Pressure flaking to produce microblades was first identified in Siberia by J. Flenniken (1987) and has been suggested for most of the Paleolithic microblade material from northeast Asia and North America. However, different modes for the... more
Pressure flaking to produce microblades was first identified in Siberia by J. Flenniken (1987) and has been suggested for most of the Paleolithic microblade material from northeast Asia and North America. However, different modes for the removal by pressure flaking of blades and microblades to reproduce various archaeological results have been proposed by J. Pelegrin, and these vary widely in size, from small microblades to very large blades. My purpose in this chapter is to apply his experimental data and results to the Diuktai Cave microblade assemblage to identify different modes of pressure flaking utilized at the site, or at least to propose arguments in favor or against them. This reevaluation of the Diuktai Cave microblade assemblage (Sakha Republic, eastern Siberia) and its relationship with other microblade sites of eastern Siberia is based on firsthand research on Siberian Late Paleolithic microblade sites carried out in Yakutsk and Magadan in the spring of 2007.
Nogahabara I is a late Pleistocene age archaeological site located in interior northwestern Alaska. In contrast to most archaeological assemblages left by mobile hunter-gatherers, which consist largely of manufacturing debris and a few... more
Nogahabara I is a late Pleistocene age archaeological site located in interior northwestern Alaska. In contrast to most archaeological assemblages left by mobile hunter-gatherers, which consist largely of manufacturing debris and a few worn or broken tools, the site contains 267 largely whole, useful tools, which we interpret as a lost or abandoned toolkit. As a snapshot of the tools carried by an individual or small group during an archaeological instant, the toolkit offers insights into specific technological behaviors and general processes that influence the formation of lithic assemblages. The toolkit exhibits a surprisingly wide range of tool forms and production technologies. It also shows direct archaeological evidence of transport and episodic use and maintenance of tools and cores. This evidence suggests intensive toolstone conservation that would have reduced the frequency with which toolkit depletion would have forced people to re-provision. One implication of these behaviors is that lithic assemblages left scattered across the landscape should be highly variable. Another is that there are profound differences between systemic toolkits and the archaeological assemblages from which they are derived.
