TYPOLOGIES & POINTS

This chapter will present an historical background to the application of typology in Australia. It will also detail two specific research issues that address the problem of, what does the variability of stone points in the Top End reveal about stone resource exploitation of the region?

To deal adequately with the research problem it is necessary to address two related issues; these are outlined as follows:

• Are stone points discrete types and typologically regular?
• Does implement variability reflect responses to resource availability?

Sufficient evidence now exists in the literature to address these two issues, which are fundamental to the Small Tool Tradition, are stone points discrete types and are they typologically regular? If implement types are merely static points along a continuum of morphological forms then new interpretations of the past are possible.

Background to Typologies in Australia

An examination of the existing methodological approaches of Australian classifications will demonstrate the need for a greater level of sophistication in implement analysis. The issues raised in this study require a technological approach rather than a typological one.

When in 1852 Akerman, as cited by Mulvaney (1977:263) described Australian stone implements as being "identical in character with the European axe and hammer heads of the primeval period" he was demonstrating a trend that would remain for many years. This was the belief that Australian Aboriginals were "representatives of the Stone Age development in a stage lower than that of the quaternary period in Europe" (Howitt 1898:102).

This comparison is to be expected, as the authors used the knowledge and training they had received in Europe. Mulvaney (1977:263) however saw a more dangerous outcome of this methodology, and that was what he termed "comparative ethnography". He believed that the goal of comparative ethnography was to draw parallels and comparisons without the detail or substance. Stone implements from Australia were being compared with European ideal specimens and cultures. No reference was allowed for the different geographic location or the indigenous people involved.

In 1876, R. Brough Smyth produced a classification of Australian stone implements based on observations of their use by Aboriginals of the day. Categories such as "hatchets", "knives", "adzes" and "chips" for cutting were all used (Mulvaney 1977). This system utilised non-Aboriginal tool names that immediately conjured a particular function and method of use in the mind of the classifier and reader. This type of classificatory nomenclature means that a tool classified as a knife is perceived as only being used for cutting. Each individual item was locked into a particular mental template and function for the life of the tool. Archaeological interpretations became locked into this same mental image of the implement. Interpretations of prehistoric people were developed from this right or wrong mental image of the function of the tool, rightly or wrongly.

Kenyon & Stirling (1900) followed Smyth’s lead and produced a classification of 10,000 stone implements based on a presumed function and to some degree morphology. Kenyon indicated that the method of manufacture should also be considered in the classificatory system, although there is no evidence of it playing a part in their classification.

Kenyon’s system was derived from ethnographic observations regarding tool function. This methodological approach was different to the prevailing ideas in Europe, where there was a scarcity of ethnographic material (Dunnell 1986).

In Australia, the 1930s saw the development of a culture chronology perspective in the examination of stone implements and archaeology in general. Tindale’s approach was typical of that adopted during this period. He attempted to identify specific implement types that could be used spatially as a chronological marker. This would enable a particular implement to be correlated with a tool tradition across the landscape.

These chronologies were frequently expressed in the form of chronological and spatial typologies defined by a combination of intrinsic and contextual features. Implement types are defined by morphology but are used as time markers. These types demonstrate a series of attributes that change over time (Schiffer & Skibo 1997). Cultural evolutionists such as Bouche de Perthe and Alfred Kidder used chronological types extensively. These typologies suffer from the temporal changes of an artefact’s attribute and so may not be representative of the same chronological framework in spatially separate areas. Associated with this is the difficult, and time-consuming process, of duplicating the classification in another area. Usually the easier route of simply adopting an existing classification was used (Fagan 1991). Essential in these typologies is the ability to identify individual and separate types. The more types that can be identified the more useful is the chronology to the analyst.

During this period, it was reasoned that culture histories could only be determined by the use of formal rigid typologies. McCarthy, drawing on his experience at the Australian Museum, produced in conjunction with Noone and Brammell, a pan-Australian classification for stone implements in 1946. This classification, "The Stone Implements of Australia", was a detailed catalogue with numerous divisions and classes. McCarthy stated that the classification was "essentially a typological one in which archaeological divisions or cultures are not directly involved". He went on to say, however, it should be seen as being "designed for the analysis of industries, cultures and mixed collections"(McCarthy, Brammell & Noone 1946:2).

