Handaxe (Other Keyword)
1-2 (2 Records)
Perhaps the most intractable puzzle of the Palaeolithic is the Acheulean handaxe. Despite a century and a half of scrutiny by several generations of archaeologists, a comprehensive understanding of these enigmatic but ubiquitous artifacts remains out of reach. The typological approach that dominated Palaeolithic studies for a century arguably generated more puzzles than it resolved (‘stasis’, the ‘Movius line’) and the functional/materialist approach simply confirmed that they were tools....
Handaxe Function at Shishan Marsh-1: Preliminary Results of an Experimental Use-Wear Analysis (2017)
Although handaxes are one of the longest lasting and most iconic stone tools in the Paleolithic, little experimental work has been done to inform archaeologists about handaxe function. The research presented here explores handaxe function using low powered microscopy and an image-based GIS approach. 32 handaxes were created with chert collected from outcrops in the region surrounding Shishan Marsh-1. For the purpose of this study, the researchers focused on experiments involving subsistence...