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abstract: The South African Middle Stone Age (MSA), spanning the Middle to Late Pleistocene (Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) 8-3) witnessed major climatic and environmental change and dramatic change in forager technological organization including lithic raw material selection. Homo sapiens emerged during the MSA and had to make decisions about how to organize technology to cope with environmental stressors, including lithic raw material selection, which can effect tool production and application, and mobility. This project studied the role and importance of lithic raw materials in the technological organization of foragers by focusing on why lithic raw material selection sometimes changed when the behavioral and environmental context changed. The study used the Pinnacle Point (PP) MSA record (MIS6-3) in the Mossel Bay region, South Africa as the test case. In this region, quartzite and silcrete with dramatically different properties were the two most frequently exploited raw materials, and their relative abundances change significantly through time. Several explanations intertwined with major research questions over the origins of modern humans have been proposed for this change. Two alternative lithic raw material procurement models were considered. The first, a computational model termed the Opportunistic Acquisition Model, posits that archaeological lithic raw material frequencies are due to opportunistic encounters during random walk. The second, an analytical model termed the Active-Choice Model drawn from the principles of Optimal Foraging Theory, posits that given a choice, individuals will choose the most cost effective means of producing durable cutting tools in their environment and will strategically select those raw materials. An evaluation of the competing models found that lithic raw material selection was a strategic behavior in the PP record. In MIS6 and MIS5, the selection of quartzite was driven by travel and search cost, while during the MIS4, the joint selection of quartzite and silcrete was facilitated by a mobility strategy that focused on longer or more frequent stays at PP coupled with place provisioning. Further, the result suggests that specific raw materials and technology were relied on to obtain food resources and perform processing tasks suggesting knowledge about raw material properties and suitability for tasks. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Anthropology 2017

La période de 3500 à 2500 avant notre ère est marquée par une mutation profonde des sociétés. Dans l’espace provençal, on constate un éclatement du complexe néolithique moyen, Ces bouleversements se traduisent, au niveau des industries lithiques, par un changement d’ordre technologique, concernant notamment l’approvisionnement en matière première. Notre étude se concentre sur 6 sites d’habitat de l’espace provençal. Ces occupations sont les plus à même de révéler des informations d’ordre socio-économique. Elles présentent à la fois des industries produites sur les sites et des produits importés provenant d’ateliers spécialisés. L’intérêt est de prendre en compte tous les composants des assemblages lithiques, afin de noter quelles peuvent être les différences de gestion et de consommation entre ces outillages qui procèdent de deux chaines opératoires, d’une part à l’échelle du site, puis entre les sites. Pour cela, la méthode de sélection des outils a été lourde, demandant beaucoup de temps et a été fondée sur l’observation à l’œil nu et à faible grossissement, en amont des observations microscopiques. Les déterminations faites à partir des observations microscopiques ont été confrontées à des référentiels expérimentaux existants. Certaines comparaisons ont nécessité le recours aux référentiels expérimentaux ou ethnographiques d’autres chercheurs. De plus, après l’observation de certaines pièces archéologiques, des expérimentations spécifiques ont été réalisées afin de répondre précisément à certaines problématiques de notre étude, permettant de développer un corpus de pièces de référence encore très peu représentées pour le moment. / The period from 3500 to 2500 BC is marked by a profound transformation of societies. In the Provence area, there is a breakdown of the Middle Neolithic complex. Changes are reflected by lithic industries. We can observe technological changes, including raw material supply. New production methods are emerging . Large blades from specialized workshops begin to spread.Our study focuses on six settlement of the Provence area. These occupations give socio-economic information. Indeed, they have both stone industries produced on sites and blades imported from workshops. The interest is to take into account all the components of the lithic assemblages, to note what are the differences in consumption and management between the tools, first across the site and between sites.For this, the method of selection of tools was cumbersome, time-consuming and was based on observation with the naked eye and low magnification before microscopic observations. The determinations made from microscopic observations were compared with existing experimental repositories. Some comparisons have required the use of experimental ethnographic repositories. After the observation of certain archaeological tools, specific experiments were performed to specifically address some issues of our study to develop a new corpus poorly represented at the moment.

