Kozlowski (2001) Origin and Evolution of Blade Technologies...

[Daryl Habel]

To all,

There is a new online journal "Mediterranean Archaeology and
Archaeometry", which for the present with all articles in volumes 1
& 2 in pdf form, is available free to all at:

http://www.rhodes.aegean.gr/maa_journal/

Many of the articles deal with Holocene-age (post-10,000 B.P)
issues, but of particular interest to those interested in lithic industry aspects of the so-called Middle to Upper Paleolithic "transition" is the first article in
Volume 1, Issue 1 (in pdf, Adobe Reader required):

Kozlowski, Janusz K. (2001) Origin and Evolution of Blade
Technologies in the Middle and Early Upper Palaeolithic.
Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry. Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 3-18.

Abstract:

The origins of blade technology used to be located at the beginning of the Upper Palaeolithic and identified with the emergence of Anatomically Modern Humans. The paper points to earlier appearance of blade technology, earlier than the beginning of the Upper Palaeolithic, in the form of a number of episodes that occurred starting from the early phase of the Middle Palaeolthic. Such episodes took place in Africa, the Near East as well as in Europe. However, it is interesting that the early emergence of blade technology in Europe is not recorded in the western Mediterranean. At the beginning of the Upper Palaeolithic we can see the emergence of a blade technology on the base of Levallois concept and, independently, of the Levallois tradition at late technology as the fully-fledged Upper Palaeolithic Aurignacian. The distribution range of these two units: Levallois stemmed "transitional" industries and the Aurignacian covers the Near East, south-east Europe and the Danube basin to the west and Central Asia to the east. The paper discusses the possibilities of the identification of the range of these units with the diffusion of the Anatomically Modern Humans in Eurasia.

(End of Abstract.)

More later,
Dar

[Jacques Cinq-Mars]

To all,

There is a new online journal "Mediterranean Archaeology and
Archaeometry", which for the present with all articles in volumes 1
& 2 in pdf form, is available free to all at:

http://www.rhodes.aegean.gr/maa_journal/

Many of the articles deal with Holocene-age (post-10,000 B.P)
issues, but of particular interest to those interested in lithic industry aspects of the so-called Middle to Upper Paleolithic "transition" is the first article in
Volume 1, Issue 1 (in pdf, Adobe Reader required):

Kozlowski, Janusz K. (2001) Origin and Evolution of Blade
Technologies in the Middle and Early Upper Palaeolithic.
Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry. Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 3-18.

Dar,

Good of you to have found this and thanks for passing it on. Other than quickly realizing that Kozlowski is, as always, "on top" of the evidence and, as ever, very cautious, I have not really had time to give much attention to the details of the paper. I should note, however, that I have been quite happy with the attention given to both the unusual quantity and quality of very informative artefactual illustrations ... an approach that, as you know, PALANTH is strongly advocating!

Jacques

[lagarvelho]

Jacques and Dar:

Yes.  The article appears to be chock-full of illustrations.  And that's one of the reasons I've only just managed to download it!  Usually, I don't have this trouble with pdf's, but for for some reason, the download was extremely slow, so if anybody out there has slower than usual connections for whatever reasons, beware(in my case the download was slow *in spite of* having an upgrade and faster speed!  I will try to read it tonight and see if I can come up with any intelligent comments on the thing.
Anne G

[rich]

Hi Dar.
What a splendid article, and just down our street,  BUT what  has caught my eye so far is the mention of Gibralter crossings. Someone has dared to elude to the possibility. Will read on and reply.
Rich

[Daryl Habel]

Hi Dar.
What a splendid article, and just down our street,  BUT what  has caught my eye so far is the mention of Gibralter crossings. Someone has dared to elude to the possibility. Will read on and reply.
Rich

Hi Rich,

On our street until you left me in Africa at Gibraltar.  I was headed out toward Central Asia.

