Table of Content

15 December 2006, Volume 25 Issue 04

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Restoration of the Nanjing 2 fossil hominid calvarium: morphology and taxonomic implications

ZHANG Yinyun, LIU Wu

2006, 25(04):  267-275. 

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The Nanjing 2 calvarium is believed to represent Homo sapiens erectus since its discovery in 1993. This calvarium preserves incomplete frontal, parietal, and occipital bones. The parietal and occipital bones are cracked and as their fragments are displaced the calvarium appears to be distorted. The calvarium was recently restored by the authors, exposing some anatomical details that had previously been obscured. Compared with Homo sapiens erectus, the restored calvarium presents larger parietal bones, a relatively narrow upper scale of occipital bone and a probable larger cranial capacity, which suggests affinities with Homo sapiens sapiens. Other anatomical details observed in the parietal and occipital bones are examined in this paper including the angular torus, parietal border of temporal squamous part, the occipital torus, the angle between the occipital and nuchal planes, the distance between inion and endinion, cranial vault thickness, the branches of the middle meningeal artery and the coronal contour of the vault. The results of this examination reveal that there must be some uncertainty in referring the Nanjing 2 calvarium to Homo sapiens erectus. It is more likely that the Nanjing 2 belongs to Homo sapiens sapiens.

A research on the ancient human skulls from Jiangjungou Cemetery in Helingeper County, Inner Mongolian

ZHANG Quanchao, CAO Jianen, ZHU Hong

2006, 25(04):  276-284. 

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In this article, fourteen ancient human s ulls ( 11 male, 3 female) unearthed from the Warring states period cemetery at the Jiangjungou site in Helingeper county, Inner Mongolian were studied. The morphological features of Jiangjungou crania show that the racial type is closely related to the modern East Asiatic Mongoloids, but some physical characteristics of these skulls are closer to those in the ancient Central Plain Region nationality population and the modern Huabei population.

A study on the stone artifacts from the Orient Plaza site of Beijing

FENG Xingwu , LI Chaorong , YU Jincheng

2006, 25(04):  285-298. 

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The Orient Plaza site near Wangfujing Street in Beijing was discovered at the end of 1996 and excavated during the following eight months. Two cultural horizons were identified from the fluvial-lacustrine sediments. More than 2000 cultural relics were unearthed from the site, including stone and bone artifacts, fossils, hematite powder, fire use remains, and plant root and foliage. A total of 1098 stone artifacts were collected from the site, Among them, 1027 were from the lower cultural horizon and 71 pieces from the upper cultural horizon. The stone assemblage consists of hammers, anvils, chunks, cores, flakes, and formal tools including scrapers, points, burins and borers.
The general characteristics of the stone assemablge are as follows:
1) Stone artifacts from both horizons have similar features in raw materials, types and technology, so they should belong to one industrial tradition.
2) Most stone artifacts are made on black fine chert pebbles, and account for more than 99 % of all stone pieces.
3) Most of the stone artifacts are small, under 50 mm in length.
4) Flakes of many types (ones with natural platforms, scarred platform, etc.) dominate the stone assemblage.
5) Scrapers especially single2edged ones dominate the assemblage. Burins are in the second place, especially single2edged ones. Retouch is common.
6) Direct hammer method was used to produce the flakes, with the bipolar method being used occasionally. It is thought that the direct hammer method was used to retouch the tools.
The assemblage of the Orient Plaza site is similar to that of the Late Paleolithic sites of North China where flakes and flake tools are predominant. By comparing these artifacts with Early and Middle Paleolithic sites in this region, we believe that this stone assemblage belongs to the small stone tool tradition that prevailed throughout the Paleolithic Age of North China.

The late paleolithic localities at Meigou and Weidipo in the Nihewan Basin

MEI Huijie

2006, 25(04):  299-307. 

