Projectile point
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Female hunters of the early Americas Open
Sexual division of labor with females as gatherers and males as hunters is a major empirical regularity of hunter-gatherer ethnography, suggesting an ancestral behavioral pattern. We present an archeological discovery and meta-analysis tha…
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Pre-Clovis projectile points at the Debra L. Friedkin site, Texas—Implications for the Late Pleistocene peopling of the Americas Open
Stemmed projectile points are ~13,500 to ~15,500 years old and lie stratigraphically below ~13,000-year-old Clovis artifacts.
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Pressure flaking to serrate bifacial points for the hunt during the MIS5 at Sibudu Cave (South Africa) Open
Projectile technology is considered to appear early in the southern African Middle Stone Age (MSA) and the rich and high resolution MSA sequence of Sibudu Cave in KwaZulu-Natal has provided many new insights about the use and hafting of va…
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Evidence of an early projectile point technology in North America at the Gault Site, Texas, USA Open
Human presence in North America before ~16 thousand years ago is confirmed by age measurements from Area 15 of the Gault Site.
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Origins and spread of fluted-point technology in the Canadian Ice-Free Corridor and eastern Beringia Open
Significance We report geometric morphometric and cladistic analyses of archaeological materials establishing early human interaction between the North American Arctic, western Canadian “Ice-Free Corridor,” and temperate North America prio…
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The age of Clovis—13,050 to 12,750 cal yr B.P. Open
The Clovis complex dates from 13,050 to 12,750 cal yr B.P. during a time of major environmental change.
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Tip cross-sectional geometry predicts the penetration depth of stone-tipped projectiles Open
Understanding prehistoric projectile weaponry performance is fundamental to unraveling past humans’ survival and the evolution of technology. One important debate involves how deeply stone-tipped projectiles penetrate a target. Theoretical…
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Fishtail Projectile Points from South America: The Brazilian Record Open
The projectile points known as Fishtail or Fell represent a specific design associated with the earliest hunter-gatherers of the Pleistocene-Holocene transition in South America. Brazil was traditionally considered as a marginal area of th…
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Assessment of complex projectiles in the early Late Pleistocene at Aduma, Ethiopia Open
Complex projectiles-propulsion via mechanical aid-are considered an important technological innovation, with possible relevance for the successful Out-of-Africa dispersal of our species. Conclusive evidence for the beginning of this techno…
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The Southern Divide: Testing morphological differences among bifacial points from southern and southeastern Brazil using geometric morphometrics Open
Bifacial points have been used to characterize the “Umbu” tradition in southern and southeastern Brazil. This archaeological tradition has been related to sites dated from the late Pleistocene-early Holocene boundary to near historical tim…
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24.0 kyr cal BP stone artefact from Vale da Pedra Furada, Piauí, Brazil: Techno-functional analysis Open
Current archaeological paradigm proposes that the first peopling of the Americas does not exceed the Last Glacial Maximum period. In this context, the acceptance of the anthropogenic character of the earliest stone artefacts generally rest…
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New records of fishtail projectile points from Brazil and its implications for its peopling Open
Fishtail or Fell projectile points constitute a specific design associated with early hunter-gatherers at the Pleistocene-Holocene boundary in many parts of South America, especially along the Pacific Coast, Patagonia, and the Argentine-Ur…
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Identification of Late Epigravettian hunting injuries: Descriptive and 3D analysis of experimental projectile impact marks on bone Open
The search for diagnostic criteria useful in hunting lesions identification is a new branch of investigation. Though recently there has been an increase in studies focused on this issue, no experimental works exist that analyze marks left …
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New Experiments and a Model-Driven Approach for Interpreting Middle Stone Age Lithic Point Function Using the Edge Damage Distribution Method Open
The Middle Stone Age (MSA) is associated with early evidence for symbolic material culture and complex technological innovations. However, one of the most visible aspects of MSA technologies are unretouched triangular stone points that app…
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Contributions to the Dart versus Arrow Debate: New Data from Holocene Projectile Points from Southeastern and Southern Brazil Open
Lithic bifacial points are very common in the southern and southeastern regions of the Brazilian territory. Dated from Early to Late Holocene, these artifacts have not been studied in terms of their propulsion system. Given the characteris…
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Poison arrows and bone utensils in late Pleistocene eastern Africa: evidence from Kuumbi Cave, Zanzibar Open
