S11 CURRENT RESEARCH ON LITHIC INDUSTRY IN SOUTHEAST ASIA FROM EARLY PLEISTOCENE TO EARLY HOLOCENE: RECENT SIGNIFICATIONS, INTERPRETATIONS AND PERSPECTIVES
19June 2019, Galleria 1, 1030-1500 hours
Convener:Hubert Forestier
hubforestier@gmail.com
The study of the Early Pleistocene to Early Holocene lithic technocomplex in Southeast Asia point out a rich variability of pebble/cobble and debitage technology with different knapping methods. In this way the diachronic changes in techno-economic pattern could be connected with the resource use during palaeoenvironmental changes. Forest environment in Southeast Asia may have played an important role in these movements of ideas and technological facts through biogeographical determinism and cultural choices. The objective of this session is to highlight the diversity of lithic technocomplexes (macro-tool vs micro-tool assemblages), their particularity and to discuss their place in the time scale in prehistoric Southeast Asia.
Block 1: 1030-1200 hours
Pham Thanh Son
C.so Ercole Id'Este 32, Dipartimento di Studi Umanistici
Ferrara University, Via Borsari, 46-44121 Ferrara, Italy/
Institute of Archaeology
61 Phan Chu Trinh, Hoan Kiem district
Hanoi, Vietnam
thanhson9119@gmail.com
Ben Marwick
University of Washington Denny Hall 117
Box 353100 Seattle, WA 98195-3100 USA
Hubert Forestier
UMR 7194 MNHN CNRS, 1, rue René-Panhard, 75013
Paris, France
Eric Kelley
University of Washington
Denny Hall 117, Box 353100 Seattle, WA 98195-3100 USA
Nguyen Tien Hoa
Civil group 44 – Dong Tam ward
Yen Bai museum, Yen Bai city
Yen Bai Province, Vietnam
Hoang Van Diep
Department of Archaeology
University of Social Sciences and Humanity
Hanoi National University
336 Nguyen Trai street, Thanh Xuan district, Ha Noi city, Vietnam
Main researches of Hoa Binh culture mostly come from cave sites in South East Asia and there are many sites of this culture dated back to 30-40ka in Northern Vietnam, Thailand and Southern China. Those areas are known as main regions of occupation and expansion of Hoa Binh culture and some cave sites have been dated to 4,000BP in Vietnam. These events are coincident with the end of Hoabinhian in Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos in the mainland of Southeast Asia. In this paper, we are going to present new insights into the existence of open-air sites fluctuating from 13ka to 4ka in Vietnam and South East Asia on the methodology and technology of lithic. I place recent discoveries of open-air sites into a broader landscape combining with the main distribution of cave sites in mainland South East Asia. We are going to examine whether there was an evolution of lithic technology or the emergence of these open-air sites merely reflected a variety of lithic industries in Hoabinhian in this region. Dataset providing for this research comes from a few sites such as Mau A, Tuan Quan 1 and Huoi Ca in Northern Vietnam. Two other sites named Huay Pano in Luang Prabang, Laos and Huai Hin site in Thailand also mentioned in this paper for making comparisons.
Armand Salvador Mijares
University of the Philippines Archaeological Studies Program
armand.mijares@upd.edu.ph
Dante Manipon
Archaeological Studies Program
dantericardomanipon@gmail.com
Edilberto Larin Jr.
Bulacan State University
edilbertolarin@yahoo.com
The recent archaeological work in Biak na Bato cave sites in San Miguel Bulacan had produced a number of stone implements. The Tanggapan and Munsayac caves have shown similar cultural chronology as those reported from Peñablanca Caves in North eastern Luzon during the terminal Pleistocene to mid-Holocene periods. This paper will present the initial result from the analysis of stone implements from Biak na Bato using morphological and low power use wear analysis. This will then be compared with the flake tool analysis conducted by Mijares (2007) for the Peñablanca cave sites.
