surface due to weathering (Martisius et al. 2020) are best viewed at <40x magnification, although certain features and fine-grained details may require higher magnifications (Backwell et al. 2012;Fernandez-Jalvo, Andrews 2016). Manufacturing traces and crude use-wear, such as such as that which developsfrom digging activities and soft-hammer percussion, is also best observed at low magnifications of between 20x-50x (Backwell, d'Errico 2001;d'Errico, Backwell 2003;Blasco et al. 2013;Bradfield, Antonites 2018;Stammers et al. 2018;Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019;Pante et al. 2020). ...
The interpretative potential of microscopic use-wear polishes is a factor of the scale of analysis. Observational surface area decreases in inverse proportion to magnification. In this paper I present the results of polishes on bone tools that have developed from fricative contact with nine different materials. Microwear polish is viewed at five different magnifications. I show that 50x―200x magnification, or observational areas of 0.4―2.0 mm2, is the most appropriate scale of analysis of use-wear polishes regardless of whether one is conducting morphological identifications or relying on surface texture analysis software. The images presented here are meant to serve as an online reference collection to allow use-wear analysts to visualise how polish appearances change at different levels of magnification.
... Raw materials have a local or semilocal origin (< 15 km) and consist mainly of quartz, followed by chert, agates, and limestones. Reduction sequences are highly fragmented, consisting in flakes and final products, with some retouched tools (mainly scrapers) and in subunit IIIb also bone retouchers, linked to the short-term occupation patterns (Rosell et al. 2010a, b;Talamo et al. 2016;Bustos-Pérez et al. 2017;Mateo-Lomba et al. 2019). In unit III, Picin et al. (2020) proposed a differentiation between in situ knapping activities in local quartz and the mobile toolkit transported at the site. ...
The northeastern region of Iberia constitutes a natural pass-area for arriving populations into the peninsula and becomes a key area to understand Neanderthal resilience to changing environmental conditions experienced during Marine Isotope Stage 3 (MIS 3; 60–30 ka). Short-term but repeated occupations by Neanderthal groups occurred in Teixoneres Cave (Moià, Barcelona) in alternation with large and small carnivores during MIS3. Abundant small-mammal remains accumulated in units III and II of this fossiliferous deposit, providing local climatic and environmental information. This work focuses on the taphonomic history of small-mammal faunas, which a is clue to validate previous palaeoecological interpretations. As was observed with leporids and bird remains, raptors are considered the major source of small-mammal remains. The most likely accumulator is an opportunistic predator, the eagle owl, with very rare inputs by mammalian carnivores. In parallel, high-resolution palaeoclimatic data are provided through oxygen isotope analyses (δ18O) of rodent teeth from four subunits (IIIb to IIa), which are compared with independent methods of palaeotemperature estimations. According to air temperatures estimated from δ18O rodent teeth, cooler conditions than present day (− 1.6/ − 0.5 °C) are recorded along the sequence, but homogenous (< 1 °C). Complementary methods also explain higher rainfall than present day (+ 44/ + 682 mm). Only slight changes between units III and II show climatic instability, which could be related to palimpsests of stadial-interstadial events. Climatic stable conditions are reported from coeval isotopic and palaeodiet analyses from northeastern Iberia in agreement with the palynological records that underline how the Mediterranean area could have sustained rich ecosystems that assured the Neanderthal subsistence during the abrupt climatic pulsations of the Late Glacial.
... While evidence for retouched lithic industries is present across the Australian continent (Holdaway & Stern, 2004;McNiven, 1993;Moore, 2004), most previous technological studies are on pressure retouching techniques (see for instance studies on Kimberley Points: Akerman et al., 2002;Hayes et al., 2014;Maloney et al., 2017;Moore, 2015), and none consider the percussion retouch. Moreover, bone and wood share similar physical and mechanical properties related to their density and elasticity ; see also Baumann et al., 2020;Bradfield, 2015;Johnson, 1985;Kamminga, 1988;Mateo-Lomba et al., 2019), and the relatively opportunistic nature of bone retouchers (i.e., "recycling" of food processing remains) well reflects the multipurpose concept behind the use of boomerangs in Australian Aboriginal cultures. ...
