100th century BCE
Africa
The Acheulian Industrial Complex is a Lower and Middle Pleistocene archaeological classification defined by conspicuous, well-developed bifaces, especially hand-axes and cleavers, alongside scrapers, awls, and Oldowan forms. It is distributed across Africa, south-west Eurasia, and parts of southern Asia. The chapter treats it as a technological complex rather than necessarily a single culture, noting debate over whether assemblage variation reflects different activities by the same populations or distinct coexisting groups.
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The Story
Around 1.5 million years ago, hand-axes and cleavers began to appear as conspicuous new forms. They were larger than ordinary Oldowan artefacts and displayed more explicit shaping, with the knapper imposing a selected form upon the stone rather than merely producing useful edges along an accessible lump. Large flakes measuring roughly 10 to 25 centimetres sometimes served as the initial blanks for these implements.
Hand-axes and cleavers became common across a very large part of the Old World and came to define the so-called Acheulian industries. Despite considerable variation in size, shape, and technology, they formed a related series often designated by the French term biface. Other regional components included heavy picks at Peninj, large core-scrapers in the Karari Industry of Koobi Fora, narrow concave-sided bifaces in north-west Africa, spheroids at Olduvai, and an increasing range of flake tools.
Acheulian assemblages were not uniform cultural packages. At Olduvai, middle Bed II assemblages could be strongly biface-dominated, while others retained modified patterns related to Bed I and were classified as Developed Oldowan. Across East Africa, the proportions of bifaces, small tools, and heavy-duty tools varied widely, and tool shape could differ substantially even within the same broad type. Three explanations are presented: parallel cultural or population systems, activity-related toolkits, and a random-walk model of technological variation.
The Acheulian eventually declined during the early Upper Pleistocene as Middle Stone Age patterns became established. The extract places the disappearance of the Acheulian mode tentatively in the interval before about 70,000 to 100,000 years ago, while stressing that the evidence is uncertain and that the change was not necessarily accompanied by a dramatic disruption of economic or social life. Large formal tools persisted in modified forms in the Sangoan-Lupemban industries of the Congo basin and adjacent areas.
100th century BCE
Africa
The Acheulian Industrial Complex is a Lower and Middle Pleistocene archaeological classification defined by conspicuous, well-developed bifaces, especially hand-axes and cleavers, alongside scrapers, awls, and Oldowan forms. It is distributed across Africa, south-west Eurasia, and parts of southern Asia. The chapter treats it as a technological complex rather than necessarily a single culture, noting debate over whether assemblage variation reflects different activities by the same populations or distinct coexisting groups.
Continue exploring
The Story
Around 1.5 million years ago, hand-axes and cleavers began to appear as conspicuous new forms. They were larger than ordinary Oldowan artefacts and displayed more explicit shaping, with the knapper imposing a selected form upon the stone rather than merely producing useful edges along an accessible lump. Large flakes measuring roughly 10 to 25 centimetres sometimes served as the initial blanks for these implements.
Hand-axes and cleavers became common across a very large part of the Old World and came to define the so-called Acheulian industries. Despite considerable variation in size, shape, and technology, they formed a related series often designated by the French term biface. Other regional components included heavy picks at Peninj, large core-scrapers in the Karari Industry of Koobi Fora, narrow concave-sided bifaces in north-west Africa, spheroids at Olduvai, and an increasing range of flake tools.
Acheulian assemblages were not uniform cultural packages. At Olduvai, middle Bed II assemblages could be strongly biface-dominated, while others retained modified patterns related to Bed I and were classified as Developed Oldowan. Across East Africa, the proportions of bifaces, small tools, and heavy-duty tools varied widely, and tool shape could differ substantially even within the same broad type. Three explanations are presented: parallel cultural or population systems, activity-related toolkits, and a random-walk model of technological variation.
The Acheulian eventually declined during the early Upper Pleistocene as Middle Stone Age patterns became established. The extract places the disappearance of the Acheulian mode tentatively in the interval before about 70,000 to 100,000 years ago, while stressing that the evidence is uncertain and that the change was not necessarily accompanied by a dramatic disruption of economic or social life. Large formal tools persisted in modified forms in the Sangoan-Lupemban industries of the Congo basin and adjacent areas.
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