Multiple uses for Australian backed artefacts

Abstract

Backed artefacts, otherwise microliths or backed bladelets, are key indicators of cultural practice in early Australia – but what were they used for? The authors review a number of favourite ideas – hunting, scarification, wood working – and then apply use-wear analysis and residue studies to three prehistoric assemblages. These showed contact with a wide range of materials: wood, plants, bone, blood, skin and feathers. These results are unequivocal – the backed artefacts were hafted and employed as versatile tools with many functions.

Population increase and environmental deterioration correspond with microlithic innovations in South Asia ca. 35,000 years ago

“…Microliths, as components of barbed projectiles, may have been economically advantageous in that associated weaponry could have increased success in capturing mobile prey through improved hunting technologies. Microlithic tools served a number of functions (31), but it is often argued that they were components of serial armatures which increased the maintainability and reliability of tools during time-stressed hunting trips (29) and increased penetration and blood loss through multiple cutting edges and internal fragmentation of the adhering barbs (32)(33)(34). It seems likely that the use of microliths in South Asia is associated with changes in subsistence practices, and the various archaeological, genetic, and paleoenvironmental findings presented here, although not conclusive, suggest that this use may have been necessitated in this region by a combination of landscape fragmentation, overall environmental deterioration, and increased population packing.…”

The changing abundance of backed artefacts in south-eastern Australia: a response to Holocene climate change?

“…We previously used this approach to show that the frequency with which backed specimens were used on different materials varied substantially between sites in close proximity to Mussel Shelter (Robertson et al, 2009). However, in this paper we concentrate on describing the diversity of backed artefact uses in Mussel Shelter, the configuration of those uses in terms of the multi-functionality of the tools, and exploring the evidence for temporal change in using these tools.…”

“…In contrast, are proposals that they were hand-held or more likely hafted domestic tools that functioned as cutting, drilling/awling and scraping tools in a variety of everyday activities: for working bone, wood and skin/ hides, as well as butchery and activities involving feathers (e.g., Dickson, 1973, 7-9;McCarthy, 1943, 149;Stockton, 1970;Tindale, 1955, 292). Many of these propositions, initially based on ethnographic analogy, conjecture, morphology and macroscopic signs of wear, have been substantiated by use-wear and residue analyses (e.g., Boot, 1993;Kamminga, 1980Kamminga, , 1982McDonald et al, 2007;Robertson, 2002Robertson, , 2005Robertson and Attenbrow, 2008;Robertson et al, 2009;Slack et al, 2004). However, there is a continuing body of opinion that their primary use was as barbs and tips on thrown spears.…”

De usos y recursos. Análisis funcional y de sustancias grasas mediante cromatografía gaseosas sobre artefactos líticos tallados

“…Estas últimas tres aproximaciones en conjunto forman parte de una propuesta metodológica evaluada en artefactos líticos tallados de Tierra del Fuego (Álvarez et al 2009;Briz et al 2014). Asimismo, estos cruces metodológicos son aplicados al estudio de problemáticas concretas como patrones de subsistencia, cambios culturales o la función de instrumentos específicos (Cooper y Nugent 2009;Hardy et al 2001;Hardy y Moncel 2011;Kononenko 2007;Perry 2002;Robertson et al 2009). Las conclusiones apuntan a la utilidad de la combinación metodológica para una comprensión más efectiva de las prácticas de subsistencia y del uso de los instrumentos, dado que permite alcanzar resultados que ninguna de las metodologías podría producir por sí misma (Hardy 2009;Högberg et al 2009;Kononenko 2011;Portillo et al 2013;Sterner Miller et al 2013).…”