Boomerangs are among the most recognisable elements of Australian Aboriginal technology. In the popular mindset, the prevailing image of these wooden artefacts is that of thrown implements that return to the thrower, principally used for hunting animals. However, boomerangs have a deep multipurpose role in Indigenous societies , with just a few examples of their known functions, including fighting, digging, and making music (i.e., "clap sticks"). Recently, yet another function for boomerangs has been proposed (Martellotta et al., 2021a): the functional modification of lithic tools (i.e., retouching)-a form of use that is almost unknown among non-Aboriginal researchers. Here, we provide the first comprehensive review of evidence for the use of boomerangs as lithic retouching tools (percussors). A detailed lexical analysis demonstrates similarities between Palaeolithic bone retouchers used for the same purposes as the Australian hardwood boomerangs, thus confirming our traceo-logical hypothesis and the power of using a multidisciplinary approach in investigating Australia's deep past. This paper provides the foundation for discussions surrounding the multipurpose concept behind many Aboriginal tools by focusing on the most iconic item. We propose that, in future studies, the complex technological and functional features of boomerangs should take precedence over their famous "returning effect".
... Retouchers are the most common bone tools found in Palaeolithic assemblages. They have been present since the Lower Palaeolithic (Roberts and Parfi tt, 1999;Langlois, 2004;Smith, 2013;Jéquier et al., 2012;Kolfschoten et al., 2015;Moigne et al., 2016), they are particularly frequent in the Middle Palaeolithic (see, in particular, Mallye et al., 2012;Jéquier et al., 2012;Mozota, 2012;Blasco et al., 2013;Abrams et al., 2014;Daujeard et al., 2014;Rosell et al., 2015;Rougier et al., 2016;Doyon et al., 2018;Mateo-Lomba et al., 2019) and last all over the Upper Palaeolithic (Armand and Delagnes, 1998;Patou-Mathis, 2002;Rigaud, 2007;Tartar, 2009Tartar, , 2012. The oldest mention of these tools dates back to 1874 in France, when Daleau reported "anvil bones" in the Grotte des Fées (Daleau, 1883 in Patou-Mathis andSchwab, 2002). ...
For a long time, the rich bone industries of the Upper Palaeolithic were opposed to the opportunistic Neandertal bone tools among which the bone retoucher was the most common type. The recent finding of a few shaped bone tools into Mousterian contexts has been taken as an emergence of a “modern behaviour”. However, this outlook is based on biased corpuses. On one side, the large number of unshaped bone tools recently discovered in Upper Palaeolithic assemblages leads us to reconsider what a bone industry can be. On the other side, the increasing discoveries of bone tools in more ancient contexts indicates that this type of production is not strictly linked to Homo sapiens. Chagyrskaya cave, located in the Siberian Altai, brings us the opportunity to discuss this question. Dated around 50,000 years BP, the site yielded a local facies of Mousterian lithic industry associated to several Neandertal remains. A technological and functional analysis of the faunal remains reveal more than one thousand bone tools. Most are retouchers, but a significant part belongs to other morpho-functional categories: intermediate tools, retouched tools and tools with a smoothed end. Even though these tools were mainly manufactured by direct percussion, their number and the recurrence of their morphological and traceological features lead us to consider them as a true bone industry. Far from the Homo sapiens standards, this industry has its own coherence that needs now to be understood.
... The utility of gigapixel and GPL strategies for imaging petroglyphs (Louw and Crowley, 2013), shale microstructure (Fauchille et al., 2018), entomological specimens (Holovachov et al., 2014), and other subjects has been explored. Archaeological applications of GPL strategies have explored lithic use-wear with SEM (Vergès and Morales, 2014) and reflected light microscopy for lithic use-wear and retouch modifications from bone instruments (Mateo-Lomba et al., 2019). The present study concentrates on examples of macro-to microscopic features on dental tissues using SEM as a means of creating multi-scale mosaic images for didactic purposes ranging from scientific publication to teaching and outreach. ...
Gigapixel and gigapixel-like (GPL) imaging strategies are a powerful means of communicating scientific results of visual observations in academic and public spheres. GPL images are made from a photomosaic of multiple, adjacent extended focus images, which allows users to “pan and zoom” across a surface to document or analyze specific features. Microscopic approaches using GPL imaging strategies are gaining popularity in use-wear analyses of lithics and bone implements but have not been applied to the study of human skeletal or dental remains. Here we present three examples of GPL imaging using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) of the dental surfaces of teeth excavated from the Chalcolithic contexts of El Mirador Cave (Sierra de Atapuerca, Burgos, Spain). Numerous common features are identifiable in the GPL examples from El Mirador Cave that include wear features (e.g., enamel chipping, labial striations), perikymata, calculus deposits, hypoplasias, and postmortem taphonomic features. One GPL example shows a less-commonly documented pair of lingual surface features (i.e., lingual surface attrition of the maxillary anterior teeth [LSAMAT] and a continuous cingular lesion [CCL]) for which co-occurrence has not been previously documented. Another example using a combination of GPL, macrophotography, and additional high magnification SEM images shows a clear case of chemical erosion on a labial surface of the tooth - a seldom documented form of wear in bioarchaeological contexts. This latter example also highlights the complementary nature of SEM (and GPL) with digital macrophotography for documenting dental wear features. Together, these examples illustrate the utility of GPL images of dental surfaces for didactic purposes and analysis.
