Rock Steady: A Review of the Stone Tool Traditions of Our Hominid Ancestors

When one thinks of our hominid ancestors many thoughts and ideas come to mind: big, burly men who are largely unintelligent, dragging their knuckles or large wooden clubs, speaking in nonsensical grunts, etc.  None of these pay respect to the level of intelligence and cultural innovations produced by our hominid ancestors, specifically their stone tool traditions.  Rudimentary and primitive by modern Homo sapiens standards these stone tool traditions are indicative of the intelligence, creativity, and innovation of our hominid ancestors, which led to the cultural complexities that define humans today.  Today’s blog post is dedicated to reviewing the stone tool traditions created by several hominid ancestors in the genus Homo.

Oldowan Tools & Homo habilis

Oldowan Tool (Image Source: Museum of Anthropology)

While excavating in the Olduvai Gorge in 1959 Louis and Mary Leakey discovered what they noticed were crudely but unnaturally manipulated stones.  These were pebble stones that were smooth on one side but had chips systematically removed from the other side.  The Leakeys recognized these stones as tools and named them the Oldowan tradition (Figure 1) and associated them with the hominid species Homo habilis, which places their use to between 2.6-1.8 million years ago (MYA).  Albeit nothing spectacular or as complex as stone tools seen today, these tools were revolutionary for the time because their creation required a certain level of intelligence and forethought that had not been seen in previous hominid species, specifically in the Australopithecines species. 

The Oldowan tools were flake tools, meaning the parts removed from the stone were manipulated into specific tools.  They were used for several purposes, including but not limited to cutting meat and plant materials, scraping meat off of bones, and sawing wood or bone, all of which have been confirmed by microwear analysis.  Further study of the Oldowan tools have demonstrated that the source stone used  for the manufacture of these tools came from great distances away from the Homo habilis home bases, suggesting that they spent a great deal of time figuring out which tools would be best suited for the creation of these tools. 

Acheulian Tools & Homo ergaster

 

Acheulian Tool (Image Source: Museum of Anthropology)

About 1.7 MYA a new stone tool tradition began to replace the previous Oldowan tradition, just as a new hominid species also replaced the ones that preceded it.  The Acheulian is named after St. Acheul in France, the site where the tools were originally found, the tradition is actually found across Africa and Europe, not Asia.  The tradition is characterized by bifacial, meaning worked on both sides, hand axes, cleavers, and flake tools (Figure 2).  These tools were formed by slowly chipping away flakes from a blank core, a simple, unmanipulated rock, by means of a hammer stone, a stone chosen specifically for removing stone flakes from the core.  The manipulated core was then thinned and shaped based on the desired shape of the manufacturer, usually with a softer tool such as an antler, and finally the tool was finished with a softer hammer stone that would straighten the edge of the tool and sharpen it.  The Acheulian tools required more precision and craftsmanship than the previous Oldowan tools, and the tools are more uniform, suggesting not only skill and practice but the passing down of the tradition among members of the Homo ergaster species. 

Levallois Tradition & Homo heidelbergensis

Levallois Tool (Image Source: Museum of Anthropology)

A new species in the genus Homo, Homo heidelbergensis, was responsible for a new stone tool technique referred to as the Levallois technique (Figure 3).  The Levallois technique came about 300,000 years ago and is far more creative and complex than the previous Oldowan and Acheulian techniques, the latter of which is believed to be where the technique was dervied. This particular technique involved actually manipulating the stone core by chipping away tiny flakes, leaving a chipped and well formed core.  Homo heidelbergensis would flake off larger pieces that were already fully formed and able to be immediately used for cutting, scraping, or piercing.  This was an ingenious technique that allowed Homo heidelbergensis to carry a minimal number of stones with them so they could quickly flake off a point (up to four or five on a single core) whenever necessary.  The utility of the Levallois technique explains it popularity and presence among groups that resided throughout Africa, Europe, and Asia. 

Mousterian & Chatelperronian Traditions & Homo neanderthalensis

 

Mousterian Tool (Image Source: Museum of Anthropology)

Homo neanderthalensis, the Neanderthals, were responsible for building upon the Levallois technique and creating the Mousterian tradition (circa 100,000 years ago) (Figure 4).  This stone tool type got its name from the site of Le Moustier in France, and it involves retouching the flakes removed from the cores.  These carefully reshaped flakes and cores allowed up to 63 different stone tool types to be created to meet the requirements of the Neanderthals, ranging from animal butchery, woodworking, bone and antler carving, and working animal hides.  This tradition also gave rise to a haft stone point, which is the act of attaching a stone or bone point to a wooden handle or shaft.  

