Use-wear studies were undertaken to determine if the Clovis bifaces discovered at the Gault site in Central Texas were utilized implements or rather products of lithic raw material procurement. Those bifaces bearing microscopic traces indicative of use were studied in detail to determine the use-history of the tools. This thesis describes an experimental program aimed to build analogues for probable biface functions. A series of projectile impact studies, butchering experiments, and expedient-like tool useactivities were conducted to document the traces acquired on the tool surface from use. The experimental results are used to identify the utilized tools, demonstrate their functional purpose, and suggest the extent of tool use of the prehistoric biface assemblage.

This study evaluates how prehispanic central Mexicans made stone tools—primarily from obsidian—and used them in their homes over a period of 3,000 years. Mesoamerican scholars have often assumed the functional purposes of different lithic tools based on their material or technological attributes. Most limit their studies to single sites and extrapolate broader reconstructions of economic activities. I assess stone tool functions and associated economic activities through technological analyses of more than 43,000 lithic artifacts and, in addition, a feasibility study for high magnification use-wear analysis utilizing 589 of these artifacts from multiple household contexts in the central Mexican villages of Amomoloc (900-650 B.C.), Tetel (750-500 B.C.), and Mesitas (600-500 B.C.); the town of La Laguna (600 B.C.-A.D. 150); the city of Teotihuacan (A.D. 200-550); and the Aztec village of Cihuatecpan (A.D. 1150-1550). I determine that pressure blades—the most common tool form—were multifunctional. They were regularly modified via pressure trimming or notching and recycled through bipolar percussion to suit specific tasks. Blade production error rates decreased consistently, especially after the invention of core platform grinding near the end of the Classic period (A.D. 100-600). Preliminary results of the use-wear feasibility study suggest that certain tools became associated with specific tasks. Scrapers were mainly used to produce goods of maguey, wood, and hide. People came to use hafted atlatl dart points and bifacial knives almost exclusively for hunting and meat butchering tasks, respectively, and smaller bifacial drills mostly for shell craft production. Bipolar tools created through anvil percussion were more common during the Formative period (1500 B.C.-A.D. 100), when they were probably used as expedient kitchen utensils. Obsidian tools in central Mexico were not exclusively staple goods. Ritual bloodletting implements are spatially associated with communal altars and commoner and elite residences, but after the Epiclassic period (A.D. 600-900) bloodletting was restricted primarily to temples. Likewise, although weaponry was common during the Classic through Postclassic periods, and jewelry was relatively common during the Late Postclassic period (A.D. 1325-1521), in prehispanic times their spatial distributions were much more restricted across site contexts compared to obsidian staple goods. I demonstrate that in prehispanic central Mexico stone tools were produced and used primarily in household spaces, contrary to models that have emphasized sponsorship by elites or religious institutions. Residents produced stone tools in their homes primarily to satisfy their own needs during the Formative period. As rising populations contributed to urban densities and the development of marketplace economies, household lithic production increased to satisfy broader consumer demand. Producing households often specialized in blade production or followed a multicrafting strategy, in which the scale of production exceeded their own needs.

Early phases of Kolomoki’s occupation have been characterized as relatively egalitarian, with little evidence for status differentiation. However, patterned variability in lithic raw material use and intensity of production in domestic areas suggests heterogeneity in the community at multiple scales. In light of Kolomoki’s emphasis on communal ceremony, internal divisions between groups of households highlight the tension between public and private expressions of status and social solidarity. New radiocarbon dates from the southern margins of the village have allowed us to assess the contemporaneity of this pattern, and by extension, the chronology of village aggregation.

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

Yes / Confocal microscopy has been increasingly employed in the field of traceology to acquire metrological data of surface changes on a micro-scale. However, its advantages for a traditional visual inspection of use-wear are rarely highlighted. As traditional optical microscopy (OM) has proven unable to entirely fulfil the prerequisites for an ideal observation of highly reflective and irregular materials, alternative ways for providing better observation conditions must be sought. In this contribution, we explore the combination of laser scanning confocal (LSCM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) micro-graphs for the visual characterisation of wear on quartzite and evaluate the potential of both techniques. / AHRC Fragmented Heritage project (AH/L00688X/1) at the University of Bradford, and of the MICINN-FEDER (PGC2018-093925-B-C32), the AGAUR (SGR 2017-1040) and the URV (2018PFR-URV-B2-91) projects at IPHES-URV. One of the authors (A.P.) was beneficiary of a Catalan pre-doctoral grant (2014FI B 00539), at the Rovira i Virgili University (URV), the IPHES and the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle of Paris.

