关键词: 河南南召, 余坪地点, 石核-石片技术, 旧石器时代晚期

Abstract:

The Yuping locality located at the front edge of second terrace of Songhe river, Hanjiang River Basin, Nanzhao county, Henan province, is discovered during the field survey conducted by Jilin University and Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology of Nanyang City in March year 2021. A total of 38 stone artifacts were collected from the surface and can be classified into five basic categories: Cores (n=4), flakes (n=3), chunks (n=4), retouched tools (n=22), and some blanks with obvious use wear (n=5). Quartz (n=31) was utilized as the main raw material for the production of stone artifacts, followed by sandstone, quartzite, etc. As shown by the characteristics of cores and flakes, freehand percussion was applied commonly, but bipolar technique also used to exploit some small quartz materials occasionally. All cores (n=4) with double and multiple platforms display some simple reduction methods without clear core preparation and organization. Most of the retouched tools were made on flakes. Side scrapers (n=13), unifacial points (n=4) and borers (n=2) are small in size and account for very large proportion in the toolkits, some of which were modified relatively fine. Several heavy-duty tools including chopper (n=1), chopping tool (n=1) and adze-like tool (n=1) can be identified at this site. In the meanwhile, some edges of several cores, flakes and chunks show distinct use-wear scars and can be regarded as scrapers and points. Based on the evidence from stratigraphy and lithic assemblage, we can speculate that this site belongs to the period of Upper Paleolithic. Above all, this site shares common features with the core-flake industry while also exist some regional traits, detailed analysis of which would make great sense in our understanding to the technological attributes and behavioral adaption in the transitional zone between northern and southern China.

Key words: Nanzhao County, Henan, Yuping Locality, Core-flake Industry, Upper Paleolithic