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> But some archaeologists say it's hard to imagine that humans would repeatedly traverse a site and leave no stone tools. Those tools were really valuable. The
by ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
> But some archaeologists say it's hard to imagine that humans would repeatedly traverse a site and leave no stone tools.
Those tools were really valuable. They busted their butts, making them, and wouldn't want to toss them aside, just because they got chipped or cracked. They are much more likely to throw them into a "spare parts bag," and keep them around.
Today's throwaway culture is actually pretty new, in human history. Just hang around some poor folks, to see radical conservation, in action.
- AlotOfReading 2y agoLithics were, broadly speaking, more akin to how we treat plastics than metal tools. Lithic production results in enough waste that archaeologists give the waste a special name ("debitage") and even use it for destructive testing that would be unthinkable for more significant / less voluminous artifacts.
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y agoThanks. Was not aware. The other possibility, is that most of their tools were composed of biodegradable stuff, like wood, bones, and shells. In Africa, they used wood and raw iron for their stuff (I have spears, shields, and arrows, from there). That doesn't tend to age well.
- AlotOfReading 2y agoThat leaves other evidence that's been looked for. Additionally, the Eurasian cultures that peopled the Americas are all known to have been heavy lithic users.
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y agoSomewhere, I have an old stone hand axe. It's really well-made. Not sure where it's from, but I believe it came from a European Stone Age dig, about fifty years ago (probably stolen. People weren't so circumspect, in those days).
- jandrewrogers 2y agoI am skeptical of this assertion. If you walk the mountains of Nevada along the fossil shoreline where the Lahontan[0] civilization thrived, you will regularly find large quantities of neolithic trash strewn about. Broken, half-finished, or abandoned stone tools are ubiquitous. It takes little effort to find obsidian arrowheads, some in perfect condition. The preponderance of the evidence is that these were viewed as disposable artifacts, use once and throw away. If they were actually valuable, they could have picked these up in the same way we pick them up today. It would have essentially been "free money" lying on the ground. Yet for some reason, in all the intervening millennia, so few people did that modern humans can find them everywhere. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Lahontan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Lahontan
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y agoYou are probably correct. This is not my area of expertise, and I likely made an assertion that has weak support.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]