Dietary adaptation during the Longshan period in China: stable isotope analyses at Liangchengzhen (southeastern Shandong)

Rice and millet were staple crops at Liangchengzhen, a late Neolithic Longshan site in Shandong, China, but the degree of dietary variation is not known. This study uses stable isotope analysis of human and faunal skeletal remains to quantitatively address the importance of these crops as well as terrestrial domesticates and aquatic resources in the diet at Liangchengzhen. Although no collagen could be extracted from the poorly preserved human bones, the δ¹³C stable isotope results for 2 apatite sample and 16 tooth enamel samples averaged −9.8‰ suggesting that diet was based on foods averaging from −24‰ to −18‰, with millet and millet-fed animals comprising at most approximately 25–30% of the diet. Pig faunal δ¹³C isotope values suggested that during the earlier Longshan period pigs were fed mainly millet with more C₃ foods such as rice included by the later Longshan period. Solid ceramic residues from two guan jar sherds produced δ¹³C values averaging −18‰ and δ¹⁵N values averaging +16‰, suggesting both vessels contained fish. The results of the study indicate that by the Longshan period, people in southeastern Shandong no longer relied as heavily on millet and that the agricultural crop of rice had increased in importance at Liangchengzhen. Unfortunately, without human collagen samples to provide nitrogen isotope results, we cannot estimate the relative contribution of aquatic and terrestrial protein to the diet of people at Liangchengzhen. In general, however, the pattern of a diverse agricultural system on the basis of the macrobotanical remains from Liangchengzhen is supported by the isotopic results.     

Ethnoarchaeology and the Organization of Lithic Technology

Although the modern production and use of stone tools is rare, ethnoarchaeological research on this subject has provided important perspectives on methodological approaches to archaeological lithic analysis. Recent ethnoarchaeological research on lithics frequently takes the form of “cautionary tales,” warning against the primacy of functional variables most commonly invoked by lithic analysts. I argue that lithic ethnoarchaeology would benefit from a comparative organizational framework for explaining variation in patterns of stone tool use that takes into account the predictability and redundancy of the location and timing of technological activities. Understanding the underlying causes of modern patterns of stone tool use, in turn, offers a framework for exploring sources of lithic technological variation in the archaeological record. I also argue that technological analytical perspectives, such as the cha?ne opératoire and sequence of reduction approaches, can benefit from the insights gained through lithic ethnoarchaeological research, helping us define important analytical concepts and identify appropriate units of analysis.     

山东博兴县利戴遗址清理简报

利戴遗址为省级文物保护单位利城遗址的一部分,整个遗址面积约60万平方米.利戴遗址以龙山文化遗存为主,此次清理的5座灰坑及1座半地穴式房址均为龙山文化遗迹,其中出土陶、石、蚌器38件.从出土的器物看,该遗址龙山文化遗存的文化面貌与潍坊姚官庄、鲁家口和青州凤凰台相类似,其年代约为龙山文化早期偏晚阶段并一直延续到龙山文化晚期.     

A tale of two sites: Functional site differentiation and lithic technology during the Late Pithouse period in the Mimbres area of Southwestern New Mexico

The raw materials from which stone tools are made can provide considerable information relevant to behavioral variation within a prehistoric population. By examining the stone used for tools from two different types of Late Pithouse period (A.D. 550-1000) residential sites from the Mimbres Mogollon area of Southwestern New Mexico, this paper illustrates how understanding the lithic landscape of a region provides a means to assess behavioral variation in stone procurement practices. The analysis indicates that the differences in mobility and economic pursuits between longer-term residential sites containing pit structures and a shorter-term seasonal residential site with ephemeral architecture structured the raw material procurement practices of site’s occupants. Pit structure sites were focused on agricultural pursuits and used a technology that centered on the production of informal tools fashioned from locally available raw materials. The seasonal residential site focused on wild resources and evidenced greater reliance on formal tool production using raw materials acquired from beyond the immediate vicinity of the site. Despite increasing sedentism and agricultural dependence of the region’s population, some portion of the population exercised seasonal mobility strategies and associated technological and behavioral practices more typical of hunting and gathering populations, suggesting a diverse socio-economic system within the region.     