Kozlowski eludes to a possible Gibraltar crossing to explain the presence of the Middle Pleistocene Acheulean of Levallois tradition in Western and Northwestern Europe after about 500 kyr BP, while at the same time the industries of Central Europe are dominated by pebble tool traditions (Taubachian, etc.), but I don't think he mentions any possible Upper Pleistocene.  I think I still favor the Straus (2001) arguments in:

Straus, L.G. (2001). Africa and Iberia in the
Pleistocene. Quaternary International 75: 91-102.
(p. 95):

1) the presence of early Aurignacian ca. 40 kyr BP in
northern Spain and
2) the survival of Mousterian and Neanderthals until
after 30 kyr BP in southern Spain.  No evidence for
Aurignacian in southern Iberia until about 30 kyr BP.

From this, Straus points out the arguments of others
about "behavioral modernity and adaptive superiority"
involving language, mental capacities, etc.,(p. 96):

"But, with such a supposed adaptive advantage on the
part of early Upper Paleolithic Homo sapiens sapiens,
one would imagine: (1) an ability to cross the Strait
of Gibraltar (no wider than the estuary of some of the
Tagus), and (2) a proclivity first to occupy the most
African like of European environments, i.e., southern
Iberia. Yet they did not do so."

"Indeed, the simplistic, delayed-reaction Out of
Africa "invasionist" model to explain the Upper
Paleolithic of Europe meets with its biggest challenge
in the 10,000 year survival of Mousterian Neanderthals
in southern Iberia at the very door of Africa" (Straus
2001:96).

But you've seen this argument before.
I was happy to see the article mention the OIS 7 Khonako III site in Tadjikistan and mentioned also the that at Kara Bom site layers 6-5 and 4-1  in Siberia as being "the most convincing instance of such continuation"  referring to the Levallois technique in "transitional" UP industries (p.15).

Cheers,
Dar

[rich]

Hi Dar,
yes I agree with the fact that the crossing was in ref to middle pleistocene. I was just pleased to see it mentioned as posible at some time or other. we never know what will turn up next to alter the status quo ?
What has confused me though in the article is on page 16 "total absence of technological and morphological continuation between the MP and Aurignacian in the entire territory of Europe."
and "the whole aurignacian tool kit exhibits UP features and a lack of mousterian type tools."
I am referring to Siuren 1 rock shelter in the Crimea, southeastern edge of Europe, which @ 29/28k for the middle levels is an Aurignacian site with some MP associated tools, namely bifacials, ponts and scrapers similar to the Crimean micoquian @ levels H & G.( V.P Chabai Now granted this could be due to mechanical mixture but I found the absence of  mention of the site odd.
Open to debate.
Rich

[Daryl Habel]

Yes I agree Kozlowski is confusing on page 16.  To begin with he notes this Aurignacian  lack of Mousterian tools in earliest assemblages in only the context of "Western Europe" and the initial appearance of Aurignacian and the ovious discontinuity with Mousterian or, for that matter, Chatelperronian whenever the Aurignacian first appears on a site (I know, there are some Aur/Ch interstratifications documented, but some folks, Pettitt for instance, dispute these).

Whatever Kozlowski says about all of "Europe" (and I get confused, also), I'd say from other sources that the matter is much more complex to the east of "Western Europe".  Whether Siuren (I'm assuming you mean the Chabai article in the IPA link I posted)  is mixed or not, there does seem to be many instances (Sungir' is a good example) in Eastern Europe where the taxonomy of individual assemblages (described as having an "Aurignacian" component) is, as you say, "open to debate."

Dar

[Dale Hoogeveen]

Hi Rich, Dar,

Isn't what he's saying is that the European Aurignacian is imported and lacking signs of long term local development?  That would make its users an immigrant group - IOW AMH.  It is more amazing that he seems to be reincorporating long term native European influence with the appearance of the Gravettian, raising a possibility of that being the Neanderthal/AMH hybrid culture that shows N/AMH fusion.

That appears to me to be more of an afterthought with the much more important message that UP level blade technology seems to have risen seperately in several different areas growing out of several different schools of technological development, including more than a single type of Levallois technique.  That latter was where the referance to a Gilbalter crossing was made to seperate MSA Levallois technique in Europe from the MSA in the Levant.  He later develops that to quite distinct schools of local technology each eventually with its own blade entrance to the UP.