Did Neanderthal produce a bone industry? The recent discovery of a large bone tool assemblage at the Neanderthal site of Chagyrskaya (Altai, Siberia, Russia) and the increasing discoveries of isolated finds of bone tools in various Mousterian sites across Eurasia stimulate the debate. Assuming that the isolate finds may be the tip of the iceberg and that the Siberian occurrence did not result from a local adaptation of easternmost Neanderthals, we looked for evidence of a similar industry in the Western side of their spread area. We assessed the bone tool potential of the Quina bone-bed level currently under excavation at chez Pinaud site (Jonzac, Charente-Maritime, France) and found as many bone tools as flint ones: not only the well-known retouchers but also beveled tools, retouched artifacts and a smooth-ended rib. Their diversity opens a window on a range of activities not expected in a butchering site and not documented by the flint tools, all involved in the carcass processing. The re-use of 20% of the bone blanks, which are mainly from large ungulates among faunal remains largely dominated by reindeer, raises the question of blank procurement and management. From the Altai to the Atlantic shore, through a multitude of sites where only a few objects have been reported so far, evidence of a Neanderthal bone industry is emerging which provides new insights on Middle Paleolithic subsistence strategies.
Neanderthal subsistence strategies were considered for a long time through the lens of the duality of selection versus opportunism, mostly as a comparison to the hunting behaviours developed in later periods. Based on some examples from the literature, this chapter proposes a review to discuss the presence of selection and opportunism in the different stages of the predation chaîne opératoire developed by Neanderthal populations in Eurasia. We underline the existence of a continuum between these two options and the impossibility of using this duality to evaluate the Mousterian subsistence strategy. We conclude that long-term organisation is at the centre of the Neanderthal subsistence and is strongly connected with the adaptation of Neanderthals to the opportunity offered by their territory.
The present paper examines Middle and Upper Palaeolithic retouchers recovered from various sites of the Swabian Jura located in the Ach, Lone and Lauchert river valleys of southwestern Germany. We provide an updated account of the available evidence including some of the finds retrieved over the last 50 years. Our study builds on the work of Wolfgang Taute, who in the 1960s compiled an extensive review on the retouchers of Central Europe from the Middle Palaeolithic to the Neolithic. Bone retouchers are the only organic tool that “survived” the transition from Neanderthals to modern humans in a nearly unchanged form. No other organic tool has had such a long tradition. The analysis of bone retouchers from Hohle Fels, Geißenklösterle, Sirgenstein, Vogelherd, and Schafstall I enables us to shed new light on raw material choices and on tool use across the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic.
Most Chinese lithic industries dated between 300,000 and 40,000 are characterized by the absence of Levallois debitage, the persistence of core-and-flake knapping, the rarity of prepared cores, their reduction with direct hard hammer percussion, and the rarity of retouched flakes. Here we report the discovery of seven bone soft hammers at the early hominin Lingjing site (Xuchang County, Henan) dated to 125,000–105,000. These artefacts represent the first instance of the use of bone as raw material to modify stone tools found at an East Asian early Late Pleistocene site. Three types of soft hammers are identified. The first consists of large bone flakes resulting from butchery of large herbivores that were utilized as such for expedient stone tools retouching or resharpening. The second involved the fracture of weathered bone from medium size herbivores to obtain elongated splinters shaped by percussion into sub-rectangular artefacts. Traces observed on these objects indicate intensive and possibly recurrent utilization, which implies their curation over time. The last consists of antler, occasionally used. Lingjing bone tools complement what we know about archaic hominin cultural adaptations in East Asia and highlight behavioural consistencies that could not be inferred from other cultural proxies. This discovery provides a new dimension to the debate surrounding the existence of the Middle Palaeolithic in the region. The attribution of East Asian sites to the Middle Palaeolithic assumes that cultural traits such as the Levallois method represent evolutionary hallmarks applicable to regions of the world different from those in which they were originally found. Here, we promote an approach that consists in identifying, possibly from different categories of material culture, the original features of each regional cultural trajectory and understanding the behavioural and cognitive implications they may have had for past hominin populations.
This paper presents a critical review of the experimental works with bone retouchers that have been pub lished since the beginning of research about this type of tool. The aim of this review is not the recollection of references per se, but a critical evaluation of different studies. This critical synthesis will show where we are today from a theoretical and methodological point of view. A number of ideas on how to improve and expand the scientific research about retouchers will be proposed together with a range of open archaeological and experimental issues, which can be addressed by the research community in the years ahead.