The Analysis of Stone Tool Procurement, Production, and Maintenance

Researchers who analyze stone tools and their production debris have made significant progress in understanding the relationship between stone tools and human organizational strategies. Stone tools are understood to be morphologically dynamic throughout their use-lives; the ever-changing morphology of stone tools is intimately associated with the needs of tool users. It also has become apparent to researchers that interpretations of lithic analysis are more productive when the unique contexts and situations for which lithic artifacts were made, used, modified, and ultimately discarded are considered. This article reviews the recent literature on stone tool production with an emphasis on raw material procurement, manufacturing techniques, and tool maintenance processes as they relate to adaptive strategies of toolmakers and users.     

A Multi-Method Approach to Inferring Early Agriculturalists’ Stone Tool Use at the Crescent Bay Hunt Club Site

While there has been much research on the function of stone tools via use-wear analysis, it is clear that a multipronged approach, including an evaluation of material acquisition, production, and tool use, is necessary if tool function is going to prove truly useful for understanding past cultures. Moreover, the role of chipped lithic tools in the economies of agriculture-based populations has seen little research compared to preagricultural systems. A sample of lithic artifacts from the Crescent Bay Hunt Club site, a twelfth- to fourteenth-century Oneota village at Lake Koshkonong in southeastern Wisconsin, are subjected to a multiple-method analysis to determine individual tool use. An assemblage-based analysis provides an overall understanding of the lithic economy. A combination of microscopic identification of edge damage and surface polishes and an analysis of protein residue provides independent lines of evidence that yield strong inferences about tool use in the lithic economies of sedentary agricultural groups in the midcontinent.     

中原文明的起源与形成

总观全国各地新石器时代文化的发展,中原地区以它强大的文化根基,在文明起源和形成过程中始终走在前面.中原地区文明的起源是相当早的,在龙山时代晚期,中原地区已进入文明时代.     

黑龙江大兴安岭呼中北山洞遗址2016年发掘简报

2016年对北山洞遗址的发掘,共清理灰坑3座、灶址16处,出土陶器、石器、玉器等遗物1800余件。依据层位关系及出土遗物特征分析,该遗址可分为六个时期文化遗存。第一期文化遗存属旧石器时代晚期,石器加工包含石片工业和石叶工业两种类型,剥片技术以锤击法为主,工具加工多采用打制修理技术。第二至第五期文化遗存属新石器时代,石器加工以细石核、细石叶等细石器工艺为主,剥片技术包括锤击法和间接压制法,工具加工多采用较为精细的压制修理技术。第六期文化遗存应与早期鲜卑遗存有密切关系,年代为东汉时期。北山洞遗址的发掘对大兴安岭东麓山区考古学文化编年体系的构建在一定程度上具有填补空白的意义。     

Slicing Cut Marks on Animal Bones: Diagnostics for Identifying Stone Tool Type and Raw Material

Abstract

Butchering implements leave identifying signatures on bones. From these signatures, it is possible to distinguish the different raw materials and types of chipped stone butchering tools. The results of recent experiments enable us to distinguish the different types of raw materials and tools used in the butchering process, in particular those implements that produce slicing cut marks. Three types of chipped stone tools (blades,flakes, and side scrapers) and raw materials (flint, obsidian, and quartzite), as well as issues relevant to lithic production and use were examined and tested. Silicone molds of cut marks produced by each of the instruments were made and subjected to analysis in light optical and scanning electron microscopes under various levels of magnification. The criteria used for distinguishing tool type, raw material, type of production and use characteristics of the respective cutting instruments are presented, as well as a discussion of the application of the experimental results to the Early Bronze Age I site of Afridar, Israel. The data from Afridar indicate that almost all of the butchering marks on animal bones from the site were made by stone tools, in particular haphazardly-made flakes.     