This study aims to shed light on how and when mechanisms of the human brain evolved to support complex cognition and language. The field of evolutionary cognitive archaeology asserts that prehistoric technologies, as products of past cognition in action, are informative of the minimum cognitive and linguistic abilities that hominins needed to possess for their production. Previous researchers attempted to reconstruct the neural correlates of two Early Stone Age (ESA) tool industries, the 2.6 million-year-old Oldowan industry and the 0.7 million-year-old late Acheulian industry, by using positron emission tomography (PET) to observe the functional activation occurring in the brains of trained and expert stone knappers after making these different tool types. Because of evidence for overlap between the knapping and language circuits of the brain and increased anterior frontal activity during Acheulian tool production, these researchers argued that their results 1) indicate increased cognitive demands for late Acheulian tool production relative to Oldowan tool production and 2) support a technological origin for language, meaning that certain language functions co-opted the neural substrate and functions that were already established for toolmaking and tool use. Because of the motion limiting aspects of PET, however, these studies were unable to record the hemodynamic response of naturalistic stone knapping in real-time. They also were unable to observe the functional activation associated with the earliest stage of learning, which is likely to differ from late stage learning or expertise. Furthermore, any conclusion regarding a technological origin for language is problematic if it relies on data obtained from participants who learned to knap with verbal instruction. To test these two claims, this dissertation utilized a neuroimaging technique called functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to explore the neural correlates of real-time, naturalistic Oldowan and Acheulian stone knapping at three different points in learning. Participants in the study were separated into two groups to learn ESA knapping skills. Both groups watched the same video tutorials that depicted an expert’s hands as he made stone tools, but those in the verbal group heard spoken instructions, while those in the nonverbal group watched a version with the sound turned off. Functional brain images were reconstructed from the digitized landmarks of each participant’s head and from the optical data. An analysis of variance (ANOVA) revealed a clearer distinction between the neural processes of Oldowan and Acheulian tool manufacturing tasks than has previously been demonstrated. Only the Acheulian task recruited a frontotemporal working memory network. Selection for individuals with increased working memory capacities, which would have allowed them to make increasingly complex tools to gain access to novel dietary items, may have spurred the evolution of larger brain size in the genus Homo during the early Pleistocene. The results also demonstrated that the presence or absence of language during training dictated which higher-order cognitive areas of the brain become engaged and at what point in training. Thus, the results of previous neuroarchaeological studies reflect a very specific condition of stone knapping skill acquisition that involves linguistic instruction, which may not be analogous to how skills were transmitted during the ESA. Finally, evidence of overlap between left hemisphere language and stone knapping circuits among the participants in the nonverbal group lends additional support for the technological origin for language hypothesis.

The thesis raises questions concerning prehistoric conditions in a high mountain region in central Scandinavia; it focuses on the human use of stone and on hunting principally of reindeer. An analysis of how the stone material was utilized and an approach to how large mammals were hunted result in a synthesis describing one interpretation of how the vast landscape of a region in the central Scandinavian high mountains was used. With this major aim as a base questions were posed concerning the human use of stone resources and possible changes in this use. Preconditions for the occurrence of large mammals as game animals and for hunting are also highlighted. A general perspective is the long time period over which possible changes in the use of stone and hunting of big game, encompassing the Late Mesolithic, Neolithic, Bronze Age and to a certain extent the Early Iron Age. Considering the manufacture of flaked stone tools, debitage in the form of flakes from a dwelling, constitute the base where procurement and technology are essential. The occupation of the dwelling covers a period from the Late Mesolithic to the Bronze Age. Possible changes in lithic use are discussed based on an analysis of debitage which includes testing variables reflecting various steps in the process of flaked stone tool manufacture. Also, the results are discussed from a methodological aspect; the classificatory aspect of analyzing large flake assemblages is implied. The result of the flake analysis indicates differences in the use of stone from the Late Mesolithic to the Bronze Age/Early Iron Age. These differences are interpreted in a three-part chronological division and as theoretically proceeding in a manufacturing process of five steps including acquisition, reduction through three steps and use of completed tools. A pattern, dividing the Bronze Age use of stone from that of the Neolithic and Late Mesolithic is discerned and discussed in terms of changes in procurement strategies and technology. Also, social organization is touched upon. When approaching the issue of hunting the character of data differ; archaeological and palaeo-environmental data together comprise the base for a discussion of possible changes. This is based on a theoretical model applied in a hypothetical research design. Archaeological categories of remains relevant in hunting contexts together with ethnographic and traditional hunting techniques are discussed. They constitute the base and illustrate possible variables in the testing of the hypothetical model. Changes in the Holocene climate are clear, just as changes in the archaeological record are observable. Together these circumstances indicate changes in the hunting process. The structural changes in economy and society that occur in central and north Scandinavia during stone-using periods are discernible in the region studied here. / digitalisering@umu

