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Ex-archaeologist here. You are correct, less people less trash, but you might be surprised. Archaeological landfills are called middens[0], and they're more li

Ex-archaeologist here. You are correct, less people less trash, but you might be surprised. Archaeological landfills are called middens[0], and they're more like trash heaps than landfills, but there's a lot of them around the world. A quick primer from dig it Scotland on middens: https://www.digitscotland.com/a-load-of-old-rubbish-what-middens-can-reveal-about-scotlands-past/ https://www.digitscotland.com/a-load-of-old-rubbish-what-mid... [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midden https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midden

lostlogin 4y ago
I’d assumed that a large part of it was that things were broadly biodegradable. Bone and pottery seems to be found, but a lot has rotted away. Near me there are a lot of middens and it’s just shells now, presumably from nearby Maori pa sites.
- zikduruqe 4y ago
  I am no expert, but I have always joked that instead of the Stone Age, it probably should be called the Wood Age. There were probably some awesome wooden structures or techniques that have been now lost to the ages because they are no longer around.
  - Y_Y 4y ago
    Good point, bearing in mind that working wood with only stone and wooden tools is a lot harder than with metals
    - naniwaduni 4y ago
      Working, well, anything we're still going to see traces of would've been even harder harder with only stone and wooden tools than it would be to work wood. It seems pretty reasonable to guess that if we see a culture with stonework and pottery and access to wood, they probably also did stuff with the wood that hasn't survived. (We can then look for evidence, like tools that seems like they they make the most sense to be using for woodwork.)
  - gus_massa 4y ago
    I'm not sure if it's correct, but I remember a tv show about archeology in East Asia, and they claimed that the problem is that they made too many tools of bamboo (that decompose) instead of tools of stone (that is forever).

lostlogin 4y ago

I’d assumed that a large part of it was that things were broadly biodegradable. Bone and pottery seems to be found, but a lot has rotted away. Near me there are a lot of middens and it’s just shells now, presumably from nearby Maori pa sites.

zikduruqe 4y ago
I am no expert, but I have always joked that instead of the Stone Age, it probably should be called the Wood Age. There were probably some awesome wooden structures or techniques that have been now lost to the ages because they are no longer around.
- Y_Y 4y ago
  Good point, bearing in mind that working wood with only stone and wooden tools is a lot harder than with metals
  - naniwaduni 4y ago
    Working, well, anything we're still going to see traces of would've been even harder harder with only stone and wooden tools than it would be to work wood. It seems pretty reasonable to guess that if we see a culture with stonework and pottery and access to wood, they probably also did stuff with the wood that hasn't survived. (We can then look for evidence, like tools that seems like they they make the most sense to be using for woodwork.)
- gus_massa 4y ago
  I'm not sure if it's correct, but I remember a tv show about archeology in East Asia, and they claimed that the problem is that they made too many tools of bamboo (that decompose) instead of tools of stone (that is forever).