scholarly journals Aesthetic sense and social cognition: a story from the Early Stone Age

Synthese ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Greg Currie ◽  
Xuanqi Zhu
Keyword(s):  
Social Cognition ◽  
Stone Tool ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Regular Feature ◽  
Aesthetic Responses ◽  
Aesthetic Sense ◽  
Early Stone Age

AbstractHuman aesthetic practices show a sensitivity to the ways that the appearance of an artefact manifests skills and other qualities of the maker. We investigate a possible origin for this kind of sensibility, locating it in the need for co-ordination of skill-transmission in the Acheulean stone tool culture. We argue that our narrative supports the idea that Acheulean agents were aesthetic agents. In line with this we offer what may seem an absurd comparison: between the Acheulean and the Quattrocento. In making it we display some hidden complexity in human aesthetic responses to an artefact. We conclude with a brief review of rival explanations—biological and/or cultural—of how this skills-based sensibility became a regular feature of human aesthetic practices.

scholarly journals Raw material optimization and stone tool engineering in the Early Stone Age of Olduvai Gorge (Tanzania)

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (162) ◽  
pp. 20190377 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alastair Key ◽  
Tomos Proffitt ◽  
Ignacio de la Torre
Keyword(s):  
Functional Performance ◽  
Material Selection ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Cutting Tools ◽  
Raw Material ◽  
Stone Tool ◽  
Olduvai Gorge ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Material Optimization ◽  
Early Stone Age

For more than 1.8 million years hominins at Olduvai Gorge were faced with a choice: whether to use lavas, quartzite or chert to produce stone tools. All are available locally and all are suitable for stone tool production. Using controlled cutting tests and fracture mechanics theory we examine raw material selection decisions throughout Olduvai's Early Stone Age. We quantify the force, work and material deformation required by each stone type when cutting, before using these data to compare edge sharpness and durability. Significant differences are identified, confirming performance to depend on raw material choice. When combined with artefact data, we demonstrate that Early Stone Age hominins optimized raw material choices based on functional performance characteristics. Doing so flexibly: choosing raw materials dependent on their sharpness and durability, alongside a tool's loading potential and anticipated use-life. In this way, we demonstrate that early lithic artefacts at Olduvai Gorge were engineered to be functionally optimized cutting tools.

scholarly journals Group-specific archaeological signatures of stone tool use in wild macaques

eLife ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lydia V Luncz ◽  
Mike Gill ◽  
Tomos Proffitt ◽  
Magdalena S Svensson ◽  
Lars Kulik ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Tool Use ◽  
Macaca Fascicularis ◽  
Stone Tools ◽  
Stone Tool ◽  
Old World Monkeys ◽  
Cultural Variation ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Ecological Diversity ◽  
Early Stone Age

Stone tools in the prehistoric record are the most abundant source of evidence for understanding early hominin technological and cultural variation. The field of primate archaeology is well placed to improve our scientific knowledge by using the tool behaviours of living primates as models to test hypotheses related to the adoption of tools by early stone-age hominins. Previously we have shown that diversity in stone tool behaviour between neighbouring groups of long-tailed macaques (Macaca-fascicularis) could be explained by ecological and environmental circumstances (Luncz et al., 2017b). Here however, we report archaeological evidence, which shows that the selection and reuse of tools cannot entirely be explained by ecological diversity. These results suggest that tool-use may develop differently within species of old-world monkeys, and that the evidence of material culture can differ within the same timeframe at local geographic scales and in spite of shared environmental and ecological settings.

scholarly journals Quantifying 3D Micro‐Surface Changes on Experimental Stones Used to Break Bones and Their Implications for the Analysis of Early Stone Age Pounding Tools

Archaeometry ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 60 (3) ◽  
pp. 419-436 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Benito‐Calvo ◽  
A. Arroyo ◽  
L. Sánchez‐Romero ◽  
M. Pante ◽  
I. Torre
Keyword(s):  
Stone Age ◽  
Early Stone Age ◽  
Surface Changes

scholarly journals Prefrontal cortex activation supports the emergence of early stone age toolmaking skill

NeuroImage ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 199 ◽  
pp. 57-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shelby S.J. Putt ◽  
Sobanawartiny Wijeakumar ◽  
John P. Spencer
Keyword(s):  
Prefrontal Cortex ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Early Stone Age

Production and use of percussive stone tools in the Early Stone Age: Experimental approach to the lithic record of Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania

2015 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 367-383 ◽  
Author(s):  
Policarpo Sánchez Yustos ◽  
Fernando Diez-Martín ◽  
Isabel M. Díaz ◽  
Javier Duque ◽  
Cristina Fraile ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Approach ◽  
Stone Tools ◽  
Olduvai Gorge ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Early Stone Age

The Early Stone Age of the Nomos of Preveza: Landscape and Settlement

2003 ◽  
Vol 32 ◽  
pp. 47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Curtis N. Runnels ◽  
Tjeerd H. van Andel
Keyword(s):  
Stone Age ◽  
Early Stone Age
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