This book explores new approaches to the remarkably detailed information that archaeologists now have for the study of our early ancestors. Rather than explaining the archaeology of stones and bones as the product of group decisions, the contributors investigate how individual action created social life. This challenge to the accepted standpoint of the Palaeolithic brings new models and theories into the period; innovations that are matched by the resolution of data preserving individual action among the stones and bones. The volume brings together examples from recent excavations such as Boxgrove, Schöningen and Blombos Cave and the analyses of artefacts from Middle and Early Upper Pleistocene excavations in Europe, Africa and Asia.
Author(s): Clive Gamble, Martin Porr
Edition: 1
Publisher: Routledge
Year: 2005
Language: English
Pages: 347
Book Cover......Page 1
Title......Page 4
Copyright......Page 5
Contents......Page 6
List of figures......Page 8
List of tables......Page 12
List of contributors......Page 14
Preface......Page 20
1 From empty spaces to lived lives exploring the individual in the Palaeolithic......Page 22
2 The Acheulean and the handaxe structure and agency in the Palaeolithic......Page 34
3 Transformations in dividuality personhood and palaeoliths in the Middle Pleistocene......Page 50
4 Seeking the Palaeolithic individual in East Africa and Europe during the Lower Middle Pleistocene......Page 71
5 The making of the biface and the making of the individual......Page 89
6 Observations on the relationship between Palaeolithic individuals and artefact scatters at the Middle Pleistocene site of Boxgrove UK......Page 102
7 The natural and socio cultural environment of Homo erectus at Bilzingsleben Germany......Page 119
8 The Lower Palaeolithic art of hunting the case of Schöningen 13 II 4 Lower Saxony Germany......Page 136
9 Tracking hominins during the last interglacial complex in the Rhineland......Page 154
10 Bones and powerful individuals faunal case studies from the Arctic and the European Middle Palaeolithic......Page 175
11 All in a day’s work Middle Pleistocene individuals materiality and the lifespace at Makapansgat South Africa......Page 197
12 Life and mind in the Acheulean a case study from India......Page 218
13 Individuals among palimpsest data fluvial landscapes in Southern England......Page 241
14 Being modern in the Middle Stone Age individuals and innovation......Page 265
15 Concluding remarks context and the individual......Page 286
Bibliography......Page 292
Index......Page 331
