Where the Conventional and Unconventional Meet: Marrying Tradition and Innovation in Lithic Use-wear Analysis

Summary

The majority of lithic use-wear research has been geared towards the development of newer more quantitatively precise methods involving evermore sophisticated forms of microscopy. As vital as such efforts are there is still a place in today’s interdisciplinary world for more traditional approaches when coupled with new ideas. This presentation will look at the results of a GIS analysis of experimental use-wear traces from images generated using conventional incident light microscopy. Specifically, the role of intra-raw material type variability in the formation of use-wear accrual patterns on experimental tools made from Yellow Silicified Wood and Morrison Undifferentiated Gray Chert, two of the raw materials used during the Late Archaic of Northwestern New Mexico, will be examined.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Exploring the Microscale: Advances and Novel Applications of Microscopy for Archaeological Materials

Keywords

Spatial Coverage