Mitchell (1949:22) stated "For the elucidation of problems of material culture, the knowledge of true function is most important". However, Kenyon & Stirling (1900:193) demonstrated that artefact names are far from a precise statement of true function. In their study, Kenyon & Stirling (1900) used "names of European tools" that they believed "most nearly representing" the stone tool’s function. The European tool name provided a mental image of how the Aboriginal stone tool was used. When the reader interprets the use of an axe, they are using their knowledge of a steel axe used for felling trees. The task of felling anything other than a sapling with a ground edge axe is a much more difficult task. The later classification developed by McCarthy, Brammell & Noone (1946:4) failed to rectify problems of using an incorrect functional nomenclature. If an "implement is known by a well established name, then this priority name was used". Therefore, the single function interpreted by the type name may be unrelated to the actual uses of the artefact.

In more recent times archaeologists have questioned the validity of rigid typologies. Stone implement manufacture was seen as being produced in a "completely profane manner" (Hayden 1977:186). These new insights were obtained from studies in Central Australia and Papua New Guinea by White (1968, 1969). This has lead to a variety of approaches from current day researchers. Bowdler (1981) and Johnson (1979) see the implements as largely symbolic with social significance. Kamminga (1982) and Hiscock (1994a, 1994b) have used a technological approach to produce economic interpretations of the functional uses of implement.

Stone Points as Discrete Types

Turning now from the historical background of Australian classifications described above, to the question of form. Namely, can artefacts be viewed as discrete types or are they a continuum of morphological forms. Archaeological analysis based on typology requires, by definition, the existence of discrete entities called types. In stone implement analysis, the archaeological type has been linked to the underlying doctrine that all stone implements result from a mental template.

Mental Template

One of the most influential theoretical positions adopted in the analysis of stone implements is the concept of a mental template. This propounds the notion that the finished stone implement is an expression of the thoughts and ideas of the knapper. All implements are seen as a close approximation of the image or template maintained in the mind of the knapper (Deetz 1967:45). Therefore, a typology consists of sets of artefacts that are completed and finished in accordance with the knapper’s mental template.

Sheets (1975) disagrees with Deetz’s (1967) concept of a mental template. Archaeologists should attempt to codify the actual order rather than the perceived ideal order in their classifications. "We should classify people by what they did, not what they thought, and particularly not what we think they thought" (Sheets 1975:374).

If a mental template approach to stone implement analysis attempts to divine the thoughts of the prehistoric knapper, then a technological analysis focuses on the behaviour of the knapper. Sheets (1975) believes that there is probably a direct relationship between manufacture and use. But a direct one to one relationship cannot be assumed. Items are broken in manufacture and used for entirely different tasks than originally anticipated, and some items served more than one function.

In summary we cannot assume that all the items of a given type (a) were intended for the same use, (b) was the only items in that industry or the material culture as a whole that were used for that purpose (Sheets 1975:370).

Variability in the physical expression of the mental template is argued to be the result of differences either in the stored mental template of different knappers, or in the vagaries of the manufacturing process. Stone knapping is a subtractive process, where material is removed until the finished product is created. Because material cannot be added back onto the artefact, mistakes and errors are preserved in the archaeological record (Deetz 1967:48).

Unfortunately for archaeologists, they only have the finished implement that includes errors and mistakes to examine. The mental template of the prehistoric knapper is not available to the archaeologist. The mental template of the knapper needs to be known in order to establish the degree of variability, and hence determine the reasons for that variability in the implement. Any mental template divined in this way is likely to be dissimilar to that of the knapper. Due to the number of processes that can add variability to the implement, the archaeological version is unlikely to correspond to the original mental template.

Many stone tool analyses have succumbed to what Hayden (1977:178) has described as the "mystification of stone tools and the treating of them as semi-sacred relics". Any analysis that adopts the mental template as its underlying doctrine exhibits the "finished artefact fallacy". The misguided belief is that any flaked stone artefact found by archaeologists, are in the intended form of the implement and hence how the knapper finished it (Davidson & Noble 1993: 365).

Holmes (1890) indicated that the composition of an assemblage is of completed, damaged and modified implements or various stages of implement manufacture. In his extensive experiments, he made the following observation:

The course of procedure just described I have investigated in the most careful manner, and by experiment in the most careful manner, and by experiment have followed every step of the process. I have left many failures ... that duplicate in proper proportions, all the forms found upon the site (Holmes 1890:13).

