Dylan JONES

Title

Stone tool use in hominin populations at the edge of the Pleistocene world: a functional approach to MIS11 assemblages in Britain

Co-supervisors

Prof. L. BARHAM (University of Liverpool, UK)

J. GOWLETT (University of Liverpool, UK)

Summary

Dylan Jones is a current PhD research student at the University of Liverpool under the supervision of Professor John Gowlett, Professor Larry Barham, and Dr Veerle Rots (ULiège). Dylan’s research aims to compare and contrast stone tool functions amongst assemblages from MIS11 Britain. Stone tool assemblages from East and Southern England from this time vary greatly in their composition of handaxes. This variation has been used to recognise two contemporary traditions of tool-making in the region. One tradition is recognised by symmetrical, bifacially shaped tools of the Acheulean Industry (handaxes) and the other, by the absence of handaxes and stone flake dominated toolkits of the Clactonian Industry. Use-wear analysis will be used to address a long-running debate about the behavioural significance of these two traditions of tool-making in the region, by comparing the use of handaxes and flake tools within and between these assemblages. The debate has revolved around the hypothesis that the two traditions represent different coexisting cultural groups, as opposed to functionally different tools in the repertoire of a single cultural tradition. Functional analyses offer a means of resolving this ongoing debate, whilst simultaneously contributing information about site use, and the role of technology in hominin adaptations to northern habitats in the Middle Pleistocene.