Noridayu Bakry
Centre For Global Archaeological Research
noridayubakry@gmail.com
Hsiao Mei Goh
Centre Global Archaeological Research, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia
ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, School of BEES
hmgoh@usm.my
Mokhtar Saidin
Centre Global Archaeological Research, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia
mmokh@usm.my
Zainal bin Ariffin
Department of Museum Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur
Yeng Meng Kiew
Department of Museum Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur
Kota Tampan is known as one of the key Palaeolithic open sites that contains a huge lithic workshop that extend our current understanding of the early stone tool technology in Southeast Asia. The site was excavated as early as 1938 by Collings and later re-investigated by Sieveking in 1954, Majid in 1987 and Isa in 2005. Located on an ancient lakeshore, this site was relatively dated to ~74,000ka based on the Toba tephra that found associated with the stone tools and later dated to ~70,000ka using the OSL approach. Previous investigations in Kota Tampan have revealed a huge collection of “pebble-based” stone artifacts including core, flake tools, hammerstones and anvils. However, these studies are limited to typological classification and the technological attributes of Kota Tampan lithic assemblages is still poorly understood. This project reexamines the old Kota Tampan lithic assemblages excavated by Ann Sieveking with a special focus on its attributes and stone reduction technology. Our preliminary study shows that the stone tools from Kota Tampan are mostly consisted of flake tools produced through bipolar and free-hand reduction and majority of the core stones were modified into core tools with slight retouched along the edges.
Keywords: Kota Tampan, Lenggong Valley, Palaeolithic lithic assemblages, stone reduction
Block 2: 1330-1500 hours
David Codeluppi
Birkbeck, University of London
dcodeluppi@gmail.com
The Malaysian part of Borneo is an incredible research laboratory for the comprehension of humankind’s adaptations across time. The evolution of knapping techniques is a pertinent and innovative method through which to decrypt this paleo-environmental and cultural complexity. In fact, during the Palaeolithic, a period marked by big climate phenomena, certain new techniques have helped provide responses to the environmental changes.
While considerable progress has been made in the area of paleo-environments (Abdullah, et al. 2014; Barker, et al. 2002; Louys and Meijaard 2010; Majid, et al. 1998) the cultural approach to the topic needs to be reinforced for Sabah, and Borneo more widely. Present studies do not provide a chrono-typological framework due to the persistence of certain ""simple"" systems of lithic reduction. Often overlooked, these systems need to be detailed, evaluated and prioritised in order to obtain a comparison between different sites on a similar time scale. Although the objective of this study is to highlight the diversity of technical behaviours and thus to determine differences between and within groups, it will also provide a technological approach to the lithic industries that demonstrates the way in which adaptation to the environment impacted knapping techniques.
Hubert Forestier
Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, UMR7194 CNRS-MNHN-UPVD, France
hubforestier@gmail.com
J. Kariwiga
Archaeology, School of Humanities & Social Sciences
University of Papua New Guinea
jkariwiga@gmail.com
H. Baills
MNHN, UMR 7194 CNRS-MNHN & CERPT
Tautavel, France
baills@orange.fr
R. Tsang
Archaeology, School of Humanities & Social Sciences
University of Papua New Guinea
roxtsang92@gmail.com
S. Puaud
MNHN, UMR 7194 CNRS-MNHN, France
simon.puaud@mnhn.fr
K. Miampa
National Museum and Art Gallery (Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea)
S. Plutniak
École française de Rome (Italy)
Lisst–Cers (UMR 5193, CNRS), France
sebastien.plutniak@ehess.fr
A. Kuaso
National Museum and Art Gallery (Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea)
F.-X RICAUT
CNRS EDB UMR 5174
Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse, France
francois-xavier.ricaut@univ-tlse3.fr
M.-G Leavesley
CABAH, James Cook University, Cairns, Queensland 4811, Australia
Archaeology, School of Humanities &Social Sciences, University of PNG
matthew.leavesley@gmail.com
In 2017-2018 the French Prehistoric Mission in Papua New Guinea, co-directed by F.-X. Ricaut and M. Leavesley, undertook archaeological surveys and excavations in the Paimbumkanja (PBK) rock shelter located in the upper Karawari-Arafundi region of East Sepik. Prehistoric research in the lowlands is scarce and dates back to the pioneer work of P. Gorecki and D.S. Giellieson in the late 1980s in the neighbouring valley of Jimi-Yuat. Our research at PBK uncovered an archaeological sequence dating back to the late Holocene between 2956 and 1 00 years Cal BP (1006 BC to 650 AD). Two stratigraphic units (SU1 and SU2) contained lithic industries but no faunal remains, and were separated by a layer rich in blocks.
Raw material used for knapping were mainly local: cobble quartz and quartzite from the puddingstone forming the awning of the shelter, with some rare pieces of flint, jasper and volcanic rocks.
