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Core, Culture and Complex in the Old Stone Age†

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

T. T. Paterson
T. T. Paterson
Affiliation:
Curator, University Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Cambridge
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Extract

A Correspondence in Man a few years ago led to the expression of various attitudes towards the nomenclature of Lower Palaeolithic finds. It was agreed that cultural names should not be used to describe distinct techniques, but it was recognised that difficulties of terminology might arise, since techniques may indicate cultural similarities and therefore perhaps connections. When the time factor enters into the problem then other authorities differ. Professor Childe says, ‘where there is the slightest danger of confusing the chronological with the cultural classification, such usage is to be deprecated.’ Yet Professor Garrod later states, ‘the time has come when the labels Lower, Middle and Upper Palaeolithic should be used exclusively in a chronological sense,’ and she refers them to subdivisions of the geological chronology. Nevertheless, as Professor Garrod herself remarks, ‘nine prehistorians out of ten continue to use these terms as more or less synonymous with hand-axe, flake and blade industries respectively,’ so these names have a purely technical or cultural significance. It follows from Professor Childe's sage advice that their chronological application ought to be allowed to fall into disuse. There is a perfectly good chronology supplied by the geologist already, with a world-wide system of five glaciations (Geikie), or their equivalents. Moreover, since it is becoming more and more apparent that the division into hand-axe, flake and blade industries is unsatisfactory (there are blades, according to Burkitt's definition of a blade, in Lower Palaeolithic industries), the threefold division has lost its meaning. I therefore suggest that we label as Lower Palaeolithic all those industries of the Pleistocene not comprised within the purely cultural group association of those predominantly blade industries which are found towards the end of the Upper Pleistocene, and are known as the Upper Palaeolithic. It is the purpose of this paper to clarify the relationship between technique and culture in the Lower Palaeolithic industries, to define more satisfactorily the terms, culture, industry and technique as used by the prehistorian, and to define some, at least, of the major cultural assemblages in North-western Europe.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society , Volume 11 , 1945 , pp. 1 - 19
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1945

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References

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page 1 note 2 Childe, V. G., Proc. Prehist. Soc., 1935, 6Google Scholar.

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page 2 note 1 Breuil, H., ‘Le Clactonien’, Prehistoire, I, fasc. 11, 1932Google Scholar.

page 2 note 2 The author considers that this is a more logical spelling than the generally accepted form, Mousterian, used elsewhere in these Proceedings.—Editor.

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page 8 note 1 The classification of the Pleistocene used in this paper is the one advocated in Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin., LX (1941), 373Google Scholar. Lower, and Middle Pleistocene are each divided into two phases, l1, and l2; m1, and m2, and Upper Pleistocene in three; u1, u2 and u3.

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page 10 note 2 The flakes are from Mr Burkitt's collection; the core, as all the other specimens drawn, is in the Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology.

page 12 note 1 Cf. Garrod, D. A. E. and Bate, D. M. A., ‘The Stone Age of Mt. Carmel’, I (Oxford, 1937)Google Scholar, pl. XXV, no. 10.

page 12 note 2 Cf. Proc. Prehist. Soc. 1937, 115Google Scholar, fig. 16, no. 5—an elementary form.

page 12 note 3 Cf. Proc. Prehist. Soc. 1937, 103Google Scholar, fig. 8, nos. 1 and 8; 230, fig. 4, nos. 8-13.

page 12 note 4 See any Moustierian industry, especially La Quina.

page 12 note 5 Cf. Peyrony, D., ‘Le Moustier’, Révue Anthropologique, 1930, fig. 12, no. 5 (see p. 31Google Scholar in offprints).

page 14 note 1 Nature, vol. 143 (1939), 822CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Proc. Prehist. Soc. 1940, 1Google Scholar.

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page 16 note 1 Cf. Weimar and Ehringsdorf industries.

page 16 note 2 Terra, H. de and Paterson, T. T., ‘Studies on the Ice Age in India, etc’. Carnegie Inst., Washington, no. 493 (1939)Google Scholar.

page 17 note 1 Harrison, H. S., ‘Evolution in Material Culture’, Rept. Brit. Ass. 1930Google Scholar.

page 17 note 2 Breuil, H., ‘Le Clactonien“, Préstoire, I, fase. 11 (1932)Google Scholar.

page 17 note 3 Ibid.

page 19 note 1 Breuil, H. and Koslowski, L., L'Anthropologie, XLI (1931)Google Scholar.