In any archaeological collection, there are implements that have never been used, and some that are unsuitable for use. However, these implements do share similar morphological features. These "failures" as Holmes calls them, may have been unsuitable for the intended use, but may have been more than adequate for another function. A failed projectile point, still has sharp edges and could be used for scraping, cutting or as a material source for small flakes to be used as spear barbs. Just because the implement failed to reach the knapper’s mental template (if there was one), does not preclude it from further use.

The fallacy of the archaeological record being composed solely of completed implements that are a perfect replication of the knapper’s mental template is outlined as follows by Flenniken and Wilke (1989):

No one questions that faunal remains and debitage entered the archaeological record by being discarded, yet projectile points are implicitly considered to have been lost when they still may have been perfectly useable items. (Flenniken & Wilke 1989:156).

The work of Holmes also identified further challenges to the notion that all implements are functional "tools". Many of the implements from quarry sites that he analysed were in fact rejects, blanks or the rough form to be carried away and prepared later. As well as blanks, there were also debitage and broken implements left at a site, further indication that not all implements are "tools" (Holmes 1890).

Post depositional processes generate variability in the implements located in the archaeological record. Studies have demonstrated those taphonomic processes, such as treadage, may produce edge damage, broken flakes and scars that are elongated and irregular in shape and size. Flakes can become patinated, discoloured, exhibit a crumbling and rounding of edges and roughening of surfaces (Tringham et al 1975; Hiscock 1985).

Morphological Continuum

If assemblages are not composed of "finished artefacts", and there are these incomplete, damaged and failed artefacts, then what surety is there that any are "finished artefacts"? An alternative to discrete functional and stylistic types it that the artefacts should be viewed as stages along a continuum (Dibble 1987: 109).

Implements can be located at differing points along this continuum because of initial manufacture, maintenance and rejuvenation, as well as reworking previously discarded implements. Not all the implements located in the archaeological record have followed the same unidirectional path through the system. At various junctures in the route from manufacture to final discard, an implement may be re-routed in a direction that will lead to possible reuse and/or discard. A stone point that, through wear and use, may become unsuitable for further use as a point may still be used for another purpose. Implements then, should be considered multi-functional rather than function specific (Schiffer 1972:158).

A rejuvenation and maintenance strategy is one method of moving a stone point from one continuum extreme to the other continuum extreme. Flenniken & Wilke (1989:152) theorise that rejuvenation and maintenance of points was commonplace and is therefore typologically unstable. The point morphology changed after a single reworking and the reworked point remains in the archaeological record.

Dibble (1987:112) proposes that as a tool is used and the need for rejuvenation arises, it becomes expedient to modify a second edge. As the two edges are resharpened, they converge and form a different "type". The artefacts were retouched until a certain minimum width was obtained and then discarded.

As shown there is now some debate as to the existence in the archaeological record of discrete types as proposed by Kenyon & Stirling (1900) and McCarthy, Brammell & Noone (1946) amongst others. An alternative is to view the archaeological record as being a continuum of form as proposed by Schiffer (1972), Hayden (1977), Hiscock (1994a, 1994b) and Dibble (1987).

Classificatory classes can be seen as mutually exclusive, in that no single class is synonymous or subsumed into any other class (Adams 1988). Sokal and Sneath (1963) as cited by Vierra (1982:162) see classificatory systems as a procedure, or process, that arranges or orders entities into groups based on their relationships. This group forming classification is the method most commonly utilised by archaeologists. Such a classification produces archaeological types (Vierra 1982).

Implement Variability & Resource Availability

Typologies are systematic representations of one or more objects called types. They are rigidly bounded, so those items to be categorised are clearly defined. A typology must also be comprehensive enough that each entity is assigned to a single category. The particular attributes that are unique to that implement define, describe and identify its typological classes (Brown 1982). There are several underlying assumptions inherent to typologies. Two of these assumptions are that all types are equally important to each other, and that the presence or absence of a type is not dependent on the presence or absence of another type (Adams 1988; Brown 1982; Vierra 1982).