Entre 4300 et 3500 avant notre ère, la diffusion du silex bédoulien en contexte chasséen a atteint une ampleur considérable. Ce silex, extrait des affleurements crétacés inférieurs du nord du Vaucluse a été mis en forme dans des ateliers spécialisés situés à proximité des gisements. Il a été ensuite exporté sous forme de lames non chauffées, mais aussi de nucléus chauffés préparés pour le débitage de lamelles par pression sur les sites consommateurs. Il s’agit, dans ce travail, de mieux cerner l’organisation des sociétés chasséennes, de l’amont vers l’aval des réseaux de diffusion, en abordant la question du renforcement des spécialisations artisanales qui en est l’un des aspects les plus marquants. Les productions sont abordées par le biais des réseaux, approche originale puisque jusqu’à maintenant les études ont concerné des sites isolés ou des corpus de sites au sein d’un terroir. La zone d’étude est vaste, et par conséquent nous avons fait le choix de nous concentrer sur les productions spécialisées communes à tous les sites, c'est-à-dire les productions lamino-lamellaires en silex bédoulien chauffé et non chauffé, mais aussi sur d’autres matériaux (silex oligocène, silex sénonien, silex de Los Monegros). Le corpus inclut des sites géographiquement positionnés de l’amont vers l’aval des réseaux et ayant accès aux productions spécialisées : le seul site producteur ayant fait l’objet d’une fouille méthodique (Saint-Martin, Vaucluse), des sites consommateurs (Les Moulins, Drôme ; L’Héritière, Bouches-du-Rhône et Saint-Antoine, Hérault), un site hypothétiquement central redistributeur (Auriac, Aude) et des sites aux marges de l’aire d’extension du Chasséen méridional (Saint-Michel-du-Touch et Château Percin, Haute-Garonne). Une méthodologie basée sur une approche tracéologique et un recours aux sciences des matériaux a permis dans un premier temps, de constater que le traitement thermique, par une modification de la porosité, provoque une baisse de la ténacité et a une incidence sur la fracturation et sur son cheminement.Il a pu être démontré que la modification des propriétés de la roche par la chauffe se traduit par une amélioration du pouvoir de coupe des tranchants des lamelles débitées sur silex bédoulien notamment par des mesures d'acuité des tranchants et par des séries de tests mécaniques ou d'utilisation en aveugle de lamelles chauffées ou non chauffées. L’analyse fonctionnelle a permis ensuite d’approfondir nos connaissances sur la place des productions spécialisées dans les sous-systèmes techniques, c'est-à-dire de comprendre comment et pour quelle finalité ces outils ont été utilisés. Enfin, la réflexion a été poussée sur des questions d’ordre plus général concernant l’organisation des réseaux d’échanges. Ces idées sont basées sur l’intégration plus ou moins forte des sites aux différents réseaux et mènent à des discussions concernant la complémentarité et le fonctionnement de ces réseaux. / Between 4300 and 3500 BCE, the distribution of bedoulian flint in southern Chassey culture context reached a considerable scale. The flint blocks extracted from lower Cretaceous outcrops in northern Vaucluse was formed in specialized workshops situated near the deposits. It was then exported as unheated blades, but also as heated cores prepared to knap bladelets by pressure on consumer sites. The aim of this study is to understand better the organization of Chassey societies, distribution of networks from upstream to downstream, dealing with the question of enhancement of craft specializations which is one of the most important aspects. The productions are dealt with through networks, which is an original approach, because until now the studies have involved isolated sites or corpus of sites within a region. The study area is large, and therefore we have chosen to focus on the common specialized production, that is to say blades and bladelets of heated and unheated bedoulian flint, but also on other materials (Oligocene flint, Senonian flint, Los Monegros flint) in all sites. The corpus includes sites geographically positioned upstream to downstream of networks and have access to specialized productions: the only producer site which was the subject of a methodical excavation (Saint-Martin, Vaucluse), consumer sites (Les Moulins, Drôme, L’Héritière, Bouches-du-Rhône and Saint-Antoine, Hérault), a hypothetical central redistributor site (Auriac, Aude) and sites on the margins of the extension area of southern Chassey culture (St. Michel-du-Touch and Château-Percin, Haute-Garonne). Firstly, a methodology based on a traceological approach and materials science has enabled us to note that the heat treatment affects the stone fracturing and its path by changing the porosity and decreasing the tenacity. It could be shown, especially by edge acuity and mechanic tests or use of heated and unheated bladelets in a blind test, that the change in the properties of the stone results in an improvement in the sharpness of the blades. The functional analysis was then used to further our understanding of the role of specialized productions in the sous-systèmes techniques, that is to say, to understand how and for what purpose these tools were used. Lastly, the analysis was expanded into more general issues concerning the organization of exchange networks. These ideas are based on the level of integration of sites to different networks and lead to discussions on complementarity and operation of these networks.