Chatelperronian Tools (Image Source: Archaeology at About.com)

The Neanderthals were also responsible for the creation of the Chatelperronian tradition (Figure 5), a new, improved tradition that built upon the previous Mousterian stone tool tradition.  The Chatelperronian traditions seems to be similar to the contemporary anatomically modern human stone tool tradition, Aurignacian tradition, which scholars believe the Neanderthals imitated in their own Chatelperronian tradition.  The Chatelperronian tradition existed between 45,000 to 40,000 years ago, and it is characterized by denticulate, or toothed, stone tools, stone knives, and assorted ivory tools.  

Bibliography

Feder, Kenneth and Park M. Human Antiquity: An Introduction to Physical Anthropology and Archeology, McGraw-Hill.  

Economic Anthropology Profile: Foragers

San Foragers (Human Area Relations Files)

 The most basic form of economy is the foraging economic unit, and up until about 10,000 years ago, every society in the world was a foraging society.  Foraging societies, also referred to as hunter-gatherers, are characterized by a reliance on nature to survive and constant movement across the landscape.  They do this by practicing seasonality, meaning they migrate across their landscape based on the presence of resources that are in season.  Each group exploits different resources based on the environment of which they inhabit.  For example, foraging groups of the Artic exploit big game animals that are native to the region, including whales, polar bears, artic foxes, and seals, but foraging groups in the Amazon rainforest will exploit other natural resources, such as local fruits and vegetables, snakes, frogs, fish, etc.  Because of their way of life and heavy reliance on their environment foraging groups cannot be and are not ecologically dominant, meaning they only take the resources they need but they do not over-exploit the resources in their region. 

Foraging societies are distinguished by two social groups that their members find significant.  These two groups are the nuclear family (immediate family) and the band.  The band is comprised of two or three nuclear families that are related and therefore are each other’s extended family.  Membership in the band is fluid and can change from year to year, as kin networks are created and maintained through marriage, trade, and visiting. 

Tlingit Foragers (Human Area Relations Files)

Foraging bands are egalitarian, meaning there is little social division within the group and everyone is considered relatively equal in status.  There are, however, some differences within the group and these differences are based on achieved status, or status that one earns in their lifetime.  In the case of foraging bands achieved status is based on age and knowledge and ability to hunt or gather.  The advanced age and/or abilities of an individual nets them prestige, which refers to the esteem or respect of others. 

Foraging societies do have a gender-based division of labor despite being egalitarian.  Women primarily gather while men hunt and fish, but the reason for this is based on reproduction and child rearing responsibilities that fall primarily on women.  Women give birth and feed their infants through breast milk until they are weaned.  They are therefore at a disadvantage for hunting large game because the infant requires a great deal of time and attention, and the infant can be loud and distracting, scaring away the big game that is being hunted.  Despite this, women, as gatherers, still hunt small game and actually contribute most of the food resources to the group as big game hunting is not consistently successful.       

Figure 1: Map of Historically Known Foraging Groups as Globally Distributed (Gezon & Kottak, 2014)

Foraging societies are still commonplace today in many regions in the world but not as prevalent in the past (Figure 1).  Modern foraging groups are under state control of the country that they reside in.  They are often forcibly moved from their traditional lands as a means of forced assimilation by the state, which results in culture loss among the foraging groups.  This occurs because of negative perceptions of foraging groups that include beliefs that they are less intelligent and primitive.  The reason that foraging societies continue is not because the group is stubborn or does not desire to change, but because the environments the group inhabits are not favorable for changing economic strategies (e.g. horticulture or agriculture).  Foraging societies are neither less intelligent nor primitive.  The fact that they continue to thrive today in their traditional life ways despite technological advances demonstrates their intelligence, and what we consider primitive may actually be more beneficial given that their ecological footprint is minimal and not as damaging to the environment as the state level societies that dominate them.

Bibliography:

Gezon, L., & Kottak, C. (2014).  Cultural Anthropology McGraw-Hill