The modalities of the knapping process follow a “chaîne opératoire” associating debitage and shaping. Debitage is better represented; the objective was to produce artifacts preferentially narrow and elongated, resembling blades or small blades with or without utilized flake. Knapping on pebbles is relatively frequent with some macro-tools (e.g. choppers). A specific bifacial tool (chisel) made in exogenous volcanic rock with a transversal bevel was found.
Human occupation in the PBK rock shelter is included in the recent Holocene chrono-sequence proposed in 1989 by P. Gorecki and D.S. Giellieson. This confirms flake production associated to macro-tools from 3000 years BP in the Sepik lowlands.
Marine Benoit
University of Western Australia
marine.benoit@research.uwa.edu.au
Questions about possible links between South East Asia and Australia have often been raised in Indo-pacific archaeology. Links have been attested on two occasions: the initial colonisation of the Sahul and the recent contact between Australian indigenous populations and Macassan fishermen on the Kimberley and Arnhem Land coasts. Previous hypotheses regarding contact between SEA and mainland Australia have been made for the mid-Holocene period, at the dingo’s arrival and (microlithic) Small Tool tradition’ appearance (STT). Similarities between Australian STT and Toalian lithic industries have been noted by some researchers. But such hypotheses are not currently investigated. Current studies on Australian lithic assemblages give adaptations to altering climatic conditions and changes in social networks dynamics within Australia as leading causes for lithic industries changes. These quantitative lithic studies also show both a blank standardisation and the appearance of points in Kimberley and Arnhem Land during the mid-Holocene. However, the nature of knapping operations leading to lithic artefacts production has not been documented. This paper will describe the results obtained with the chaîne opératoire approach on recently excavated mid-Holocene assemblages from the North East Kimberley. I will show that microlithic production has been a part of mid-Holocene changes in lithic industries in this region. I will also depict how the mid-Holocene lithic industries are exhibiting temporal variations both in the techniques used and the artefacts produced. I therefore hope to offer a finer depiction of lithic industries changes in North West Australia and provide a basis for further comparisons between Indo-Pacific region’s lithic industries.
Convener:Hubert Forestier
hubforestier@gmail.com
The study of the Early Pleistocene to Early Holocene lithic technocomplex in Southeast Asia point out a rich variability of pebble/cobble and debitage technology with different knapping methods. In this way the diachronic changes in techno-economic pattern could be connected with the resource use during palaeoenvironmental changes. Forest environment in Southeast Asia may have played an important role in these movements of ideas and technological facts through biogeographical determinism and cultural choices. The objective of this session is to highlight the diversity of lithic technocomplexes (macro-tool vs micro-tool assemblages), their particularity and to discuss their place in the time scale in prehistoric Southeast Asia.
Block 1: 1030-1200 hours
The presence of systematic open-air sites of Hoa Binh culture during Terminal Pleistocene and Holocene in Vietnam and mainland of South East Asia
Pham Thanh Son
C.so Ercole Id'Este 32, Dipartimento di Studi Umanistici
Ferrara University, Via Borsari, 46-44121 Ferrara, Italy/
Institute of Archaeology
61 Phan Chu Trinh, Hoan Kiem district
Hanoi, Vietnam
thanhson9119@gmail.com
Ben Marwick
University of Washington Denny Hall 117
Box 353100 Seattle, WA 98195-3100 USA
Hubert Forestier
UMR 7194 MNHN CNRS, 1, rue René-Panhard, 75013
Paris, France
Eric Kelley
University of Washington
Denny Hall 117, Box 353100 Seattle, WA 98195-3100 USA
Nguyen Tien Hoa
Civil group 44 – Dong Tam ward
Yen Bai museum, Yen Bai city
Yen Bai Province, Vietnam
Hoang Van Diep
Department of Archaeology
University of Social Sciences and Humanity
Hanoi National University
336 Nguyen Trai street, Thanh Xuan district, Ha Noi city, Vietnam
Main researches of Hoa Binh culture mostly come from cave sites in South East Asia and there are many sites of this culture dated back to 30-40ka in Northern Vietnam, Thailand and Southern China. Those areas are known as main regions of occupation and expansion of Hoa Binh culture and some cave sites have been dated to 4,000BP in Vietnam. These events are coincident with the end of Hoabinhian in Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos in the mainland of Southeast Asia. In this paper, we are going to present new insights into the existence of open-air sites fluctuating from 13ka to 4ka in Vietnam and South East Asia on the methodology and technology of lithic. I place recent discoveries of open-air sites into a broader landscape combining with the main distribution of cave sites in mainland South East Asia. We are going to examine whether there was an evolution of lithic technology or the emergence of these open-air sites merely reflected a variety of lithic industries in Hoabinhian in this region. Dataset providing for this research comes from a few sites such as Mau A, Tuan Quan 1 and Huoi Ca in Northern Vietnam. Two other sites named Huay Pano in Luang Prabang, Laos and Huai Hin site in Thailand also mentioned in this paper for making comparisons.