De nombreux scenarii, incluant une variété de processus culturels et populationnels, ont été proposés pour décrire le phénomène de néolithisation en Europe. Dans ce contexte, le potentiel des objets de parure à reconstruire la géographie culturelle d’un territoire, à identifier les interactions, les frontières et les remplacements culturels et populationnels qui peuvent s’opérer au sein des groupes, n’avait jamais été exploré pour étudier cette période. Le travail mené constitue ainsi la première approche visant à la caractériser de tels changements au cours du Mésolithique et lors de la diffusion du Néolithique en Europe, à travers une analyse diachronique des objets de parure. Les premières hypothèses de travail ont été constituées à partir de l’analyse 4 177 objets de parure, combinant des analyses morphométriques, technologiques et tracéologiques. Le matériel analyse provient des séries archéologiques attribuées au Mésolithique final de Braña-Arintero (Cantabrie, Espagne), de Hohlenstein-Stadel (Bad-Wurtemberg, Allemagne), Groβe Ofnet (Bavière, Allemagne) et des premières phases du Néolithique ancien de Essenbach-Ammerbreite (Bavière, Allemagne).Les axes de travail développés à l’échelle régionale au cours de l’analyse du matériel ont ensuite été testés à l’échelle continentale à travers la constitution et l’analyse géostatistique d’une base de données des éléments de parure recensés sur 1 022 unités stratigraphiques appartenant à 408 gisements attribués au Mésolithique et au Néolithique ancien en Europe. La base de données a été analysée à travers la combinaison d’analyses de voisinage, d’ordination, des calculs de densité de Kernel et des interpolations Spline.Les résultats obtenus à travers ces différentes approches ont été croisés et discutés dans une synthèse développée à l’échelle du continent européen. Il a ainsi pu être suggéré que certains types d’ornements ont une fonction forte de marqueur identitaire territorial, alors que d’autres signent des échanges inter-régionaux et une diffusion des pratiques à une large échelle géographique. Il ressort également de cette synthèse que les pratiques ornementales néolithiques semblent se construire sur un substrat mésolithique, à l’exclusion du Bassin égéen, où une discontinuité dans les pratiques ornementales mésolithiques et néolithiques semble exister. Cette participation active du substrat mésolithique dans l’évolution des pratiques ornementales a favorisé une régionalisation de celles-ci entre le Mésolithique et le Néolithique ancien. Parallèlement à cette variabilité régionale, un phénomène de « globalisation » des pratiques néolithiques s’observe à travers l’ensemble du territoire européen, par la présence de certains types d’ornements d’Est en Ouest du continent, tout le long du Néolithique ancien. Cette globalisation des pratiques ornementales participe à une recomposition partielle de la géographie culturelle proposée pour le Mésolithique dans notre analyse. La variabilité ornementale régionale accrue à la fin du Néolithique ancien témoignerait d’une stabilisation territoriale de groupes, s’affranchissant partiellement des normes stylistiques des premières phases du Néolithique, tout en maintenant une partie de leur identité héritée des chasseurs-cueilleurs, enrichie par l’émergence de nouvelles pratiques. On observerait ainsi un continuum culturel dans le développement des modèles évolutifs locaux néanmoins soumis à des influences extérieures fortes. Les hypothèses soulevées par notre travail sont bien loin du remplacement total et passif des dernières sociétés de chasseurs-cueilleurs par les premiers groupes d’agriculteurs. Cette idée n’est pas nouvelle mais l’intérêt est ici de mettre l’accent sur une sphère rarement prise en compte dans les réflexions sur le processus complexe de néolithisation de l’Europe. / Multiple scenarios, including a variety of cultural processes and population dynamics, have been proposed to explain the neolithization of Europe. The potential of personal ornaments to reconstruct cultural and population geographies, interactions, boundaries, replacements at this turning point in European prehistory has as yet not been explored. Here we provide the first attempt to extract such information from this category of the archaeological record. In this aim, we performed a detailed first-hand analysis of more than 4000 perforated shells and animal teeth from four archaeological burial sites : three dated to the final Mesolithic (Brana-Arintero, Spain ; Hohlenstein-Stadel and Grosse Ofnet, Germany ) and one to the Early Neolithic (Essenbach-Ammerbreite, Germany ). In addition, we have created a comprehensive georeferenced database of Mesolithic and Early Neolithic personal ornaments used in Europe and submitted it to a to spatial and statistical analyses combining GIS , correspondence - and neighbor-joining analyses. Results show a partial continuity of Mesolithic beadtypes and exchange networks in Neolithic societies. The order of magnitude of this continuity varies however according to region. For instance, the Baltic region shows very limited change while the northern Iberian Peninsula shows an almost complete replacement in personal ornament types. Exchange networks may also be either maintained, for example through the Ebro corridor, or abandoned, as in case of the North-South connections between the Mainz Basin and the Swabian Jura that are well documented in the Mesolithic but absent in the Early Neolithic. In contrast to the regional dynamics, partially inherited from the Mesolithic, the Early Neolithic is also characterized by the large-scale diffusion of exclusively Neolithic ornament types, in particular discoid beads and shell bracelets. These Neolithic ornament types occur however in different beadtype configurations according to region. This suggests a partial reconfiguration of the Mesolithic cultural geography during the neolithization process. We conclude that beadtypes and exchange networks contradict replacement theories and rather sustain an integrationist view.

