Revisiting the Rolland and Dibble Synthesis: The Emergence of Artifact Retouch and Artifact Density Variability in Paleolithic Assemblages

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Establishing the Science of Paleolithic Archaeology: The Legacy of Harold Dibble (1951–2018) Part I" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The Rolland and Dibble synthesis was an ambitious attempt to reframe the interpretation of Middle Paleolithic variability. The model postulates that Middle Paleolithic assemblage variability is continuous in nature, driven principally by raw material availability and occupation intensity. As occupation intensity increases, the model predicts a greater degree of lithic utilization, leading to the production of more flakes per core as well as more retouched artifacts. Intuitively, this prediction translates to an expectation that artifact density should correlate positively with the proportion of retouched objects. However, empirical observations have repeatedly described the opposite, that Paleolithic assemblage retouch frequency generally correlates negatively with artifact density. In this paper, I show that the Rolland and Dibble synthesis can explain the empirical negative relationship if we introduce two new elements to the model: flake size distribution and flake selection probability. Using simulation, I demonstrate that the negative correlation between retouch frequency and artifact density can emerge organically through a relatively simple flake selection process, without additional parameters of mobility or technological strategies. The results suggest the possibility that the widely described relationship between artifact density and retouch frequency among Paleolithic assemblages reflects a fundamental aspect of assemblage accumulation, driven primarily by place-use intensity.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Establishing the Science of Paleolithic Archaeology: The Legacy of Harold Dibble (1951–2018) Part I   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 35647.0