Citation: MOZOTA, M. (2017 in press): "Experimental programmes with retouchers: Where do we stand and where do we go now?". In Hutson, J.M., García-Moreno, A., Turner, E., Villaluenga, A., Gaudzinski-Windheuser, S. (Eds.), 2017. The Origins of Bone Tool Technologies. Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum, Mainz.
The stone knapping industry is largely unknown from Galician Iron Age hillforts. Research into the material culture of these settlements is increasingly diverse, meaning this research is no longer reduced to techno-typological studies of pottery and metals, but also includes a wide range of approaches, including anthracological and carpological analyses, macrolithic tools, and so on. However, there have still been no studies on knapped stone tools. This gap in the research, which may be dependent on various factors, limits the overall perception of the economy of these communities.
In this paper we present the data obtained from a use-wear study of a rock crystal tool from the O Achadizo hill fort (Boiro, A Coruña, Galicia). This tool was located in shell midden A, dated as Second Iron Age, and is of particular importance because of its pointed morphology and the configuration evidence on its perimeter. We carried out a macroscopic and microscopic analysis to obtain as much data on this piece as possible. Macroscopically we identified retouching as well as an impact fracture, and at the microscopic level we found several series of striations on the ventral face which are not in keeping with the use of the piece as a projectile tip. We decided to generate several “gigapixel” images of different areas of the tool, in order to record the order and arrangement of these striations, and to understand their origin. We identified differential orientation of the striations in the various sectors of the tool, suggesting a technical origin. The combination of the macro and microscopic analysis of both faces has allowed us to functionally interpret the tool as a sharp element.
En este trabajo abordamos el estudio de cuatro conjuntos de retocadores de hueso provenientes de otros tantos sitios musterienses del norte de la Península Ibérica: Peña Miel (La Rioja), Covalejos (Cantabria), Morín (Cantabria) y Prado Vargas (Burgos). A partir del análisis de 260 retocadores óseos, se presentan los resultados de un estudio que abarca los enfoques de la tafonomía, la morfometría y las huellas de uso. El objetivo es comprender el papel de los retocadores dentro de los sistemas de subsistencia de los neandertales. Nuestras observaciones demuestran que los retocadores de hueso se integran con diversas áreas productivas en la economía de esos grupos humanos, y no
pueden ser considerados "herramientas de fortuna". Los conjuntos estudiados comparten algunas características estructurales, pero también hay un cierto grado de variabilidad. Esas variaciones se pueden explicar por los conndicionamientos funcionales de los útiles, y en menor medida, por tradiciones o prácticas culturales de los distintos grupos.
The debate over hominidecarnivore interactions during the Pleistocene has been mainly approached from a human perspective, with the aim of contributing to the knowledge of the evolution of human cultural capabilities in the different periods. Regarding the European Middle Palaeolithic, it is most commonly concluded that Neanderthals were clearly superior to carnivores in the context of competitive relationships, with respect to both prey and the occupied space. Therefore, the presence of some human groups in the environments usually inhabited by carnivores could be perceived, from an ecological point of view, as a disturbance in the balance of the ecosystems. In order to assess the ecological impact of these human groups, the present study analyses the Unit III of Teixoneres Cave (MIS 3;Moià, Barcelona, Spain) through a comparison of palaeoecological and archaeological data. The site is located in the highlands between the two main rivers connecting the central region of Catalonia with the Mediterranean coast: the Llobregat and the Ter. Palynological and paleontological data indicate a cold landscape dominated by woodlands and some wet meadows. The high vertebrate diversity recorded in this stratigraphic unit suggests an environment marked by a balanced predatoreprey dynamic, which may have been interrupted by the occasional presence of small human groups. According to the archaeological data, these human groups tended to predate the same prey as did carnivores, which may have generated a certain perturbation in the system. However, the small size of the groups and the brevity of their visits to Teixoneres Cave seem to have minimised the perturbation, allowing the environment to recover its original balance.
