战国时期农业生产工具进步之考评

本运用先秦献记载与考古物对照辨析的方法,较详细评论战国时期铁制农业生产工具在质地上、种类上明显的时代性进步,并认为这一进步不仅直接为当时精耕细作的农业生产提供了有效的保障,而且对后世农具变革也产生了极为深远的影响,在中国古代经济史上占有极其重要的地位。     

Remains of the day-preservation of organic micro-residues on stone tools

Here I report on the decay processes of microscopic organic residues left on stone tool surfaces after their use. Residue analysis on ancient stone tools facilitates reconstruction of past activities. This study enables predictions about the circumstances under which ancient residues preserve. Experimental tool sets with modern residues were buried for a year in separate deposits at Sterkfontein, Sibudu (South Africa) and Zelhem (the Netherlands) whose pH and geomorphology varied, they were then analysed using light microscopy. Biological weathering mainly causes residue decay. In unstable environments rich in microbes and micro-organisms, residues decay quickly. From an archaeological perspective this means that sites that are stable, desiccated, waterlogged, extremely acidic or alkaline and extremely cold or hot sites. Different residue types have different preservation optima and this may lead to a preservation and perhaps interpretation bias. The preliminary predictive models presented in this paper could aid in the considered selection of sites and samples.     

Use-wear analysis of obsidian artifacts from Later Stone Age shell midden sites on the Red Sea Coast of Eritrea,with experimental results

This paper presents results of use-wear study on lithic artifacts from two Later Stone Age sites (Gelalo and Misse) on the Red Sea Coast of Eritrea. The sites produced large quantities of lithic artifacts in association with mollusk shells and ostrich eggshell beads, but it is unclear if all the stone tools were required for bead and mollusk shell processing. The study involved recording of microfracture damage traces in order to infer the use-material and the manner in which the artifacts were used. A large percentage of the analyzed samples from Gelalo and Misse preserve wear patterns suggestive of human use. The diagnostic wear types include: (1) dense step, snap (crushing) and hinge fractures typically confined on the working edges, and (2) feather scars organized in a scalar manner visible on the ventral and dorsal surfaces of the active parts. The observed damage patterns suggest cutting and engraving medium to hard materials. The evidence is incomplete for more generalization about the specific activities carried out at the sites. A brief experimental study involving ostrich eggshell drilling, oak twig sawing and bark scraping, meat slicing, and mollusk shell sawing and drilling was carried out to aid interpretation of wear features observed on the archaeological specimens. Wear traces produced by sawing mollusk shell and oak wood showed close affinity to those observed on the archaeological specimens. The study contributes important information about early Holocene site use on the Red Sea Coast of Eritrea. The close association of used lithic artifacts, symbolic objects (beads) and broken shell remains indicates that the sites were habitation areas.     

磨制石器类型学的分类原则与术语界定——以大辛庄商代石器为例

<正>对事物的分类是古代人类社会文化生活中的一种重要的比较自觉的行为和客观现象,人们在从事生产和生活时都会根据自己的标准进行自觉的分类活动。当然这些标准产生于特定的文化社会背景和思想意识,这就给我们今天的探寻以实际上有效的线索。所以考古研究中的器物分类是我们研究和复原古代文化的一条重     

新发现的唐武令璋石椁和墓志

武令璋石椁为唐代石椁中最高等级的庑殿式结构,迄今唯在皇亲国戚或高官宠臣墓中出土过。石椁线刻的技艺精湛、题材丰富,有琵琶、吹箫、歌妓、胡腾乐舞、侍女以及卷草花叶等图案。乐舞内容占比例较大,作者推测其表现的是墓主生前的私家乐舞场景。墓志载墓主于天宝十三载葬于"统万城南二十里高原",如此,墓志资料也为统万城历史沿革的考证提供了重要线索。     

几种红岩碑拓片考释

红岩碑是贵州著名古迹,而数年来考释者频仍不断,众说纷纭,至今无一定论。碑之原迹早已不存,研究者大多是以拓本摩本为据。然而红岩碑传世拓本摩本种类繁多,据统计近30种。而其形状不一,内容各异,让人依违难决。贵州省博物馆收藏有数种红岩碑拓片,应是历史上流传较广且影响较大的本子,本文对它们的历史渊源及有关事实作一些查考,期于研究者慎选工作底本。     