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Chert tool production and exchange has long been studied for the Maya Preclassic to Terminal Classic Periods of Northern Belize (1000 B.C.-A.D. 950). It is increasingly clear that lithic systems of production and exchange were an integral part of the economic environment for this region, yet lithic research pertaining to the Maya Postclassic Period (A.D. 950-1530) is not well represented in the general literature. A recent examination of 110 chert, chalcedony, and obsidian small side-notched projectile points and point preforms, as well as 2,163 pieces of associated production debitage from two Late Postclassic households at Santa Rita Corozal, Belize, has yielded the identification of two lithic craft production areas. Examination of the complete lithic collection from these residences, as well as an additional 176 projectile points located throughout the site, reveals the need for new models of lithic production and exchange for this region during the Postclassic Period.

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Submitted by Mario BC (mario@bc.ufrpe.br) on 2016-08-12T12:56:30Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Barbara Lins Caldas de Moraes.pdf: 1002020 bytes, checksum: 55835be7452bb5679593acd3c7c7c122 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-12T12:56:30Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Barbara Lins Caldas de Moraes.pdf: 1002020 bytes, checksum: 55835be7452bb5679593acd3c7c7c122 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013-02-26 / Wild capuchin monkeys use stones tools to access food items that otherwise would be unavailable, as encapsulated fruits and seeds. The successful completion of this activity not only requires the selection of the suitable tool, but also the correct technique. In order to analyze if the stone tools used by the capuchin monkeys are adjusted to the type of food item consumed and if this adjustment entails variations or behavioral adaptations to accomplish the task, stone tools and techniques used by animals to process five distinct food items, were compared. The study was conducted in an area of Pernambuco’s semiarid Caatinga, located in Serra Talhada. Along 15 months, 257 sites were identified, characterized and monitored. Behaviors of using stones as tools were documented by camera traps. Accounted a ‘total of 395 stones, used as hammers to break of five food items: Syagrus oleracea, Manihot epruinosa, Pilosocereus pachycladus, Tacinga inamoena and Commiphora leptophloeos, these last three were not yet described as accessed auxiliary items by other populations of capuchin monkeys. The use of stones as tools to process the cactaceae revealed especially interested, such strategy is related to the presence of these item’s thorns. It was found also that the characteristics of food items such as hardness, size and the presence of spines influences the stone’s selection to be used as hammers. The postures adopted by the animals for activity breaks are similar to those already described in other studies, however behavioral adaptations in handling the tool are performed to increase its functionality. / Macacos-prego selvagens utilizam ferramentas de pedra para acessar itens alimentares que de outra forma estariam indisponíveis, como frutos encapsulados e sementes. O sucesso na realização desta atividade requer não só a seleção da ferramenta adequada, mas também a correta aplicação da técnica. A fim de analisar se as ferramentas de pedras utilizadas por macacos-prego são ajustadas de acordo com o tipo de item alimentar consumido e se esse ajuste acarreta variações ou adequações comportamentais para a realização da tarefa, ferramentas de pedras e técnicas aplicadas pelos animais, para o processamento de cinco itens alimentares distintos, foram comparadas. O estudo foi realizado em uma área de Caatinga no semiárido Pernambucano, localizada no município de Serra Talhada. Ao longo de 15 meses, 257 sítios de quebra foram identificados, caracterizados e monitorados. Comportamentos de uso de pedras como ferramentas foram documentados através de armadilhas fotográficas. Contabilizamos um total de 395 pedras utilizadas como martelos para a quebra de cinco itens alimentares: Syagrus oleracea, Manihot epruinosa, Pilosocereus pachycladus, Tacinga inamoena e Commiphora leptophloeos, estes três últimos ainda não descritos como itens acessados com o auxílio de ferramentas por outras populações de macacos-prego. O uso de pedras como ferramentas para o processamento das cactáceas revelou-se especialmente interessante, pois tal estratégia está relacionada à presença de espinhos destes itens. Fatores como a distribuição e o tamanho do item alimentar parecem influenciar nas escolhas feitas pelos animais no uso das bigornas. Constatou-se, também, que características dos itens alimentares como rigidez, tamanho e presença de espinhos influenciam na seleção das pedras utilizadas como martelos. As posturas adotadas pelos animais para a atividade de quebra são semelhantes às já descritas em outros estudos, mas adequações comportamentais na manipulação da ferramenta são realizadas para aumentar a sua funcionalidade.