The Lower Paleolithic locality of Schöningen 13 II-4 is famous for the discovery of wooden spears found amongst the butchered remains of numerous horses and other large herbivores. Although the spears have attracted the most interest, other aspects of the associated artifact assemblage have received less attention. Here we describe an extraordinary assemblage of 88 bone tools from the 'Spear Horizon.' This sample includes numerous long bone shaft fragments (mostly of horse), three ribs used as 'retouchers' to resharpen flint tools, and a complete horse innominate that was used as an anvil in bipolar knapping. Most of the retouchers were prepared by scraping the diaphysis of fresh and dry long bones. Technological analysis of the associated lithic assemblage demonstrates exhaustive resharpening to maintain functional cutting edges. Whereas the flint tools were brought to the site, curated, and maintained, the retouchers had a shorter use-history and were either discarded after a limited period or broken to extract marrow. Horse and bison metapodials with flaked and rounded epiphyses are interpreted as hammers used to break marrow bones. Several of the 'metapodial hammers' were additionally used as knapping percussors. These constitute the earliest evidence of multi-purpose bone tools in the archeological record. Our results highlight the advanced knowledge in the use of bones as tools during the Lower Paleolithic, with major implications for understanding aspects of non-lithic technology and planning depth in early hominins.
Bone retouchers are more common during the Middle Palaeolithic (from MIS 7 to 3) and are now considered as a part of the tool kit of Neanderthals. In Middle Pleistocene and Lower Palaeolithic assemblages, they are few in number and attest to the scarcity of use of bones as material for shaping tools. Some MIS 11 to MIS 9 sites allow the description of the onset of bone use and its multiplication after the MIS 9 attests of another functional relationship between bones and hominins. Our aim is to provide details about the bone retouchers found in some MIS 11e9 sites with lithic assemblages, often described as late Acheulean, that include handaxes and heavy-duty tools. The sites sampled are Terra Amata (south-east France, MIS 11), Orgnac 3 (south-east France, MIS 9e8), Cagny l'Epinette (Northern France, MIS 9) and Cueva del Angel (Spain, MIS 11e7). The study examined the number of retouchers, their support and type of animal, types of marks, bone sizes, and the lithic and faunal contexts. While bone retouchers sometimes total several hundreds of pieces in Middle Palaeolithic sites, our Lower Palaeolithic corpus yields generally between 1 and 6 retouchers. Retouchers are always made on fragments of bones from the main hunted species (horses, large bovids and cervids). Marks on bone retouchers indicate specific processes for selecting fragments of bones, and hypotheses are provided on their method of use. Categories may be suggested according to their types of support (diaphysis, epiphysis) as well as their types of marks, and allow us to suggest hypotheses for the retouching of both bifacial tools and flake-tools as well as for direct percussion. The results are compared with other sites from which bone retouchers were already published (Cueva del Bolomor, Gran Dolina TD10 in Spain, and La Micoque in France and Qesem in Israel). They are also compared with younger Acheulean assemblages such as Lazaret cave in France.
Diversity in the used bone found in the European Middle Paleolithic is very low, but bone retouchers are
the most abundant and the most common. This paper focuses on the detailed study of numerous bone
retouchers found in nine Middle Paleolithic sites bordering the French Massif Central in Southeastern
France. Multidisciplinary and recent data on chronology and biostratigraphy on the archaeological
sequences and the great number of bone retouchers have permitted a meaningful comparative regional
analysis. Their occurrences and characteristics allow us to speculate about the skills and choices of the
knappers using these bone tools, for instance deliberate selection or opportunistic choices within the
butchery remains, as well as commenting on the length of time and the way that sites were occupied.
Furthermore, in most of the studied layers we observed a strong disparity between the abundance of
bone retouchers and the number of retouched lithic products presents, raising questions about their
function and their role within the stone tool reduction sequence (primary retouching, resharpening
stone tool cutting-edges, producing marginal and micro-retouch or in some cases semi-Quina retouch).
Results are compared with a large European database, allowing us to discuss the characteristics of the
bone retouchers in the Neanderthal world.
Archaeologists can use different kinds of data to identify recycling. However, most approaches to recycling are based on lithic artefact attributes, especially on surface alterations, suggesting a period of discard between different events. Recycling can also be approached by means of faunal remains based on bone damage characteristics. Bone breakage processes, aimed at maximizing the nutritional value of consumed animals, generate a high number of small- and large-sized fragments, which are eventually discarded. Some of these are morphologically suitable for human use. It is necessary to distinguish between the use of bone as raw material from pre-existing very large-sized carcasses such as elephants (in cases where it is not certain if these had a nutritional purpose) and the recycling of fragments resulting from bone marrow extraction of smaller mammals that were obtained and consumed by human groups. In the first case, when the bones of a pre-existing elephant (including natural deaths) are exploited for tool making, the bones can be considered raw material, very similar to collecting stones as raw material for the lithic industry. In the second case, the bones of smaller mammals are selected to be used in a subsequent life cycle, after being broken for nutritional purposes and discarded. Here, we present some early cases of recycled bones from the Middle Pleistocene sites of Gran Dolina TD10-1 and Bolomor Cave in Spain and Qesem Cave in Israel. The studied elements appear to have been part of a previous faunal processing sequence (nutritional in nature), which were later discarded, and then used or modified for purposes other than the original ones. These fragments are dated to MIS 9 and show damage produced by use (retouched and unmodified soft retouchers) or shaped forms (bone artefacts). This study is an attempt to provide new data on recycling activities of faunal remains in the Middle Pleistocene and discuss the origin of this behaviour.
