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This thesis records the study of over one thousand selected, bone, antler and ivory artifacts from the Upper Palaeolithic in Britain and Belgium, with particular reference to manufacture. The methods used include the experimental manufacture and use of certain bone and antler artifacts, and the recording of the traces produced. This information is used as a reference collection with which to compare the archaeological material. Both the experimental and the archaeological implements are examined either with the aid of a handlens, or at a variety of magnifications using an optical microscope and a scanning electron microscope. Upper Palaeolithic bone tool types as a whole are considered for comparative purposes, as are some ethnographic artifacts. The artifacts studied here are ordered into twenty-six different tool types, each of which is discussed in turn; this includes a description of the raw materials used, of the identifiable traces of manufacture and their interpretation, and of the identifiable traces of use, and their interpretation. The regional and chronological distribution of the specimens is also considered, as is any variation in each type, for example in size or in the raw materials used. Some regional and chronological patterning is found, but in the absence of reliable contextual information, its interpretation is often speculative. It is concluded that a large scale programme of radiocarbon accelerator dating of actual artifacts is required to solve this problem.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Nevada, Reno, 2008. / "May 2008." Includes bibliographical references. Online version available on the World Wide Web.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2004. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 211-243).

No description available.

Nos recherches se sont orientées vers l'étude des niveaux correspondant aux dernières phases du Moustérien de deux sites en grotte, Grotta del Cavallo et Grotta Mario Bernadini, situées sur le versant ionique des Pouilles dans la province de Lecce . Les deux sites en question ont fait l'objet de nombreuses études à partir des années 1960 (Palma Di Cesnola, 1963 ; Borzatti, 1970). Le choix de se concentrer spécifiquement sur les phases finales de cette période a été d'abord motivée par la nécessité de combler un vide de connaissance dans l'aire prise en compte concernant les aspects technologiques. L'objectif premier a été par conséquence de reconstituer les éléments liés à la production afin d'en comprendre la spécificité technologique et, dans une certaine mesure, les comportements techno-économiques. Ensuite, le choix des collections s'inscrit dans la volonté d'établir le point de départ pour évaluer à travers une confrontation entre les séries, les rapports phylogénétiques entre les dernières phases du Moustérien et les industries uluzziennes qui dans les deux sites succèdent à la séquence moustérienne. Enfin, le choix des deux sites repose sur une raison d'ordre géographique. Si les Pouilles constituent déjà un contexte particulier lié à l'isolement de l'extrême sud-est de l'Italie, la région de Salento qui est située dans sa partie méridionale se présente comme une insularité dans l'insularité. Cette position géographique singulière pourrait avoir revêtu un rôle d'isolement potentiel par rapport aux autres régions limitrophes et avoir comme conséquence laconstitution de phénomène locaux qui se sont traduit dans l'expression de caractères culturels, au sens plus large du terme, originaux. / The puzzles arising from the fragmentation of the Mousterian expressions in their late phases, as emerged fromthe archaeological evidence, have always been of interest for prehistoric research, as far as they are concerned with both cultural and biological aspects of human evolution. The cultural complexity that can be observed between 40.000 and 28.000 years ago in Europe depends onthe variety of Neanderthal economic and symbolic attitudes, in relation to both the advent of new technical expressions (Castelperronian, Uluzzian and sensu lato, transitional complexes) and to the persistente of productions that are still rooted in to the traditional variability of theMousterian groups. At the same time the appearing of techno-complexes attributed to the Upper Palaeolithic has been related by some authors to the emergence of particolar cognitive abilities, ascribed to the arrival of the anatomically modern humans (AMH) in Europe. In the last years the recognition of blades and bladelets productions in Mousterian context in France, Italy and in the Near East has mitigated this hypothetical relationship between these productionsand the spread of the AMH. This paper reports the results of the study of Mousterian lithic industries of Grotta del Cavallo and Grotta Mario Bernardini (Nardò, Lecce). The technological study shows the development of an autonomous schèma opératoire (along with other types of productions) oriented in the direction of blades and bladelets production bymeans of a volumetric exploitation. The recognition of this type of production - not recorded until now in the Salentin area - gives us the possibility to review the production systems that we can attribute at the Mousterian terminal phases of the southern Italy.