Is it the same? Comparative Analysis of Biak na Bato Flakes with the Peñablanca Flakes
Armand Salvador Mijares
University of the Philippines Archaeological Studies Program
armand.mijares@upd.edu.ph
Dante Manipon
Archaeological Studies Program
dantericardomanipon@gmail.com
Edilberto Larin Jr.
Bulacan State University
edilbertolarin@yahoo.com
The recent archaeological work in Biak na Bato cave sites in San Miguel Bulacan had produced a number of stone implements. The Tanggapan and Munsayac caves have shown similar cultural chronology as those reported from Peñablanca Caves in North eastern Luzon during the terminal Pleistocene to mid-Holocene periods. This paper will present the initial result from the analysis of stone implements from Biak na Bato using morphological and low power use wear analysis. This will then be compared with the flake tool analysis conducted by Mijares (2007) for the Peñablanca cave sites.
The Kota Tampan Lithic Assemblage Revisited: Attributes and Technology
Noridayu Bakry
Centre For Global Archaeological Research
noridayubakry@gmail.com
Hsiao Mei Goh
Centre Global Archaeological Research, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia
ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, School of BEES
hmgoh@usm.my
Mokhtar Saidin
Centre Global Archaeological Research, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia
mmokh@usm.my
Zainal bin Ariffin
Department of Museum Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur
Yeng Meng Kiew
Department of Museum Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur
Kota Tampan is known as one of the key Palaeolithic open sites that contains a huge lithic workshop that extend our current understanding of the early stone tool technology in Southeast Asia. The site was excavated as early as 1938 by Collings and later re-investigated by Sieveking in 1954, Majid in 1987 and Isa in 2005. Located on an ancient lakeshore, this site was relatively dated to ~74,000ka based on the Toba tephra that found associated with the stone tools and later dated to ~70,000ka using the OSL approach. Previous investigations in Kota Tampan have revealed a huge collection of “pebble-based” stone artifacts including core, flake tools, hammerstones and anvils. However, these studies are limited to typological classification and the technological attributes of Kota Tampan lithic assemblages is still poorly understood. This project reexamines the old Kota Tampan lithic assemblages excavated by Ann Sieveking with a special focus on its attributes and stone reduction technology. Our preliminary study shows that the stone tools from Kota Tampan are mostly consisted of flake tools produced through bipolar and free-hand reduction and majority of the core stones were modified into core tools with slight retouched along the edges.
Keywords: Kota Tampan, Lenggong Valley, Palaeolithic lithic assemblages, stone reduction
Block 2: 1330-1500 hours
To what extent did geographic determinants and cultural choices influence lithic technology systems? Presentation of the methodology chosen on the lithic assemblages from Sabah (Borneo)
David Codeluppi
Birkbeck, University of London
dcodeluppi@gmail.com
The Malaysian part of Borneo is an incredible research laboratory for the comprehension of humankind’s adaptations across time. The evolution of knapping techniques is a pertinent and innovative method through which to decrypt this paleo-environmental and cultural complexity. In fact, during the Palaeolithic, a period marked by big climate phenomena, certain new techniques have helped provide responses to the environmental changes.
While considerable progress has been made in the area of paleo-environments (Abdullah, et al. 2014; Barker, et al. 2002; Louys and Meijaard 2010; Majid, et al. 1998) the cultural approach to the topic needs to be reinforced for Sabah, and Borneo more widely. Present studies do not provide a chrono-typological framework due to the persistence of certain ""simple"" systems of lithic reduction. Often overlooked, these systems need to be detailed, evaluated and prioritised in order to obtain a comparison between different sites on a similar time scale. Although the objective of this study is to highlight the diversity of technical behaviours and thus to determine differences between and within groups, it will also provide a technological approach to the lithic industries that demonstrates the way in which adaptation to the environment impacted knapping techniques.