Complex raw materials and the supply system: Mineralogical and geochemical study of the jade artefacts of the Longshan Culture (2400–2000 bce) from Sujiacun site in coastal Shandong,China

X‐ray fluorescence (XRF), X‐ray diffraction (XRD) and Raman spectroscopy were employed to analyse the chemical compositions and phase structures of nine pieces of jade artefacts unearthed from Sujiacun, a Longshan Culture (2400–2000 bce ) site in coastal Shandong, eastern China. The results of the analyses indicated these samples were primarily made from multiple raw mineral materials, including antigorite, actinolite, clinochlore, turquoise and muscovite. No nephrite was recovered from the Sujiacun site. This is strikingly different from other top‐ranking settlements of Longshan Culture, such as Dantu, Liangchengzhen and Xizhufeng, in which nephrite was the main material of jade artefacts. This may reflect the distinctions in the supply system of jade raw materials among different rankings of Longshan period sites. In addition, laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA‐ICP‐MS) was used to analyse the composition of the rare earth elements of serpentine jade. These preliminary results were compared with published data on the composition of serpentine jade and it was found that the Sujiacun serpentine jade artefacts were likely sourced from the Taishan jade deposit.     

Lithic technology and social transformations in the South Indian Neolithic: The evidence from Sanganakallu–Kupgal

Here we examine patterns in stone tool technology among Mesolithic, Neolithic and Iron Age localities in the Sanganakallu–Kupgal site complex, Bellary District, Karnataka, South India. Statistical tests are used to compare proportions of raw materials and artefact types, and to compare central tendencies in metric variables taken on flakes and tools. Lithic-related findings support the inference of at least two distinct technological and economic groups at Sanganakallu–Kupgal, a microlith-focused foraging society on the one hand, and on the other, an agricultural society whose lithic technologies centred upon the production of pressure bladelets and dolerite edge-ground axes. Evidence for continuity in lithic technological processes through time may reflect indigenous processes of development, and a degree of continuity from the Mesolithic through to the Neolithic period. Lithic production appears to have become a specialised and spatially segregated activity by the terminal Neolithic and early Iron Age, supporting suggestions for the emergence of an increasingly complex economy and political hierarchy.     

Microdebitage analysis: Initial considerations

Microdebitage is defined as all stone flaking residue less than 1 mm in maximum dimension. Experimental replication indicates that it is produced in great quantities by stone tool manufacture and can permeate site matrices as a permanent signature of past cultural activity. Initial sampling studies suggest that microdebitage analysis may have considerable utility as a means of lithic site surveying.     

Were Olduvai Hominins making butchering tools or battering tools? Analysis of a recently excavated lithic assemblage from BK (Bed II,Olduvai Gorge,Tanzania)

A new interpretation of early stone-tool use by hominins at Olduvai depicts them as involved in battering activities (using pounding tools) rather than making cutting butchering tools as is commonly inferred in most other Plio-Pleistocene sites where lithics appear associated to faunal remains. The bulk of this interpretation is based on the recognition of the stigma of percussion activities in anvils and detached by-products. Renewed excavations at BK after more than half a century of the beginning of the digging at the site by M. Leakey have produced a new and unbiased lithic assemblage. The taphonomic study of the faunal assemblage has shown that BK is an anthropogenic site where carcass butchery practices were repeatedly performed over a vast amount of time. The present analysis of the lithic artefacts supports this interpretation by showing that the obtainment of flakes was the principal aim in stone knapping. We argue that a number of technical traits observed in the lithic collection of BK can be best interpreted as the result of bipolar loading rather than the by-products of battering activities. Since BK has provided the second largest collection of hominid-modified bones from Olduvai, it is concluded that detached pieces produced in the course of bipolar reduction might have played an active role in bone modification and that active rather than passive percussion behaviors might have been responsible for the formation of the lithic assemblage. The functionality of the Oldowan stone tools are discussed under the light of the new study.     