Morphological typologies include all the types in any given body of material that can be recognised on the basis of intrinsic attribute combinations, whether or not the types show any consistent patterning in their distributions or associations. There is no selection of attributes, or of types, without reference to a purpose, except that of description. The descriptive type is based on the form of the physical or external properties of the implement. It has been the practise of typologists, that after the function or use for the implement becomes known it is assigned a more functional "type". Often the highly visible attributes such as size, shape and colour will play a larger role in the determination of morphological types than attributes such as raw material, density or manufacturing methods (Adams & Adams 1991).

The morphology of points can be seen as the product of the interaction of stylistic, functional and technical components. The functional component includes the task for which the artefact is actually used. The technical component pertains to the actual method of stone tool production. Stone resources directly affect the functional and technical component of the point morphology (Wiant & Hassen 1985).

Byrne (1980) demonstrated that at Lower Murchison, Western Australia, there was a measurable variation in implements as the distance from the stone resources increased, thus making them less available. A reduction in implement weight, and an increase in the number of smaller cores and flakes, as well as a reduction in the thickness measurement of flakes measured implement variability. Among both cores and flakes, the unretouched items are heavier than the retouched. Byrne (1980) also found that the percentage of tool cores and retouched flakes increases with distance from source. In the ethno-experiments conducted by Hayden (1977), he found that if there was an abundance of raw material, then knappers would forego the need of maintenance and rejuvenation in favour of creating a new flake. It would be expected that in resource deficient areas, the reverse would be true and knappers would place a greater emphasis on retouch and rejuvenation (Hayden 1977).

Byrne (1980) summarises the results of his study by stating that there were three responses to a diminishing supply of a particular stone resource. Firstly, there tended to be an increase in the level of maintenance and rejuvenation of implements. Secondly, there was an increased selectivity in regard of that portion of the toolkit discarded. Finally, there was an increased procurement of alternative raw materials. As the distance from the silcrete material increased it was replaced in the assemblage by chert and quartz (Byrne 1980). When the means of transport or mobility of the population group is rudimentary or expensive then a high value is placed on the portability and high replacement costs of the implement/technology. These considerations are likely to be important elements in the creation of the toolkit (Schiffer 1972).

Goodyear (1975) proposes that the use of high quality cryptocrystalline materials for projectile points be attributed to maximising tool longevity. In other words, point technology is organised to maximise tool longevity under conditions where tool replacement costs are high. This situation would occur in circumstances of population groups moving into new areas or areas where there is a restricted availability of stone resources.

Both the mechanical properties and availability of particular stone resources could be expected to have influenced which raw material will be used in any technology. If a population is moving long distances, good quality stone materials may be abundant in one area and not another. It can be expected in some cases that the maintenance, rejuvenation and recycling of implements will be related to the localised resource availability (Beck & Jones 1990). A resource cannot be considered as available until its presence and the population group knows its location. Migration of one group into another unknown area results in a loss of resource availability until knowledge of the new environment is accumulated and resource location identified.

Implement variability has been shown to be a product of several factors, one of the most important factor is the availability of stone resources (Byrne 1980; Hayden 1977). Stone technology then, is a product of function/style and is an "adaptive response" to spatial and temporal variations in raw material and food resources (Wiant & Hassen 1985:105).

Conclusion

In this Chapter, it has been shown that it is appropriate to consider implements such as stone points as representing a continuum of form rather than discrete types. It emerges from the discussion that a technological analysis is the most suitable technique for dealing with the questions raised in this study.

It has also been shown that much of the variability of an implement is a product of raw material issues. These issues include the physical properties of the material and its. Strategies such as risk minimisation attempt to combine multiple influences into an integrated model of settlement and subsistence.

While many of the sites have undergone archaeological analysis these have tended to be intra-site studies. In order to establish the range of variability between sites and raw materials a diverse range of diagnostic attributes are required. The following chapter on research methodology details these attributes.

This study will demonstrate that regional studies, in particular the Top End of the Northern Territory, will benefit by a new interpretation of prehistoric utilisation of resources. Holdaway (1995) states that increased regional studies are required to address issues of resource utilisation in the Holocene Period. Previously, archaeological studies have been restricted to the continent wide or the single site. This then can be applied to the wider problem of the Small Tool Tradition in other areas of Australia.

Study Area Part II

Research Methods

Author: Wayne Roddom, Dept. Archaeology and Anthropology
Feedback: peter.hiscock@anu.edu.au .
Date Last Modified: 5-June 1998
URL: http://artalpha.anu.edu.au/web/arc/aboutus/studs/chapter3.htm