Thirty years after P. Gorecki and D.S. Giellieson in Papua New Guinea: New data on the Holocene settlement of East Sepik, upper Karawari-Arafundi region
Hubert Forestier
Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, UMR7194 CNRS-MNHN-UPVD, France
hubforestier@gmail.com
J. Kariwiga
Archaeology, School of Humanities & Social Sciences
University of Papua New Guinea
jkariwiga@gmail.com
H. Baills
MNHN, UMR 7194 CNRS-MNHN & CERPT
Tautavel, France
baills@orange.fr
R. Tsang
Archaeology, School of Humanities & Social Sciences
University of Papua New Guinea
roxtsang92@gmail.com
S. Puaud
MNHN, UMR 7194 CNRS-MNHN, France
simon.puaud@mnhn.fr
K. Miampa
National Museum and Art Gallery (Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea)
S. Plutniak
École française de Rome (Italy)
Lisst–Cers (UMR 5193, CNRS), France
sebastien.plutniak@ehess.fr
A. Kuaso
National Museum and Art Gallery (Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea)
F.-X RICAUT
CNRS EDB UMR 5174
Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse, France
francois-xavier.ricaut@univ-tlse3.fr
M.-G Leavesley
CABAH, James Cook University, Cairns, Queensland 4811, Australia
Archaeology, School of Humanities &Social Sciences, University of PNG
matthew.leavesley@gmail.com
In 2017-2018 the French Prehistoric Mission in Papua New Guinea, co-directed by F.-X. Ricaut and M. Leavesley, undertook archaeological surveys and excavations in the Paimbumkanja (PBK) rock shelter located in the upper Karawari-Arafundi region of East Sepik. Prehistoric research in the lowlands is scarce and dates back to the pioneer work of P. Gorecki and D.S. Giellieson in the late 1980s in the neighbouring valley of Jimi-Yuat. Our research at PBK uncovered an archaeological sequence dating back to the late Holocene between 2956 and 1 00 years Cal BP (1006 BC to 650 AD). Two stratigraphic units (SU1 and SU2) contained lithic industries but no faunal remains, and were separated by a layer rich in blocks.
Raw material used for knapping were mainly local: cobble quartz and quartzite from the puddingstone forming the awning of the shelter, with some rare pieces of flint, jasper and volcanic rocks.
The modalities of the knapping process follow a “chaîne opératoire” associating debitage and shaping. Debitage is better represented; the objective was to produce artifacts preferentially narrow and elongated, resembling blades or small blades with or without utilized flake. Knapping on pebbles is relatively frequent with some macro-tools (e.g. choppers). A specific bifacial tool (chisel) made in exogenous volcanic rock with a transversal bevel was found.
Human occupation in the PBK rock shelter is included in the recent Holocene chrono-sequence proposed in 1989 by P. Gorecki and D.S. Giellieson. This confirms flake production associated to macro-tools from 3000 years BP in the Sepik lowlands.
Insights into mid-Holocene changes in North tropical Australia: the case of North East Kimberley lithic industries
Marine Benoit
University of Western Australia
marine.benoit@research.uwa.edu.au
Questions about possible links between South East Asia and Australia have often been raised in Indo-pacific archaeology. Links have been attested on two occasions: the initial colonisation of the Sahul and the recent contact between Australian indigenous populations and Macassan fishermen on the Kimberley and Arnhem Land coasts. Previous hypotheses regarding contact between SEA and mainland Australia have been made for the mid-Holocene period, at the dingo’s arrival and (microlithic) Small Tool tradition’ appearance (STT). Similarities between Australian STT and Toalian lithic industries have been noted by some researchers. But such hypotheses are not currently investigated. Current studies on Australian lithic assemblages give adaptations to altering climatic conditions and changes in social networks dynamics within Australia as leading causes for lithic industries changes. These quantitative lithic studies also show both a blank standardisation and the appearance of points in Kimberley and Arnhem Land during the mid-Holocene. However, the nature of knapping operations leading to lithic artefacts production has not been documented. This paper will describe the results obtained with the chaîne opératoire approach on recently excavated mid-Holocene assemblages from the North East Kimberley. I will show that microlithic production has been a part of mid-Holocene changes in lithic industries in this region. I will also depict how the mid-Holocene lithic industries are exhibiting temporal variations both in the techniques used and the artefacts produced. I therefore hope to offer a finer depiction of lithic industries changes in North West Australia and provide a basis for further comparisons between Indo-Pacific region’s lithic industries.
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