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Meigou and Weidipo Paleolithic localities are situated respectively near Xishuidi and Hutouliang Villages in the central part of the Nihewan Basin，Yangyuan County，HebeiProvince．The cultural remains lie in the second terrace of the Sangganhe River．Both of the sections include two major parts of cultural remains．The upper is the Hutouliang mierolithie cultural layer．From the lower part of the two localities a total of 57 stone artifacts analyze din this report were unearth edduring the tentative excavation in 1998 and 1999．They were buried above the bottom gravel layers of the tarrace．Based on geomorphology an d relative dating results，the ag e ofthe artifactsshould be estimated to range from 18 to 14Ka BP，i．e．thelate UpperPleistocene．
Among the seven kinds of raw material utilized at the localities chert is the main one for producingtools，and vein quartz plays an important role．Agatetuf and quartzite，etc．werealsoused． The implementsare mostly side-scrapers ．Th e general featuers oftheseartifactsshow thatthey beara strong resemblance to those of Locality Xibaimaying．Furthermore，no microlithic technique factors were found among the sediscoveries．Thus it is considered that they belong to the traditional small flake tool industry in North China and are different from those ofthe micro blade one．
Though the two kinds ofcultural layers namely microblade and smallflake．Tool industries lie together in the same section at Meigouand Weidipo localitie sand are dated to the approximate period， the technological difference between them is notable．It is supposed that the future excavati on and further study of this kind of cultural remains may provide new lights on the relationship of the Upper Paleolithic cultures，especially on the origin of the Hutouliang microlithic culture characterized mainly bywedge-shaped microcoresin the Nihewan Basin and North China．

A study of the stone artifacts from Yang-an-du, a late neolithic site in the three gorges region

CHEN Fuyou , FEN G Xingwu , GAO Xing, YAO Jiong, WU Yongjian

2006, 25(04):  309-322. 

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The Yang2an2du site (31°01′43″N, 109°30′24″E) is situated in Fengjie County, Three Gorges Region, and was discovered in 1994 and excavated in 2000. The site was buried in the second terrace of the Yangtze River. According to pottery stylistic [ do you want to use this word ?] research, this site belongs to the Daxi Neolithic Culture, with an absolute date of 5 ka BP.
A total of 616 stone artifacts were unearthed from this site, including hammerstones (6), cores(13), flakes (335), chunks (59), fragments (132), choppers (9), scrapers (32), chipped axes (17), polished axes (3), millstones (5), and polished pebbles (5). Raw materials exploited at this site were pebbles selected from riverbeds, of which more than 80 percent were silicarenite. [ check spelling].
The main flaking technique used at the site was a particular“throwing against anvil”approach, which can produce abundant null-platform flakes easily. Null-platform flakes are the most important kinds of whole flakes. [ I do not quite understand this last sentence ].
There are two kinds of stone tools that coexisted at the site: chipped stone tools and polished stone tools, with the number of chipped stone tools being greater than polished stone tools. In fact, polished stone tools only include three polished axes and five millstones , which were all broken. Choppers and scrapers are smiliar to types in Paleolithic sites, but the chipped axe is a particular kind of chipped stone tool, which is direct ;y associated with the production of polished axes. Although the site is dated to the late Neolithic, the chipped stone tools were still imported.

Preliminary report on paleoliths from Xixia, Henan Province

PEI Shuwen, SONG Guoding

2006, 25(04):  323-331. 

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This report presents the results of Paleolithic reconnaissance conducted in Xixia, Henan province in June, 2005 by the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Cultural Relics and Archeology of Henan Province. Some eight Paleolithic sites distributed in Paimaling, Fengshan and Yanggang and more than 40 lithic artifacts and few mammalian fragments were discovered. Four fluvial terraces were recognized along the Laoguanhe river around Xiaxia town, and lithic artifacts were found from T3. The stone assemblage includes cores, flakes, chunks and tools. Raw materials for stone making were collected from ancient riverbeds, which included quartz, quartzite, tuff and siltstone, etc. but quartz is the predominant type. The principal flaking technique is direct hammer percussion, but bipolar technique is also used. Most lithic artifacts are middle and large in size. Scrapers are the main tool type, followed by cleavers and spheroids. Modified tools appear to be retouched by simple direct hammer percussion on the flake blank edges. The lithic assemblage not only has the features of the pebble industry in South China, but also shows close tie with the flake industry of North China. Geomorphologic and stratigraphic comparison suggests a Middle Pleistocene date for this assemblage.