All in all, Kozlowski seems to be mainly saying that he sees multiple and quite independant development of several types of blade technology to UP levels.  

Fascinating stuff.  

Dutch

Yes I agree Kozlowski is confusing on page 16.  To begin with he notes this Aurignacian  lack of Mousterian tools in earliest assemblages in only the context of "Western Europe" and the initial appearance of Aurignacian and the ovious discontinuity with Mousterian or, for that matter, Chatelperronian whenever the Aurignacian first appears on a site (I know, there are some Aur/Ch interstratifications documented, but some folks, Pettitt for instance, dispute these).

Whatever Kozlowski says about all of "Europe" (and I get confused, also), I'd say from other sources that the matter is much more complex to the east of "Western Europe".  Whether Siuren (I'm assuming you mean the Chabai article in the IPA link I posted)  is mixed or not, there does seem to be many instances (Sungir' is a good example) in Eastern Europe where the taxonomy of individual assemblages (described as having an "Aurignacian" component) is, as you say, "open to debate."

Dar

[Daryl Habel]

Hi Dutch,

You're right on the money, all the way down the line with your comments.  I'll add that, although Kozlowski sees an immigrant AMH as responsible for the European Aurignacian, and a two-pronged diffusion (Danube corridor to Germany and Mediterranean to Iberia) from the Balkan "pre-Aurignacian" at Bacho Kiro and Temnata, he doesn't expand further on the "origin."  However, if you check Fig. 14 (page 15), and look at the "Near East" column, you will see the Aurignacian at Kebara c. 36 kyr BP is preceded by a "Baradostian" industry.

I'm still running on memory here, but I'm pretty sure it was Kozlowski (I'll check when I get home next week) who has suggested in other writings that the Baradostian, which is sometimes referred to as the "Zagros Aurignacian" is a possible candidate for Aurignacian origins.

However, the sites of the Baradostian are, for the most part, located in Iraq, were excavated long ago, have not been investigated for decades, are dated very inadequately, and have collections unavailable (in Baghdad?) for re-examination, save for one assemblage curated outside Iraq that was excavated from Warwasi.  So we wait.

This is an excellent "short history" of Levallois development and sites with early blades, but it lacks more detailed argumentation for substantiating many of the interpretations.  Not criticizing because, after all, it's  _mostly_ intended as an information review, despite him saying he'll develop a few ideas.  It should be kept in mind that opinions vary on interpretation, and there are other archaeologists who would differ from Kozlowski's interpretation of lithic classification, as well as those responsible for manufacture of the many "transitional" industries (aside from Aurignacian, which almost everyone agrees is AMH).

Later,
Dar

[lagarvelho]

Dar:

"However, the sites of the Baradostian are, for the most part, located in Iraq, were excavated long ago, have not been investigated for decades, are dated very inadequately, and have collections unavailable (in Baghdad?) for re-examination, save for one assemblage curated outside Iraq that was excavated from Warwasi.  So we wait."

Since the Baradostian is in Iraq, dated very inadequately, etc., there is the possibility that they might well have been blown to smithereens by various bombings.  I hope this is not the case, but given the situation in that part of the world for *at least* the last ten years, I am not overly optimistic. And it would be a sad loss to science if they were.
Anne G

[Dale Hoogeveen]

Prepared core blade technology looks to me to be an excellent form of small scale mass production for equipping work groups on an incident by incident basis.

Is there some sort of regular number of blades generated per core that can perhaps give an indication of work group size, perhaps leading from there to some sort of understanding of local social organization?

Dutch

[Daryl Habel]

Dar:

"However, the sites of the Baradostian are, for the most part, located in Iraq, were excavated long ago, have not been investigated for decades, are dated very inadequately, and have collections unavailable (in Baghdad?) for re-examination, save for one assemblage curated outside Iraq that was excavated from Warwasi.  So we wait."

