Cumbrian erratic dispersal (Stephen Briggs)
I should have thought it was a no-brainer that erratics would have been used as raw materials for tool making back in the Neolithic -- but apparently there has been quite a lot of fuss about this in "lithic" circles. This paper by Stephen Briggs lays out some of the arguments from both sides, and highlights some of the rather nasty animosities too:
There are many theories explaining later prehistoric 'trade' and 'exchange systems' in stone artefacts. Evidence matching the petrographic information of transported implements with the country rock (local bedrock) where 'factories' produced flaked stone axes is felt to be compelling. Consequently, across Europe it is widely believed that the only way 'factory' rock could have reached the places where artefacts have been found was by human carriage. The discovery of implement working floors, or 'factories' in montane areas (c. 1900-1970) on primary exposures of stone, lithologically almost identical to polished axes found considerable distances from them, has led to a belief in the industrial, economic or social processing and carriage of finished products. There are caveats to this proof of evidence, however. Natural processes constantly redistribute incalculable numbers of durable erratic pebble- to boulder-sized clasts, so why could these not have been used for making prehistoric artefacts? There is abundant evidence in the archaeological record that artefacts were crafted from such material. And although there is now an archive of petrographic thin-sections available to help to identify the origins of the artefacts, no comparable data are available on re-cycled stone. Implement provenancing is therefore unlikely to be of lasting scientific value until investigative programmes have accumulated far more accurate petrographic data on pebbles and erratics from superficial deposits. Comparisons between some British-Irish implement distribution patterns with those of glacial erratics suggests the available evidence already better fits an interpretation of deterministic and opportunistic stone procurement rather than one involving long-distance travel by prehistoric peoples. Extensive, long-term sampling and provenancing programmes are now needed to address this requirement.
It's interesting that in some quarters it has been deemed perfectly OK to say that tools were made from "destroyed Stonehenge orthostats" but that tools would not have been made from erratics of suitable rock found lying about in the countryside. In other words, Stonehenge orthostats would have had high value, and scattered erratics would not. At the heart of the debate is Stephen's contention that Neolithic toolmakers were involved in the "opportunistic" rather than the "deterministic" use of stone. In the latter scenario tool-makers would have targetted certain rock-types and maybe used quarries to find the perfect stones that they needed. (That belief of course lies at the heart of the bluestone debate.) Clearly there is a huge difference (in the minds of archaeologists) between a society of utilitarian or opportunistic tool-makers and one in which certain stone types were targetted because they were deemed special -- or even sacred! A relatively primitive and adaptable society on the one hand, and on the other a society in which there were high and low value items, sacred places and a degree of societal stratification. The stone age artisan versus the sophisticated tribal specialist who had a status attached to his skill level in the working of stone.
As an extension of the idea that Neolithic tool makers had a "deterministic" strategy, it helps if you can demonstrate that their tribal society was capable of creating a landscape full of ritual features which marked it out as being more "advanced" or sophisticated than neighbouring landscapes. This is what lies behind MPP's insistence that the Mynydd Preseli area was one of the great cultural centres of western Britain.......... But it's a circular argument. Because there were quarries and lost circles and so forth, that shows the local tribal society was quite advanced compared with others. And because society was quite advanced, it should come as no surprise that there were sacred places, quarries and stone circles. In my view it's all nonsense. The density of ritual or sacred features in the landscape here is interesting, of course, but no greater than anywhere else in SW Wales, as pointed out by Figgis and many other archaeologists.
As an extension of the idea that Neolithic tool makers had a "deterministic" strategy, it helps if you can demonstrate that their tribal society was capable of creating a landscape full of ritual features which marked it out as being more "advanced" or sophisticated than neighbouring landscapes. This is what lies behind MPP's insistence that the Mynydd Preseli area was one of the great cultural centres of western Britain.......... But it's a circular argument. Because there were quarries and lost circles and so forth, that shows the local tribal society was quite advanced compared with others. And because society was quite advanced, it should come as no surprise that there were sacred places, quarries and stone circles. In my view it's all nonsense. The density of ritual or sacred features in the landscape here is interesting, of course, but no greater than anywhere else in SW Wales, as pointed out by Figgis and many other archaeologists.
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Geochemical provenancing of igneous glacial erratics from Southern Britain, and implications for prehistoric stone implement distributions
Olwen Williams-Thorpe, Don Aldiss, Ian J. Rigby, Richard S. Thorpe
First published: 22 February 1999
Another influential article on a similar topic is this one. Sadly, it's stuck behind another of those wretched paywalls.
Olwen Williams-Thorpe, Don Aldiss, Ian J. Rigby, Richard S. Thorpe
First published: 22 February 1999
https://doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1520-6548(199903)14:3<209::AID-GEA1>3.0.CO;2-7
Abstract
Sixteen basic and intermediate composition igneous glacial erratics from Anglian (pre-423,000 years) deposits in Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire, southern Britain, were selected for chemical and petrographic analysis in order to determine their original source outcrops. Major and trace element compositions suggest that seven samples (plus two uncertain) originated in the Lower Carboniferous volcanics of the Scottish Midland Valley (SMV), four came from the Upper Carboniferous quartz dolerite association which crops out in Scotland, northern England (Whin Sill) and extends to Norway, and one came from the northern England Cleveland Dyke. One sample of altered dolerite is ambiguous but has some similarity to the Old Red Sandstone (Devonian) age lavas of the SMV, and one meta-basalt sample may be from southwest Scotland or Scandinavia. These results identify specific outcrops which provided glacial erratics within currently accepted ice trails in the United Kingdom, and provide the first supporting evidence based on geochemistry, rather than petrography, for these ice movements. The distribution and provenance of glacial erratics are of importance in archaeological studies, because erratics provided a potential source of raw material for stone implement production. There is a marked geographical correlation between the distribution of prehistoric stone implements of quartz dolerite in the United Kingdom, and directions of ice movements from quartz dolerite outcrops within Britain. This correlation lends support to the hypothesis that prehistoric man made extensive use of glacial erratics for implement manufacture, as an alternative to quarrying at outcrops and subsequent long-distance trade.
Abstract
Sixteen basic and intermediate composition igneous glacial erratics from Anglian (pre-423,000 years) deposits in Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire, southern Britain, were selected for chemical and petrographic analysis in order to determine their original source outcrops. Major and trace element compositions suggest that seven samples (plus two uncertain) originated in the Lower Carboniferous volcanics of the Scottish Midland Valley (SMV), four came from the Upper Carboniferous quartz dolerite association which crops out in Scotland, northern England (Whin Sill) and extends to Norway, and one came from the northern England Cleveland Dyke. One sample of altered dolerite is ambiguous but has some similarity to the Old Red Sandstone (Devonian) age lavas of the SMV, and one meta-basalt sample may be from southwest Scotland or Scandinavia. These results identify specific outcrops which provided glacial erratics within currently accepted ice trails in the United Kingdom, and provide the first supporting evidence based on geochemistry, rather than petrography, for these ice movements. The distribution and provenance of glacial erratics are of importance in archaeological studies, because erratics provided a potential source of raw material for stone implement production. There is a marked geographical correlation between the distribution of prehistoric stone implements of quartz dolerite in the United Kingdom, and directions of ice movements from quartz dolerite outcrops within Britain. This correlation lends support to the hypothesis that prehistoric man made extensive use of glacial erratics for implement manufacture, as an alternative to quarrying at outcrops and subsequent long-distance trade.
1 comment:
Stephen Briggs also wrote in a journal "Does archaeology need ethical publishing?"
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