Neolithic Studies Group & Lithic Studies Society

FLINT AND STONE IN THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD

Day meeting on 7th November 2005, British Museum, London

Organiser: Alan Saville

Artefacts of flint and stone have tended to play second fiddle to ceramics as soon as the latter appear in the archaeological record. Yet it is abundantly clear that, both in terms of everyday practical use and also in ritual and symbolic modes, lithic artefacts were just as vital a part of Neolithic life. Neolithic people had the knowledge to locate and exploit all kinds of lithic raw materials, and the craft-skill to work those materials to create functional tools and objects of great beauty. Consideration of struck lithic artefacts is often dominated by rich flint assemblages from classic zones such as Wessex in southern Britain, but to what extent do these provide a blueprint for areas where the Neolithic is less well documented, particularly those regions where flint is not the dominant raw material? And how does the British and Irish evidence for the use of flint and stone compare with that in other parts of western and northern Europe? This meeting offers the opportunity to take stock of the current state of knowledge, to consider case studies on particular implement types and raw materials, and to have progress reports on current work and new discoveries.

ABSTRACTS

 

Introduction: what do we know, what do we want to know?

Alan Saville National Museums of Scotland

A hundred years or so of lithic artefact studies have answered many questions about the use of flint and stone in the Neolithic period, but have raised many others. This brief introduction will review some of the main lines of enquiry and consider which, if any, can now be regarded as �closed� and will speculate on which may offer the greatest potential for the future.

The Sweet Track and lithic scatters: walking the land and seeing the people

Clive Bond University College Winchester

The Sweet Track, the earlier Neolithic trackway in the Somerset Levels excavated in the 1970s has played a central role in discussions on the introduction of the Neolithic in southern Britain. However, despite this unique wetland site any attendant settlement pattern was rarely mentioned and not well understood. The results of the long-term field survey of the Shapwick Project (1989-1999) from the adjacent hills to this track have yielded over 2,500 lithics. This evidence can now be interpreted to indicate the extent of a broadly contemporary and attendant settlement pattern to the many earlier Neolithic trackways. These data reflect the seasonal mobility and attachment to places of the woodworking- and pottery-using earlier Neolithic peoples who inhabited this land from 3807 BC. Lithic scatters in this case have provided a means of reuniting the wet- and dry-landscapes of this much studied landscape. What are the implications for this earliest phase of the Neolithic in southern England?

Carrying flint to the henges � lithics from the area of the Thornborough complex

Frances Healy Cardiff University

The lithics and monuments of north and west Yorkshire have been under-investigated and under-recognized in comparison to those of east Yorkshire. Several seasons of fieldwalking and targeted excavation in the Thornborough complex by Jan Harding of Newcastle University have done a great deal to redress that imbalance.

The complex includes a cursus, succeeded by a spectacular chain of three henges and, eventually, by several round barrows. There is a convincing argument that these three exceptionally uniform enclosures and other very similar ones farther down the confluence were linked to each other and visited in succession.

The Thornborough area has effectively no workable flint, although there is some chert, so that any artefactual flint was brought there. The lithics reflect a human presence from the Mesolithic onwards. From the later fourth millennium, however, that presence was focused on the higher ground to either side of the monuments, suggesting that, once the cursus was built, the use of the immediate area was altered.

The areas to either side of the complex were much-used, especially in the third millennium. Chapel Hill, to the east of the complex, stands out from the rest. The collection from it is overwhelming middle to late Neolithic in character (transverse arrowheads, Levallois technique, edge-ground pieces, a wide variety of flake tools). It stands out by its density, the use of flint almost to the exclusion of chert, high frequencies of retouched forms, coloured � especially red and reddish-brown � flint, and a high level of skill and control in the working of that flint. On typo-chronological grounds, this area would have been occupied by those visiting and using the henges.

Those visiting the henges not only brought flint with them, they brought carefully selected flint and worked it with particular skill. Interpretation will be attempted in the context of the monuments and of lithic resource exploitation in the wider region.


Rethinking lithics in early Neolithic southern Romania: t
he intriguing case of Criş and Dudeşti pit deposits

Amelia Pannett  Freelance lithic analyst

The site of Teleor 003 in southern Romania, excavated by the Southern Romania Archaeological Project (SRAP; supported by the British Academy, Muzeul National de Istorie a Romaniei, Muzeul Judetean Teleorman, & Cardiff University), has investigated a series of pit features dating from the early Neolithic (6000-5000 BC), associated with Criş and Dudeşti pottery. These features contain large quantities of material including pottery, lithics and animal bone. Elsewhere, similar features have been interpreted as pit huts, or refuse pits associated with transient occupation, ideas now being challenged by SRAP. Traditional interpretations, based on pottery typologies, have suggested that the Criş period predates the Dudestşi period, although very few reliable dates have yet been attained.