A comprehensive, but simple-to-use software package for executing a range of standard numerical analysis and operations used in quantitative paleontology has been developed. The program, called PAST (PAleontological STatistics), runs on standard Windows computers and is available free of charge. PAST integrates spreadsheettype data entry with univariate and multivariate statistics, curve fitting, time-series analysis, data plotting, and simple phylogenetic analysis. Many of the functions are specific to paleontology and ecology, and these functions are not found in standard, more extensive, statistical packages. PAST also includes fourteen case studies (data files and exercises) illustrating use of the program for paleontological problems, making it a complete educational package for courses in quantitative methods.
The UA 25 archaeostratigraphic unit of Lazaret cave is an exceptional Acheulean occupation level with
abundant lithic and bone material and reveals a clear organization of activities carried out in the cave. In
this paper, large mammals are studied from an archaeozoological perspective using a variety of methods
of analysis, in order to increase our understanding of the behavior, way of life and environment of the
Lazaret Acheuleans. During one autumn hunting episode, twenty-three red deer, six ibexes, three
aurochs and one roe deer were slaughtered. For the most part, it appears that Anteneanderthals processed
these carcasses inside the cave. They then left more than 600 bone remains piled into a heap with
a diameter of 80 cm in the middle of the cave. The study of diversity indexes points towards selective red
deer hunting, independently of the prey available in the environment. On the other hand, as far as the
deer is concerned, hunted animals do not seem to have been selected within the herd on the basis of
factors such as age or sex. The presence of the ibex, the second most hunted species at the site, seems to
be directly linked to climatic conditions and its relative abundance in the environment.
A significant challenge in Prehistory is to understand the mechanisms involved in the behavioural evolution of human groups. The degree of technological and cultural development of prehistoric groups is assessed mainly through stone tools. However, other elements can provide valuable information as well. This paper presents two bone retouchers dated to the Middle Pleistocene MIS 9 used for the shaping of lithic artefacts. Originating from Bolomor Cave (Spain) and Qesem Cave (Israel), these two bone retouchers are among the earliest of the Old World. Although the emergence of such tools might be found in the latest phases of the Acheulean, their widespread use seems to coincide with independently emergent post-Acheulean cultural complexes at both ends of the Mediterranean Sea: the post-Acheulean/pre-Mousterian of Western Europe and the Acheulo Yabrudian Cultural Complex of the Levant. Both entities seem to reflect convergent processes that may be viewed in a wider cultural context as reflecting new technology-related behavioural patterns as well as new perceptions in stone tool manufacturing.
Retouchers are fragments of bone used during the Paleolithic to strike stone flakes in order to transform them into retouched tools. Our experiments show that the mark produced on retouchers differs depending on whether they were used to strike flint or quartzite. Our results suggest that numerous pits, most often with an ovoid form, characterize the retouching of quartzite flakes. Most of the scores produced with this material have a sinuous morphology with rough interior faces. The areas with superposed traces have a pitted appearance. On the other hand, the retouching of flint flakes, produces pits that are most often triangular in form. Most of the scores have a rectilinear morphology with smooth interior faces and their superposition results in the formation of hatch marks. There is also a relationship between the characteristics of the mark and the relative state of freshness of the retouchers. The validity of the criteria identified was confirmed by a blind test. These diagnostic criteria were applied to archaeological retouchers from the Mousterian site of Noisetier Cave. The results obtained improve our knowledge of the technical behaviors of Neanderthals and allow us to address questions concerning their techno-economic implications. © 2011 Elsevier Ltd.
The use of retouching tools made on hard animal materials has a broad chronological and geographical distribution throughout the European Palaeolithic. In Italy, analyses of retouchers are not particularly numerous. The current work presents the preliminary results obtained from the study of 79 retouchers recovered from two sites located in northern Italy: Riparo Tagliente and Grotta della Ghiacciaia, Verona. Results from
Riparo Tagliente provide both qualitative and quantitative data, span several occupation levels, and the use traces on the cortical surfaces of these bone tools show great variability. Grotta della Ghiacciaia yields only qualitative data because of a restrictively small sample size. Overall, the retouchers analysed are mostlymade on bone shafts of medium- to large-sized ungulates, especially red deer and other cervids, which were the most commonly hunted animals at the sites. Many examples were also made on the bones of small-sized mammals, such as roe deer. This variability can contribute to the identifi cation of such tools at other sites and to better define a methodology for their analysis.