For a long time, research of bone industry in archeology was disorganized and mostly limited for classification according to the tools' shape, from which the function was deduced. This method was frequently imprecise and complicated for bone artifacts as well as for chipped stone artifacts. In the last few decades, scientists have tried to apply to the bone industry microwear analysis, which was then successfully applied to the chipped industry. Microwear analysis can help us recognize usewear traces and give information about the manufacturing and functioning of the tools. Using microscopes can prove which artifacts were manufactured by humans and which were simply broken in order to get marrow, and which were bitten by predators. The goal of this research is to expose the functions of tools and artifacts, which are previously unclear, by use of experimental archeology and use-wear analysis, primarily for artefacts known as bone skates (or bone ice skates), which are classified only according to their shape (and often incorrectly). In many foreign countries, the method and application of microwear analysis is increasingly popular. However, in the Czech Republic, it is largely overlooked. Therefore, we would like to extend the sample of possible contact materials and contribute to the progress of...

En Europe occidentale, la phase climatique du Dernier Maximum Glaciaire couvre une période-clé pour l’étude des dynamiques évolutives du Paléolithique supérieur. Correspondant au passage du Solutréen au Magdalénien, en passant par le Badegoulien, cette intervalle chronologique (entre 20 000 et 15 000 BP) est considéré comme un moment de «rupture» touchant tant au domaine techno-économique (productions lithiques et osseuses) que symbolique (art pariétal et mobilier). Le travail mené ici vise à interroger si la parure, qui possède ses propres sphères techniques et symboliques, a également été impactée par les bouleversements ambiants de l’époque. Avec près de 3000 objets de parure issus de sites français (Bassins parisien, ligérien et aquitain), une analyse diachronique, combinant approches morphométriques, technologiques et fonctionnelles, a pour cela été réalisée. À la lumière des nouvelles données acquises, une réévaluation des «normes» ornementales de chaque ensemble chrono-culturel étudié est ici proposée. Les résultats obtenus montrent que les pratiques de décoration corporelle de la fin du Solutréen, du Badegoulien et du début du Magdalénien n’échappent pas à la mutation pressentie. Elles se révèlent mouvantes et témoignent de profonds changements techniques et symboliques. On assiste à un renouvellement de la composition des parures et au développement de modalités de fabrication inédites qui évoquent l’émergence progressive et non généralisée de nouvelles traditions ornementales. Ces autres façons de penser et de se représenter par la parure se font ainsi l’écho des importants remaniements socio-culturels ayant eu lieu au cours du Dernier Maximum Glaciaire. / In Western Europe, the Last Glacial Maximum climatic phase covers a period-key for the study of the upper Palaeolithic dynamics, corresponding to the passage of Solutrean-Badegoulian-Magdalenian periods. This chronological interval (between 20 000 and 15 000 BP) is considered as a moment of "break" touching the techno-economic (lithic and osseous industries) and symbolism (rock-art and movable art) domains. This present work aims at questioning if the personal ornaments, which possess its own technical and symbolic spheres, was also impacted by the ambient upheavals of time. With about 3000 pieces discovered in French sites (Paris, Loire and Aquitaine Basins), a diachronic analysis, combining morphometric, technological and functional approaches, is realized for it. From the new acquired data, a revaluation of the ornamental "standards" of every cultural entity is proposed. The obtained results show that the ornamental practices of the end of the Solutrean, the Badegoulien and the beginning of the Magdalenian periods do not escape the anticipated transfer. These are unstable and expose technical and symbolic deep changes. We observe a renewal of the ornament composition and a development of new manufacturing modalities. These facts suggest the progressive and local emergence of new ornamental traditions. These other manners to think ant to represent itself by the ornaments testify about the important sociocultural reorganizations having taken place during the Last Glacial Maximum.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.