Most of our current knowledge of late Pleistocene African bone technology is drawn from southern African sites, with recent discoveries indicating that bone- and stone-tipped arrows (propelled by a bow) were in use prior to 60,000 years BP…
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Setting the Stage: The Late Pleistocene Colonization of North America Open
The timing of human entrance into North America has been a topic of debate that dates back to the late 19th century. Central to the modern discussion is not whether late Pleistocene-age populations were present on the continent, but the ti…
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Assessing Hafting Adhesive Efficiency in the Experimental Shooting of Projectile Points: A new Device for Instrumented and Ballistic Experiments Open
International audience
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ICE PATCH HUNTING IN THE GREATER YELLOWSTONE AREA, ROCKY MOUNTAINS, USA: WOOD SHAFTS, CHIPPED STONE PROJECTILE POINTS, AND BIGHORN SHEEP (<i>OVIS CANADENSIS</i>) Open
Ice patches and the alpine are important elements of the sociocultural landscape of the Greater Yellowstone Area, and they transcend the jurisdictional boundaries that divide the lands on which they occur. The ice patch record complements …
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Mammoth ivory was the most suitable osseous raw material for the production of Late Pleistocene big game projectile points Open
Late Pleistocene societies throughout the northern hemisphere used mammoth and mastodon ivory not only for art and adornment, but also for tools, in particular projectile points. A comparative analysis of the mechanical properties of tusk …
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The Technological Diversity of Lithic Industries in Eastern South America during the Late Pleistocene-Holocene Transition Open
Brazilian archaeological literature has insisted for decades upon associating hunter-gatherer sites dated to the Pleistocene–Holocene transition either to the Itaparica tradition, if located in central or northeastern Brazil, or to the Umb…
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Tracing social interactions in Pleistocene North America via 3D model analysis of stone tool asymmetry Open
Stone tools, often the sole remnant of prehistoric hunter-gatherer behavior, are frequently used as evidence of ancient human mobility, resource use, and environmental adaptation. In North America, studies of morphological variation in pro…
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The wooden artifacts from Schöningen’s Spear Horizon and their place in human evolution Open
Ethnographic records show that wooden tools played a pivotal role in the daily lives of hunter-gatherers including food procurement tools used in hunting (e.g., spears, throwing sticks) and gathering (e.g. digging sticks, bark peelers), as…
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Current and potential roles of archaeology in the development of cultural evolutionary theory Open
Archaeology has much to contribute to the study of cultural evolution. Empirical data at archaeological timescales are uniquely well suited to tracking rates of cultural change, detecting phylogenetic signals among groups of artefacts, and…
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Diet, Mobility, Technology, and Lithics: Neolithization on the Andean Altiplano, 7.0–3.5 ka Open
Neolithization was a complex, protracted process of domestication, sedentarization, and technology change that occurred in various combinations in various times and places around the world. Understanding the causal relationships among thos…
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Dating of a large tool assemblage at the Cooper’s Ferry site (Idaho, USA) to ~15,785 cal yr B.P. extends the age of stemmed points in the Americas Open
The timing and character of the Pleistocene peopling of the Americas are measured by the discovery of unequivocal artifacts from well-dated contexts. We report the discovery of a well-dated artifact assemblage containing 14 stemmed project…
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Archaeology and art in context: Excavations at the Gunu Site Complex, Northwest Kimberley, Western Australia Open
The Kimberley region of Western Australia is one of the largest and most diverse rock art provenances in the world, with a complex stylistic sequence spanning at least 16 ka, culminating in the modern art-making of the Wunumbal people. The…
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Identifying functional and regional differences in chimpanzee stone tool technology Open
The earliest hominin archaeological sites preserve a record of stone tools used for cutting and pounding. Traditionally, sharp-edged flakes were seen as the primary means by which our earliest ancestors interacted with the world. The impor…
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Were tanged points mechanically delivered armatures? Functional and morphometric analyses of tanged points from an Upper Paleolithic site at Jingeuneul, Korea Open
A total of 99 tanged points have been unearthed from the Jingeuneul site in Jinan-gun, Korea. The exceptionally large number of tanged points suggests a specific site function at this location. Even though the tanged point is one of the re…
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A Dynamical Analysis of the Suitability of Prehistoric Spheroids from the Cave of Hearths as Thrown Projectiles Open
Spheroids are ball-shaped stone objects found in African archaeological sites dating from 1.8 million years ago (Early Stone Age) to at least 70,000 years ago (Middle Stone Age). Spheroids are either fabricated or naturally shaped stones s…