Examination of the lithics from two sealed assemblages of material, one associated with Criş pottery and the other with Dudeşti, suggests that the activities associated with the creation of the pit deposits may have been significantly different. Distinctions in the lithic materials used, the manner in which they were worked, the tools produced, and ultimately the way in which they were deposited, all point to an element of complexity not discernible within the other material assemblages, or adequately explained by traditional interpretations of the pit features. In this paper I will suggest that the examination of lithics can open our eyes to hitherto unrecognized facets of the creation of these features in southern Romania, and move us towards an understanding of the sociality of pit use.


Production and circulation of Bartonian Tertiary flint artefacts in the Seine Basin during the Neolithic

Francois Giligny  Universite de Paris I

In the Seine valley downstream from Paris, there are outcrops of Saint-Ouen limestone with Bartonian levels which provide excellent quality flint in the form of slabs, as in other parts of the central Paris basin. These materials were mainly exploited during the Neolithic, first of all in the early Neolithic, around 4900 BC. during the Villeneuve-Saint-Germain culture, to make blades which were either used in unmodified form or as blanks for tools, and subsequently during the middle neolithic, in the Cerny and Chass�en, as well as in the late Neolithic, for making axe blades of different sizes. Archaeological work undertaken in this region comprising the north of the Yvelines d�partement has principally involved recording surface finds and recent surveys carried out on the flint mine at Flins-sur-Seine. In terms of products and procurement techniques this site is directly comparable to the mine recently excavated at Jablines (Seine-et-Marne). Major concentrations of mine shafts have been detected by aerial photography and geophysical survey, and debitage zones can be identified through concentrations of waste. In the absence of excavation, the site and products are not yet precisely dated. Bartonian flint axes have been found in Normandy, at about 150 km west from the mine. Territory models are then designed through examples of other flint production areas.

Shining water, shifting sand: an appraisal of the exotic lithic material from Luce Sands, south-west Scotland

Diana Coles University of Reading

The dune area of Luce Bay is well known for the range and quantity of artefacts recovered from all periods. The prehistoric material contains quantities of lithics that may be considered exotic, i.e. imported material that appears to have had a particular, and indeed, often an iconic significance to those who worked with it. Among such are Arran pitchstone and volcanic tuff from the Langdales, Cumbria, in the form of polished axes which are found in both complete and fragmentary form.

This study will look at a collection of uncontextualized surface finds of pitchstone in Dumfries museum and an assemblage of worked pitchstone from an excavation at Knocknab in 1992/3, many pieces apparently from a working floor, together with associated Group Vl material from both collections.

This paper will seek to consider avenues of exploration suggested by the presence of these imported materials and the way in which they have been utilized both within the dune system and around the local area in prehistory. Inferences may be also be made about exchange patterns and social relationships within the wider region of the northern Irish Sea.

Characterizing regional settlement through lithic scatters and excavation

Clive Waddington
Archaeological Research Services, Bakewell, Derbyshire

Some archaeologists have argued in recent decades that what is perceived as a relative lack of structural remains indicates that Neolithic settlement within Britain was predominantly mobile, with rare examples of permanent buildings being characterized as atypical or �ritual�. Lithic scatters are often thought to reflect the remains of archaeological sites that had no features cutting deeper than the modern ploughzone and so these lithic scatter sites are not thought to challenge this view of a mobile Neolithic. Detailed regional surveys, however, are now revealing a different picture with lithic scatters being able to be used to identify areas of settlement which in some cases reveal archaeological remains for both sedentary and temporary sites. Backing up fieldwalking campaigns with large-scale surface stripping and excavation provides a mechanism for accessing Neolithic settlement patterns at a regional scale and assessing lithic scatters in a more favourable light. This paper will explore how this method is being used with reference to case-studies in northern England.

A shot in the dark? Experimenting with flint-tipped arrows

Martin Smith University of Birmingham

Prior to metallurgy stone-tipped projectiles were crucial both for subsistence and as a means of offence and defence. This appears to have been particularly so during the Neolithic when the bow appears often to have been the main weapon of choice, particularly in inter-group conflicts. Whilst finds of embedded projectile points in human and animal bone are not uncommon, identifications of such wounds in the absence of embedded points are rare. Previous experimentation involving archaic projectiles has not examined the effects of stone-tipped arrows/ spears on bone. This paper details current research which involves impacting animal bone with flint-tipped arrows. Methods used involve both shooting arrows at bone targets and impacting bones with flint points using a charpy impact tester. Preliminary results indicate that positive identifications can be made, both grossly and microscopically, of bony trauma caused by flint projectiles. In addition, flint projectiles are shown to often leave small embedded fragments which can be identified microscopically. These results compare well with archaeological examples of suspected arrow wounds and this paper demonstrates the practical application of these data in identifying such injuries. This may have particular relevance to regions where evidence for Neolithic conflict is abundant such as south-western Britain.