This interdisciplinary thesis is about dwelling, both as a method in archaeology and as a mode of existence. My thesis has two principal aims. Firstly, to explore the 'dwelling perspective' as this has been outlined in recent archaeological theory. This will involve discussion of phenomenological philosophy and the figure of Martin Heidegger. The term 'dwelling' is a technical one originating in Heidegger's philosophy of being. Phenomenology has been making inroads into archaeological theory as a consequence of the interpretive turn of the 1980s. The theoretical commitment of this thesis is that phenomenological inquiry is a useful project in archaeological research. Reflexive archaeological research in the present might articulate and confirm certain phenomenological dimensions of present experience so as to inform and enhance our understanding of the past. Secondly, I discuss the notion of dwelling in the existential sense as a mode of existence in terms that might allow us to deploy this concept in Palaeolithic archaeology, with specific reference to mortuary practice and "art". I propose two case studies in order to explore this. Firstly, mortuary practice and existential awareness of death will be explored with reference to the site of the Sima de los Huesos. Secondly, Heidegger's notion of artistic production as a world-opening event will be explored in relation to Upper Palaeolithic art in caves. The focus on mortuary practice and art is not arbitrary: both are central planks of Heidegger's account of dwelling and both are linked by 'heterotopic' space. Heidegger presented a novel account of human existence as 'Dasein'. Dasein is being-in-the-world and being-in-the-world is unified by what Heidegger called 'care' (Sorge). Heidegger's account of Dasein remains anthropocentric: I argue that we should move away from Heidegger's own anthropocentric view of being-in-the-world, dwelling or care toward a phenomenological archaeology that goes 'beyond the human'. I argue that care or dwelling is evidenced by the archaeological record of human becoming and that our ancestors 'cared for' or 'dwelled with' their dead. Care is evidenced by appropriating the world and by looking after compatriots within the world, and I argue that such an existential state had been reached before the advent of the Upper Palaeolithic. I argue that Upper Palaeolithic "art" opened up a hunter-gatherer world that enabled others, including animal others, and objects, to become meaningful to groups of Daseins, and so to become part of particular "dwelling places". Heidegger remains the key theorist of dwelling but his anthropocentrism should be abandoned. Suitably revised, Heidegger's account of dwelling will provoke us to look at Palaeolithic archaeology from a fresh perspective.

This thesis examines the Mid Upper Palaeolithic (MUP) of Russia (ca. 30,000-20,000 14C BP). During this time, as in the rest of Europe, the principal archaeological industry is known as the Gravettian. However, in Russia two other industries, the Streletskayan and the Gorodtsovian, are also known from the beginning of the MUP. Historically, there have been significant problems integrating the Russian MUP record with that from the rest of Europe. The research described in this thesis concentrates on backed lithic assemblages (including Gravette points, microgravettes, other backed points and backed bladelets) from five Russian Gravettian sites: Kostenki 8 Layer 2, Kostenki 4, Kostenki 9, Khotylevo 2 and Kostenki 21 Layer 3. These are studied from an explicitly Western European theoretical perspective, using standard techno-typological methods to construct typological groupings and describe the variation between and within sites. Alongside this, new radiocarbon dates from several sites Kostenki 8 Layer 2, Kostenki 4 and Borshchevo 5) were obtained. These radiocarbon dates are critically analysed alongside published dates and unpublished dates made available to this research. The results of the research constitute a new culture history for the Russian MUP. Each stage of the MUP is dated and described, and the uncertainties in our knowledge outlined. One new lithic index fossil is defined and two others are re-assessed. The Russian record is compared with the contemporary archaeological record elsewhere in Europe, in order to describe large-scale synchronic variation and changes through time in the homogeneity and regionalisation of material culture. The relationship between these dynamics and climate change are discussed.