Since the Baradostian is in Iraq, dated very inadequately, etc., there is the possibility that they might well have been blown to smithereens by various bombings.  I hope this is not the case, but given the situation in that part of the world for *at least* the last ten years, I am not overly optimistic. And it would be a sad loss to science if they were.
Anne G

Yes it would.  I'm home now so I can verify that my memory remains reasonably intact regarding Kozlowski's earlier writings concerning Aurignacian origins.  It was a reference given me by Dan Barnes in discussions we had on your now-defunct deja.com human origins board during Oct-Nov. 1999.  And is:

Kozlowski, J.K. (1996) A cultural context of the last Neanderthals and early modern humans in central-eastern Europe.  In Bar-Yosef, O., Cavalli-Sforza, L.L., March, R.J., and Piperno, M. (eds.) Volume 5: The Lower and Middle Paleolithic. Colloquium X: The Origin of Modern Man. XIII International Congress of Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences, Forli, Italia - 8/14 September 1996. ABACO, Forli. pp. 205-218.

We also discussed another good reference to this region's MP/UP "transition", perhaps easier (for some, but certainly not me) to find in libraries:

Olszewski, D. & Dibble, H. (1994) The Zagros Aurignacian. Current Anthropology. 35 (1): 68-75.

You, Dan, and I discussed these in some detail.

Dar

[Daryl Habel]

(SNIP)
Is there some sort of regular number of blades generated per core that can perhaps give an indication of work group size, perhaps leading from there to some sort of understanding of local social organization?

Dutch

I suppose this "regular number" would depend on core volume and morphology and would be variable.  Mostly the data comes from refittings.  I would think there might be some literature on determination of "work group size", but off the top of my head I'd say there are a lot of variable interpretations of the available archaeological evidence  to consider also, such as difficulties determining whether a cultural layer is actually a palimpsest of occasional visitation and occupation by various human travelers over periods of a thousand years or more.  And so on.

As usual, you ask difficult questions for which I have no answers.

Cheers,
Dar

[rich]

Hi Dar. Hope u had a good journey home.
Just finished reading the Kozlowski paper and I find I have come full circle to the position I began on these boards some 3 years ago now.
In reading that the interpretation of the leaf pointed industries that may well have produced the Gravettian later.
And as is pointed out in the article-
nean was associated with leaf points-
szeletian is assoc with leaf points-
gravettian is def modern human-
and at Lagar Velho, which is as I said ,where I came in-
a burial of chunky gravettian stature buried with a gravettian style use of ochre, an individual with questioned mixed morphological attributes of nean and modern human.
thoughts please from the floor ?
Rich

[Dale Hoogeveen]

(SNIP)
Is there some sort of regular number of blades generated per core that can perhaps give an indication of work group size, perhaps leading from there to some sort of understanding of local social organization?

Dutch

I suppose this "regular number" would depend on core volume and morphology and would be variable.  Mostly the data comes from refittings.  I would think there might be some literature on determination of "work group size", but off the top of my head I'd say there are a lot of variable interpretations of the available archaeological evidence  to consider also, such as difficulties determining whether a cultural layer is actually a palimpsest of occasional visitation and occupation by various human travelers over periods of a thousand years or more.  And so on.

As usual, you ask difficult questions for which I have no answers.

Cheers,
Dar

Hi Dar,

Sorry for the delay in responding to your comments.

What triggered the start of my thoughts was the realization that the prepared core blades I was looking at resembled nothing so much as a straight razor blade which was sharp on both sides and lacked a handle.  It was a very small jump from there to razor blades and utility knife blades which are never carried  naked for safety's sake, rather they are either transported in some sort of handle or dispenser.  It seemed to me that nodules that could easily be transformed into prepared cores and from there to a set of work tools would be a more convenient way to transfort a tool chest than to transport the actual and very accident prone tools themselves.  IOW it seems to me that prepared core blades would be task oriented with little actual transport after manufactor.  Rather the raw material would be transported along with the skills to transform it quickly at need.

Peace

Dutch