Middle Palaeolithic sites frequently present bones with a double function, linked to subsistence and technology, and which are generally referred to as “retouchers” or “bone retouchers”. These have been identified in several European sites from the Middle Pleistocene to Holocene, but different explanations of their origin and functionality have been cited. Although bone retouchers were made using various animal parts, they were usually produced from diaphyseal fragments of medium to large hoofed mammals. We present a small assemblage of six bone retouchers recovered from Stratigraphic Unit Xa (52.3 ± 4.6 ka), in the Middle Palaeolithic site of El Salt (Alicante, Spain), and compare our data with previous studies from several sites in south‐western France, northern Italy, and north‐eastern Spain. These tools were generated using diaphyseal fragments from red deer, horses and other large mammals previously exploited by humans for meat and marrow. Our findings add to existing knowledge on the behaviour and faunal resource management of the last Neanderthal groups on the western Iberian Peninsula before they disappeared from the region around 45‐40 ka.
The use of retouching tools made on hard animal materials has a broad chronological and geographical distribution throughout the European Palaeolithic. In Italy, analyses of retouchers are not particularly numerous. The current work presents the preliminary results obtained from the study of 79 retouchers recovered from two sites located in northern Italy: Riparo Tagliente and Grotta della Ghiacciaia, Verona. Results from Riparo Tagliente provide both qualitative and quantitative data, span several occupation levels, and the use traces on the cortical surfaces of these bone tools show great variability. Grotta della Ghiacciaia yields only qualitative data because of a restrictively small sample size. Overall, the retouchers analysed are mostly made on bone shafts of medium-to large-sized ungulates, especially red deer and other cervids, which were the most commonly hunted animals at the sites. Many examples were also made on the bones of small-sized mammals, such as roe deer. This variability can contribute to the identification of such tools at other sites and to better define a methodology for their analysis.
Retouched artifacts constitute an important part of Paleolithic lithic assemblages. Evaluating what constraints shaped morphological variability can provide data about mobility, territorial management, and even about different adaptive strategies. This study attempts to understand what factors conditioned the intensity of retouch and the morphological variability of the retouched artifacts from unit III of Teixoneres cave (Barcelona, Spain) and to ascertain whether differences in retouch intensity depend on the raw materials used and the type of site occupation. First, a qualitative and descriptive technological analysis of the retouched artifacts is undertaken. Second, an analysis of the intensity and extent of retouch is carried out in a quantitative way using reduction indexes, and then crossed with a study of technological attributes such as the stone raw material, blank cross-section, or implement type. Lastly, all these variables are crossed and compared using a cluster analysis. The results show that retouched artifacts from unit III of Teixoneres cave can be classified into clear groups that represent different lithic strategies linked to the short-term occupation patterns inferred for unit III.
This paper is online open access now: http://journal.exarc.net/issue-2013-2/ea/experimental-programme-collection-and-use-retouching-tools-made-diaphyseal-bone-splinters
Les retouchoirs en os representent le plus ancien outillage en matieres dures animales du Paleolithique europeen. Ils se rencontrent tres frequemment au sein des ensembles mousteriens et perdurent tout au long du Paleolithique superieur. Plusieurs etudes fonctionnelles leur ont ete consacrees et l’hypothese la plus communement admise est celle de leur emploi dans la retouche de tranchants lithiques. Cette hypothese repose toutefois principalement sur l’etude de pieces mousteriennes alors que les exemplaires du Paleolithique superieur, en particulier ceux de l’Aurignacien ancien, presentent des caracteristiques legerement differentes. A partir de l’etude de plusieurs series de l’Aurignacien ancien (l’abri Castanet en Dordogne, la grotte des Hyenes dans les Landes et la grotte Gatzarria dans les Pyrenees-Atlantiques) et d’une reconstitution experimentale, nous montrons que les retouchoirs de cette periode temoignent d’une evolution de leur mode de fonctionnement, liee aux changements operes dans le domaine lithique. Nous envisageons egalement la possibilite de leur emploi dans le debitage lamellaire.
During the Middle Paleolithic period, carnivores and hominids periodically occupied the same areas at different times and each predator generated significant palimpsests, rendering difficult their archaeological interpretation. Teixoneres Cave, a carnivore den site, located in the northeastern part of the Iberian Peninsula, demonstrates that it is possible to overcome these problems by using a careful strategy in selecting samples for radiocarbon dating, in order to produce an accurate chronology of the site in question and certainly attest the human occupation.