The Caucasus is a land corridor between the Black and Caspian seas, linking Africa to Northern Eurasia, and is considered a migratory route for Neanderthals and Anatomically Modern Humans (AMH). Numerous cave sites in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia and southwestern Russia indicate that Neanderthals and AMH occupied the region, but poor chronological control meant that the precise timing of the occupations was unknown. This work involved identifying and geochemically characterising volcanic ash layers (tephra) in archaeological cave and open air sites spanning approximately 125 ka to 30 ka to generate a tephrostratigraphic framework. This framework was used to correlate the sites and assess the synchronicity of Neanderthal and AMH occupation across the region. Tephra investigations were also carried out on a core (M72/5-25-GC1) from the southeast Black Sea (that spans the last ~ 60 ka), with the aim of linking the archaeological sites to this palaeoenvironmental archive, to investigate the impact changes in climate had on the archaeology in the region. Eleven of the archaeological sites investigated (Gubs rock shelter and Weasel Cave in Russia; Ortvale Klde, Ortvale Cave, Sakajia and Undo Cave in Georgia; Aghitue 3, Lusakert 1, Fantan and Kagasi in Armenia; and Azokh Cave in Azerbaijan) had tephra, 30 cryptotephras and 8 visible layers, preserved. Twenty-two tephra layers were identified in the Black Sea core, with distinct periods of frequent volcanic activity separated by long periods, up to 9 ka, of seemingly volcanic quiescence in the region. The glass chemistry of the tephra found in the archaeological sites and the core, determined using a wavelength-dispersive electron microprobe, was used to characterise and correlate the units between the sedimentary sequences. Although some widespread tephra from the major Mediterranean sources (3.6 ka Minoan eruption from Santorini, Greece and the ~39 ka Campanian Ignimbrite super eruption from Campi Flegrei, Italy) were identified in the Black Sea core, none of the archaeological sites contained Mediterranean tephra. Most of the tephra layers in the archaeological sites investigated and the Black Sea core are from sources in the Caucasus and Turkey. The limited information on the volcanic history and compositional data of these sources in the region does not allow most of the units to be correlated to particular eruptions or volcanoes. However, some of the cryptotephra units have been correlated to eruptions from Nemrut, Acigöl and Erciyes Dagi volcanoes in Turkey. Unfortunately, there are no tephra layers that are common to the Black Sea core and any of the archaeological sites, prohibiting direct correlation of the sites to this detailed palaeoenvironmental record. However, the ~30 ka Nemrut Formation (NF) eruption from Nemrut volcano, Turkey, is found in the Lake Van palaeoenvironmental record and in two of the archaeological sites. This allows the archaeological sites to be correlated to each other and palaeoclimate information can also be imported into these sites. More detailed characterisation of the proximal deposits may allow more units to be correlated to eruptions and will enable these distal records to be used to further constrain the tempo of explosive volcanic activity in the region. A few compositionally distinct tephra layers were found and a suite of new radiocarbon dates were obtained at various sites, allowing archaeological occupations to be dated and the synchronicity between sites to be assessed. A distinct rhyolitic tephra correlates a layer with an Upper Palaeolithic stone technology, associated with AMH, in Azokh Cave (Azerbaijan) to a layer in Sakajia cave (Georgia) that contains Neanderthal remains. This is clear evidence that AMH and Neanderthals were in the region (within 600 km) at the same time. Other sites have also been correlated with tephra. A dacitic tephra correlates a unit with an Upper Palaeolithic lithic and bone tool techno-complex in Ortvale Klde (Georgia) to a unit with a Middle Palaeolithic lithic assemblage in Lusakert 1 (Armenia). The Middle Paleolithic tool assemblage in Lusakert 1 is clearly different from the Upper Paleolithic assemblage that is clearly associated with AMH in Ortvale Klde, but it is not clear whether the other assemblage is associated with Neanderthals, archaic modern humans or AMH. This correlation between different lithic assemblages clearly indicates that there were different groups, with different technologies, occupying the region at the same time. The NF tephra is also found shallower in the sequences at both Lusakert 1 and Ortvale Klde. This time marker shows that the Middle Paleolithic assemblage is still being used in Lusakert 1 at ~30 ka, indicating that a less diverse stone techno-complex was used for a prolonged period of time in central Armenia. There does not appear to be any direct relationship between occupation in the region and the climate at the time, implying that this had little effect on the archaeological story in the region. A new radiocarbon based age model that combines new dates with published data for the sites within the Caucasus shows temporal overlap between AMH and Neanderthals in the region. This confirms the tephra correlations and clearly indicates both species co-existed in the Caucasus. The new radiocarbon data also suggest that AMH arrived in the region earlier than previously thought, at ~50-44 ka cal BP. The arrival of AMH in the Caucasus is now temporally similar to other early AMH sites in northern Eurasia.

Handaxes are some of the longest lasting and most iconic stone tools throughout human evolution. Appearing in the early Pleistocene, these bifacially flaked tools persisted around one and a half million years and span across all of the Old World, from Africa to eastern Asia. Despite their ubiquitous nature, relatively little is known about their function. Handaxes are often speculated to be multi-functional tools which were selected for due to their large cutting edge; however, only a handful of use-wear studies have attempted to elucidate their use in the archaeological record. The lack of experimental use-wear studies surrounding handaxe function is due to preservation issues and the fact that manufacturing and curating handaxes compounds the ambiguity of microwear signatures. The methodology undertaken in this research provides a pathway to overcoming these obstacles through experimental archaeology in conjunction with low powered microscopy, image-based GIS, and statistical hypothesis testing. In particular, this thesis investigates handaxe function at an assemblage scale (n = 56) in a late Lower Paleolithic to Middle Paleolithic archaeological site called Shishan Marsh – 1 (SM-1) in al-Azraq, Jordan. Experimental handaxes (n = 22) were replicated and used in various activities such as butchery, plant processing, woodworking, shellfish processing, and digging. The results of this research corroborates the idea of handaxes being used as multifunctional tools. These results have implications for handaxe function, hominin tool use in a desert refugia, and provides a new pathway to investigate inter-site variability in handaxe use. / Graduate / 2018-08-01