The Emergence of Human Complex Abilities

University Of Colorado At Boulder, Boulder CO

Investigators

Abstract

This research concerns early human culture and the implications of early bone tools for assessing human cognitive abilities. Worked bone tools are considered among the important features characterizing modern human behavior. In Europe complex bone technologies are characteristics of the Upper Paleolithic which began about 40,000 years ago. Bone tools were made with techniques specifically adapted to bone materials such as scraping, grinding and polishing and a wide range of shapes and functions (split-base points, bone handles, spear-throwers, points, harpoons). The bone technology of earlier "pre-modern" humans is said to be simpler and involving a lower degree of conceptualization than Upper Paleolithic tools. Limb bones used as hammers and scrapers for the manufacture of stone tools are known from European sites as old as 500, 000 years ago. Just a few pieces show evidence of shaping by flaking and fully shaped tools are even rarer. The goal of this research is to understand in greater detail the processes by which they were made. This research will not only further basic knowledge regarding the human past but also further international scientific collaboration. The research involves close collaboration by members of an international team. Multiple tools made by flaking elephant long bones of symmetrical shape have been described in four sites in Latium (Italy) dated between 400,000 and 300,000 years ago. The manufacturing technique used was the same technique used in knapping stone artifacts. This transfer of techniques from stones to bone is taken as an indication that pre-modern humans were incapable of creative thinking. An important aspect of early bone technology is about the criteria used to correctly identify tools since various natural processes can produce mimics of man-made tools. This project will carry out a technological and taphonomic analysis of all the bone and stone tools from the assemblage of Castel di Guido dated to about 400,000 years ago. Many pieces classed as tools present only a limited amount of modification that is not distinctive enough to remove doubts about their intentionality. Analysis will be directed to the elimination of ambiguities in the identification of flaked bone artifacts by using features characteristic of stone artifacts. The fact that recent advances in dating suggest that the four sites in Latium are closer in time than expected invite a question: do these occurrences of flaked bone artifacts so common in the Latium region represent a genuine regional tradition, reflecting a set of socially transmitted habits between groups in the same region? This would run counter to the conventional idea that pre-modern culture was static and homogeneous over its large geographic extent and long periods. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.