Cleavers collected from the Open-air sites in Luonan Basin，China

WANG Shejiang

2006, 25(04):  332-342. 

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Like the presence ot hand—axes，cleavers in the Luonan Basin，ShaanxiProvince．also challenge many of the preconceived ideas about the distribution of Acheulian technology"．Many questions remain．particularly over an accepted definition of cleavers and whether or not there aI “ real” cleavers in Pleistocene China compared to western parts ofthe Old Continents． This article focuses on the definition of cleavers in order to identify this kind of tool found in China．
On the basis of the definition by Tixier(1956)，a cleaver should be a kind of tool that it is invariably aflake tool with a transver secutting edge atthe distalend．Generally this cutting edge is natural orin other words the distal cutting edge is unmodified by intentional retouch and the side edges and proximal end is usually bifacially produced by convergence surfaces．Based on this definition，119 cleavers were identified from 63 of 268 open—airsites found from 1995 to 2004 in the Luonan Basin． Shaanxi Province，China．Most of the cleavers are classic“U．” or“V一”shaped outline in the iroverall appearance．This article describes cleavers’ raw materials and provides a brief typo—technological analysis．Metrical analysis attempts to provide an objective typological description for the seartifacts rather than merely limiting the discussion to arbitrary cleaver morphology．
Early hominids in the Luonan Basin chose seven kinds of raw materials to makecleavers．11lemost common iscream quartzite (N = 54，45．38％ )，then dark grey quartzite (N = 25，21．01％ )． greywaeke(N = 13，10．92％)，red quartzite (N =11，9．24％)，and finesandstone (N = 14， 11．77％)．Quartz(N=1，0．84％)andsandstone(N ：1，0．84％ )arerare．Metrical analysis shows that the mean length of this sample of cleavers is 159．32 mill，average width is113．84 mm．，mean thicknessis 52．36 mm，an d mean wei【ghtis1059．5 g．Meansizeas measured by threeratios：
(width／length)×100 equals73．49
(thickness／length)×100equals33．64
nd(thickness／width)×100equals48．39
Attribute analysis shows that cleaver forms，aswellas the relative size index were significantly affected byraw materials．
The most common position of retouching flake removals on the cleavers is bifacial (N =50， 42．02％)．Retouch on the exterior surface and interior surface，as well as alternating modification are also common．Altemate removals on the cleaver’sexteriorand interior surfaces are uncommon．Parallel retouched scar pattern is the most common feature(N=66，55．46％ )，although sub—parallel，stepped， and scale patterns are also frequent．In an examinationof retouch，half of the cleavers have long retouch extension(N =58，48．74％ )，while cleavers with short retouched scars (N =29，24．37％ ) or invasive pattern (N =27，22．69％ )is infrequent．Only five cleavers have retouch covering the whole surface．Measurement of the cleaver edges shows that acute edge angles are predominant(N =74。 62．18％ )，although frequently about 1／3 have an abrupt edge．The cleavers also have asemi—abrupt． Steep edge angle，but these are very uncommon．

The blade technique of China

KATO Shinji

2006, 25(04):  343-351. 

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In the Upper Paleolithic period, the blade technique existed in the domestic industries of North China, with a typical example being that of Shiyu, in Shanxi province. Characteristics of this technique are: 1) technological simplicity; 2) production of smalltomedium sized blades; 3) the connection with high quality stone material; 4) the low function in the technical system for production of stone implements. According to these characteristics, the blade technique of North China was divided into a PreXujiayao stage, Xujiayao stage( 100 ——35ka) , and a ShiyuXiaonanhai stage ( 35 ——17ka) . These three stages correspond with the three stages ( Early, Middle, Late or Lower, Middle, Upper) of the Paleolithic of West Eurasia.