Flint quarrying in north-eastern Iberia: quarry sites and the initial transformation of raw material

Abstract

Prehistoric communities carried out quarrying activities to obtain raw materials for tool production. These were produced either directly for immediate or later use by the same groups who quarried the stone, or indirectly by distributing the raw material or partially or completely manufactured products to third parties. All these procedures could be performed within a temporal and spatial sequence of variable extent, giving rise to archaeological evidence of very different types (Nelson 1991; Ingold 2012).

Creating frames of reference for chert exploitation during the Late Pleistocene in Southwesternmost Iberia

“…Combining different analyses and methods provides a comprehensive approach to reconstructing the geological and geographical origin of raw materials, especially since different methods have their inherent limitations [66]. Several other similar methodologies and approaches have been applied in other regions [70,[88][89][90]. However, the chosen analysis techniques should be adapted to the specific geographic context, the research questions, the problematics, and the characteristics of the types of cherts in question [66].…”

“…In fact, the creation of such a database is a starting point for most raw material-focused studies, independent of the geography or studied chronology [63][64][65][66]. In western Europe, there have been substantial efforts in creating comprehensive knowledge about chert-bearing formations, which resulted in important lithotheques and databases [67][68][69], and multidisciplinary studies of raw material use throughout prehistory [29,[70][71][72][73][74], as early as the 1980s.…”