En plus des hominidés, d’autres prédateurs peuvent prendre part à la formation d’accumulations en générant des déchets qui se mélangent à ceux produits par les hominidés, conduisant à la formation de palimpsestes. Ceci est fréquemment discuté dans le cas d’assemblages de léporidés du Paléolithique moyen, auxquels les carnivores ont souvent contribué. Le niveau III de la grotte de Teixoneres (MIS 3) constitue un exemple qui peut être utilisé pour comprendre l’origine des assemblages de léporidés dans des contextes archéologiques. L’application d’une méthodologie archéozoologique et taphonomique a permis d’affirmer que l’assemblage de léporidés dans le site a été généré par différents agents, parmi lesquels les petits mammifères carnivores et les rapaces nocturnes semblent jouer un rôle important, ainsi que quelques visites occasionnelles de groupes humains. Le but de cet article est de présenter de nouvelles données sur les activités des Néandertaliens dans ce site et de contribuer à l’hypothèse relative à des occupations humaines de courte durée dans la grotte.
In this paper, we propose a specific procedure to create gigapixel-like images from SEM (scanning electron
microscope) micrographs. This methodology allows intensive SEM observations to be made for those
disciplines that require of large surfaces to be analyzed at different scales once the SEM sessions have
been completed (e.g., stone tools use-wear studies). This is also a very useful resource for academic
purposes or as a support for collaborative studies, thus reducing the number of live observation sessions
and the associated expense
Evidence of Neanderthals using bear remains as retouchers is rare. In the sedimentary unit 5 of Scladina Cave (Belgium; Weichselian Early Glacial, MIS 5d to 5b), twenty-six bone retouchers have been discovered. Among these, six have been made from cave bear bones (four from a femur and two from two tibiae). The presence of lithic splinters, still embedded in grooves, can be convincingly associated with their function as knapping tools. Particularly interesting are six bone fragments, including four fragments used as retouchers and two unused splinters, which have been refitted together to reconstitute an almost complete cave bear femur diaphysis. These specimens present modifications in the form of cut marks, scraping marks, impact notches and typical fractures of percussions on green (fresh) bone, sometimes overlapping each other, that allow for a complete understanding of the operational sequence in the production of bone retouchers at this site. The identification of a sophisticated operational sequence, where each action succeeds another in the production of a bone tool, is a major argument in favor of predetermination that guided the Neanderthal actions, and is similar to that described for stone tool chaîne opératoire.
Retouching tools made of bone and other hard animal material have very broad chronological and geographical distribution throughout the Paleolithic period in Europe that also involves the Latest Mousterian and the Uluzzian in Italy. We investigated possible behavioural differences between these two cultural complexes in the use of these implements, based on the evidence from Fumane Cave, with its MP-EUP transitional sequence that has so far yielded more than 150 such artifacts. Although they are mostly made from bone shafts, a few remarkable examples of two fragments of cervid antler are also present. At a general level, these tools form an homogenous group: taxonomically, the bones fit with the faunal composition dominated by red deer and cervids, which were the most commonly hunted animals. The identified stigmata are punctiform impressions, linear impressions, striae and wells, usually grouped in small zones. Each retouching tool has up to three of these zones. Significant similarities in species, the skeletal part, and weight between the tools from the two cultural complexes have been detected, but also a difference due to the use of brown bear bones in the Uluzzian.
A few pieces of worked bone were previously reported from Sibudu, a site from KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa featuring a stratigraphic sequence with pre-Still Bay, Still Bay, Howiesons Poort, post-Howiesons Poort, late and final MSA cultural horizons. Here we describe an expanded collection of worked bones, including twenty-three pieces. Technological and use-wear analysis of these objects, and their comparison with experimental and ethnographic data, reveals that a number of specialised bone tool types (wedges, pièces esquillées, pressure flakers, smoothers, sequentially notched pieces), previously known only from the Upper Palaeolithic and more recent periods, were manufactured and used at least 30,000 years earlier at Sibudu Cave. These tools appear to be part of a local tradition because they are absent at contemporaneous or more recent southern African sites. Variability in Middle Stone Age material culture supports a scenario in which, beyond broad similarities in lithic technology, significant differences between regions, and trends of continuity at a local scale emerge in other aspects of the technical system, and in the symbolic domain. The archaeological record is revealing a complexity that prevents evaluation of the modern character of Middle Stone Age cultures in antinomic terms. We argue here that it is the detailed analysis of cultural variation that will inform us of the non-linear processes at work during this period, and contribute in the long run to explaining how and when crucial cultural innovations became established in human history.