安徽当涂船里山遗址发掘简报

安徽当涂船里山遗址发现后良渚阶段至春秋时期地层堆积及柱洞、灰坑等遗迹,并出土铜器、陶器、原始瓷器、石器等重要遗物。根据地层、遗迹间的叠压关系以及出土遗物的情况,可将遗址分为三期:龙山文化晚期至夏初期、西周晚期和春秋早中期。其中龙山文化晚期至夏初期遗存较为丰富,为了解姑溪河流域后良渚阶段至夏时期该地区考古学文化提供了宝贵资料。     

Organized waste disposal in the Pottery Neolithic: A bifacial workshop refuse pit at Ein Zippori,Israel

A unique Pottery Neolithic context corresponding to the Wadi Rabah culture was found at the multi-layered site of Ein Zippori, Israel. Given the significant amount of flakes, cortical flakes, thinning flakes, and bifacial tool rejects, it was classified as a refuse pit in which bifacial knapping waste from a nearby workshop was disposed. In this paper we present the assemblage of Locus 8071, focusing on the by-products of bifacial tool manufacture and maintenance as well as bifacial tool rejects. We reconstruct the bifacial knapping and maintenance procedures and suggest that Locus 8071 was a disposal area for by-products from a knapping workshop of bifacial tools—an aspect of spatial organization related to possible specialized lithic production at Ein Zippori during the Neolithic period.     

Evidence for Maya Household Subsistence and Domestic Activities: Use-Wear Analysis of the Chipped Chert Assemblage from Pook’s Hill,Belize

Abstract

From 1999–2005, the Belize Valley Archaeological Reconnaissance Project excavated Pook’s Hill (PKH-1), a single plazuela group located in the Roaring Creek Valley, Cayo District, Belize. Artifacts recovered at Pook’s Hill date predominantly to the Late and Terminal Classic (A.D. 700–950) and can be stratigraphically segregated into two distinct occupation phases, namely a Late Classic (A.D. 700–830) and a Terminal Classic-Early Postclassic (A.D. 830–9507+) phase. The chipped chert and chalcedony tools from the two phases were included in a combined program of low- and high-power use-wear analysis to reconstruct aspects of the socioeconomy. The results of the analyses reveal that the site’s inhabitants produced and used both formal and informal tools for a wide variety of subsistence and domestic tasks, and for the production of some utilitarian items. Stone tool use-wear evidence and the recovery of small quantities of other artifacts suggest that the Maya from Pook’s Hill produced more valuable objects of bone, stone, and shell, although it is difficult to accurately identify craft-production activities at the site from the context of recovery. Despite some variation in the specific activities undertaken with the chipped stone tools over time, the organization of lithic technology at Pook’s Hill did not change significantly from the Late Classic into the Early Postclassic period.     

河北昌黎渟泗涧细石器地点

<正> 淳泗涧细石器地点发现于1990年,91年10月,河北省文物研究所会同秦皇岛市文物管理处,昌黎县文物保管所对该地点进行了为期一个月的试掘。试掘面积25平方米,共发现400多件石制品,没有发现动物化石。 一、地理位置与地层 该地点位于昌黎县城东北2公里处,距其东南的淳泗涧村约0.5公里,地理坐标;E119°10′N39°44′,海拔65米。该地点背靠燕山余脉亮甲山,南为平原,京山铁路在地点南部穿过。其东南约14公里处即为渤海(图一)。 淳泗涧南为饮马河,东北为东沙河,两河向东注入渤海。地点附近的山前地带为饮马河的支流,支流两岸有两级阶地发育。二级阶地紧靠山脚,由于洪水冲刷以及山脚下基岩中泉水     

河南西平县谢老庄遗址调查简报

2012年,驻马店文物工作者对驻马店市西平县谢老庄遗址进行了调查与初步勘探,采集的裴李岗文化和龙山文化遗物较丰富,有陶器、石器、动物骨角器及牙齿等。该遗址的发现为研究裴李岗文化贾湖类型增添了新资料,为研究淮河流域上游驻马店区域内史前文化发展序列提供了新的实物依据。