Polished rectangular flint knives � elaboration or replication?

Roy Loveday

Prestige flint artefacts delineate the later Neolithic as emphatically as the changed ceramic repertoire yet the spur to their production remains obscure. Social models advanced to explain the phenomenon only address the question of artefact selection and modification in broad terms: the elaboration of long-held male accoutrements in pursuit of distinctiveness and prestige. The morphological choices made (e.g. to waisted and adze form axes with purely edge polish, and to broad and remarkably thin rectangular knives with all over polish) are rarely addressed. Since neither the logical extension of lithic technology nor functional advantage appear to furnish answers, the possibility of skeuomorphism deserves consideration. Continental copper axes (Type Vinca) will be examined in terms of form, function and finish as possible  albeit invisible  prototypes for polished rectangular knives alongside insular stone and bone artefacts. The lack of fit of the finest polished rectangular knives with other types in the discoidal series raises questions about the homogeneity of the wider grouping. Might technological convergence and a common concern for replication here mask multiple stimuli?

The Levallois-like approach of late Neolithic Britain

Torben Bjarke Ballin 
Lithic Research, Denny, Stirlingshire

In the present paper an attempt is made at defining the late Neolithic Levallois-like reduction method by characterization and quantification of cores and blanks from one chronologically unmixed assemblage (Stoneyhill in Aberdeenshire), supplemented by examples from the archaeological literature. The exact date of the distinctive Levallois-like cores is discussed, and these cores are compared with classic Levalloisian cores from the Middle Palaeolithic period. It is also attempted to precisely characterize the late Neolithic blanks with finely faceted platform remnants, to allow these to be distinguished from ordinarily faceted blanks from other prehistoric periods. It is hoped that the present paper will add to the understanding of this specific late Neolithic industry by addressing the question of why an approach usually associated with the Middle Palaeolithic period was reintroduced in British later prehistory.

Prehistoric extraction: some suggestions from ethnography

Peter Topping English Heritage

The Catlinite quarries of Pipestone, Minnesota, provide a salutary lesson of how the desire for a special type of stone developed a ritualized extraction process. A review of the Old and New World archaeological record suggests that ritualized extraction and the careful crafting and curation of artefacts may have been more prevalent than previously considered. This paper will present examples taken from both North America and Europe, particularly the English Neolithic flint mines, to illustrate this point with the aim of stimulating a re-consideration of the role of some prehistoric mines and quarries.

Ideology and context with the European flint mining tradition

Paul Wheeler
Bournemouth University

Various aspects of flint mines in Britain and the continent have been explored in the past, from the search of origins to a technological and economic understanding of flint mining. This study looks to re-evaluate and focus on data concerned with the context of deposition within mines in Britain and Europe, with the aim of uncovering common practices and influences in the ideology behind flint mining.

Material Culture, human remains, art and iconography will be analysed along with landscape and spatial distributions with the aim of finding potential common ideologies and beliefs within the practice of flint mining.

Stone quarries on either side of the channel will be analysed in conjunction with the flint mines to further explore Neolithic attitudes to the exploitation of raw material and if common ideologies in both industries and on either side of the continent can be identified.

New discoveries at the Mynydd Rhiw axe production site

Steve Burrow and Heather Jackson 
National Museums and Galleries of Wales

The Neolithic quarries at Mynydd Rhiw have been known since the late 1950s, when Chris Houlder excavated several pits, revealing evidence for the production of domestic tools as well as axes (Group XXI). This has generally been assumed to be the extent of Neolithic activity at Mynydd Rhiw.

In June of this year an extensive seam of material suitable for axe working was found several hundred metres from Houlder's site. This seam show features suggestive of axe production, including screes of debris, conchoidal fractures of outcrop surfaces and areas where the rock has been significantly undercut.

These discoveries resolve several outstanding issues regarding the nature of axe production at Mynydd Rhiw and act as a spur for further research at the site.

Making places: axe production and lithic scatters in an island world

Gabriel Cooney and Brian Dolan  University College Dublin

Stone axe stone studies have been greatly influenced by interpretative approaches, such as the consideration of the biography of axes as objects. Quarry sites however are still often approached and perceived primarily from a functional perspective. While axes themselves are regarded as symbolically charged, the quarries are seen as peripheral; simply the starting point in axe biographies, often situated in isolated locations and hence marginal both in a cultural and spatial sense in Neolithic worlds. The results of recent excavation and survey work on Lambay island off the east coast of Ireland offer a different perspective. Work at a porphyritic andesite (porphyry) quarry site (the Eagle�s Nest) suggests that it had a considerable cultural significance as a place from early in the Neolithic. Understanding the insular context of the activities there has been enhanced by the analysis of the content, patterning and distribution pattern of surface lithic scatters across the island. The wider implications of the Lambay work will be considered.