Palaeolithic hunting technology

Principal investigator

Veerle ROTS

Collaborators

Justin COPPE

Funding

Fonds de la Recherche scientifique - FNRS

Years

2020-2023

Summary

The appearance of projectile technology used in hunting is a major innovation in human behavioural evolution. Stone points are iconic and often assumed to be projectiles, but a stone point does not equal a projectile. It has been demonstrated that detailed macro- and microscopic examination of stone tools allows determining their use and hafting. Identifying hunting weapons in archaeological assemblages is fundamental, but also needs to include how they were used and how they changed through time. This is now possible thanks to a new methodology developed within the EVO-HAFT ERC project. The goal of this project is to build onto these successful results and gain insight in Palaeolithic hunting technology among Neanderthals and (early) modern humans based on a systematic functional analysis of key archaeological sites in Europe within an integrated perspective that permits a link between stone tool technology, tool use, weapon design and hunting technique.