Raw material quality and Oldowan hominin toolstone preferences: evidence from Kanjera South,Kenya

The role of raw material quality in Oldowan technology has not been fully explored. There are numerous studies suggesting Oldowan hominins preferred certain types of stone for artifact manufacture. Previous studies of the artifact assemblage from the early Pliocene Oldowan locality of Kanjera South (South Rachuonyo District, Kenya) show that raw material selection and transport was an important aspect of Late Pliocene hominin adaptations. Yet the exact properties of stones that hominins were selecting remain enigmatic. Two potentially important features of artifact raw material are durability and fracture predictability. We investigate fracture predictability through mechanical tests of stone and investigations of the affect of stone properties on fracture patterns in archaeological collections. We investigate stone durability with actualistic studies of edge attrition combined with further mechanical tests of various lithologies. Oldowan hominins at Kanjera appear to have selected raw materials based on their durability. The ability for a stone to fracture consistently does not appear to be as important in hominin toolstone preference as previously assumed. Hominins that produced the assemblages at Kanjera South appear to have incorporated an extensive understanding of various attributes of raw material in the transport and production of stone artifacts. When combined with previous research on the transport patterns at Kanjera, the results of this study provide evidence for a more complex raw material acquisition strategy than has previously been suggested for Late Pliocene Oldowan hominins.     

On stone-boiling technology in the Upper Paleolithic: behavioral implications from an Early Magdalenian hearth in El Mirón Cave,Cantabria, Spain

Stone boiling is one of the principal cooking methods used by hunter-gatherer societies. The present paper proposes behavioral and organizational inferences as to how stone boiling was incorporated into hunter-gatherer subsistence practices through an examination of a shallow-basin hearth in an Early Magdalenian level (c. 15,500 ¹⁴C B.P.) of El Mirón Cave, Cantabria (northern Spain). Exploratory analysis of spatial patterns of archaeological remains (bones, lithic artifacts, and fire-cracked rocks) and use-life analysis of fire-cracked rocks demonstrate that the hearth was used and maintained during visits of humans who preyed mainly on ibex and red deer near the site. The relative accessibility of these ungulates and cost-induced technology of stone boiling suggest the implication that stone boiling was employed to maximize the energy and nutrition obtained from carcasses of these game taxa under the circumstance of resource intensification.     

Marine shell dates and surface lithic assemblages on the west coast of South Africa

Archaeological surface finds are difficult to date. There are several useful methods, but each requires special circumstances and has one drawback or another. On the west coast of South Africa marine shell are abundant on surface sites but they are rarely dated because they are perceived to be in disturbed context and in questionable association with artefacts. This paper attempts to rectify this misconception and shows that, although far from perfect, a large suite of surface dates can shed as much light as excavated data. On the Vredenburg Peninsula they help refute the hypothesis that two economically and culturally distinct populations shared this pre-colonial landscape since 2000 BP.     

Points and convergent tools in the European Early Middle Palaeolithic site of Payre (SE,France)

The lithic assemblage from the Middle Palaeolithic site of Payre (Rhone Valley, France) contains a large number of convergent tools and pointed tools of various shapes, sizes and retouch types. These were excavated from several archaeological units, dating from marine isotopic stages 8–5, which also yielded human skeletal remains. Consideration of this large tool kit has led to an improved analysis of Middle Palaeolithic tools with two retouched convergent edges. The 350 tools were not described within the classical typological framework, but, rather, from a lithic technological perspective in relation to a discoid debitage. In addition, an initial macroscopic use-wear analysis aided in establishing whether they were used according to their technical and/or morphological features. The Middle Palaeolithic convergent tools from Payre are shown to be quite diversified, and the question of the significance of the retouch and the definition of the various types is addressed. Initial functional results indicate that a clear relationship between shape and function cannot be easily established, and that these tools were used as hand tools. This study contributes to the debate on the use of stone tip spears in the Early European Middle Palaeolithic.