None of the examples of individual motivation, idiosyncratic behavior, or the cultural transfer of techniques preclude the bigger picture of raw material potential and a con- cern with function as being among the key factors causing variation in biface morpholo- gy. Biface manufacture can be summarized as the practical realization of a ‘mental con- struct’, regardless of whatever Machiavellian motivations may lie behind the materialisa- tion of this construct.This construct consists of four main aspects, as follows:
1. bifacial flaking
2. a sharp, durable cutting edge 3. broad symmetry
The full expression of this mental construct using intensive circumferential working, where raw material permits, almost invariably leads to the production of ovate bifaces, a form that could justifiably be described as a mental template. The possibility remains that the ovate form is simply the unavoidable result of intensive bifacial techniques fea- turing full and half rotations, or in other words results passively from the rhythms of man- ufacture. This same basic mental construct is used in the production of other biface forms; however, in this case raw material has dictated the form that the bifaces take. Attributes, more subtle in form that might reflect cultural variation, almost certainly underlie the mental construct, the power of which is demonstrated by its survival from more than 1.5 million years ago in Africa to the end of the Middle Paleolithic in Europe. Whatever other motivations may have at one time or another been involved in handaxe manufacture remain a subject for future enquiry.
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Whereas Acheulean handaxes have received much attention in the literature, late Pleistocene bifaces have been relatively neglected due to the current focus on Levallois debitage. Bifaces are a diagnostic feature of the Mousterian of Acheulean tradition, a Mousterian facies considered to be a forerunner of industries transitional to the Upper Paleolithic. Based on the analysis of raw material sources, technology, and use-wear of Mousterian bifaces from Grotte XVI, a cave site dated to approximately 65,000 years ago, there is strong evidence to suggest that these Mousterian bifaces were care- fully designed and maintained implements that were transported from one location to another.
B
ifaces are a diagnostic feature of the Mousterian of Acheulean Tradition (Peyrony 1920; Bordes 1961). This industry is considered by several authors (Mellars 1969, 1988, 1996; Peyrony 1948; Bordes 1972; Harrold 1983, 1989; Pelegrin, 1990, 1995:261–65) as a late Mousterian technocomplex, forerunner to the Châtelperronian, an industry transitional to the Upper Paleolithic in western Europe. How this change occurred is not completely clear. Some believe that the Châtelperronian was the product of acculturation, resulting from contact with the first Aurignacians (Demars and Hublin 1989; Mellars, 1989, 1999; Bocquet-Appel and Demars 2000). Others see it as an inde- pendent development from the local Mousterian of Acheulean Tradition (MAT) (Harrold 1983, 1989; Pelegrin 1990, 1995; Rigaud 2000; d’Errico et al. 1998; Zilhao and d’Errico 1999). The organization and use of the bifacial technology characteristic of the MAT is also poorly understood (however see Geneste, 1985).An analysis of raw material sources, technology, and use-wear of MAT bifaces dated to approximately 65,000 years ago from Grotte XVI, a cave site located in southwestern France (Guibert et al.1999) are presented.Bifaces from Grotte XVI were analyzed to test a model of expedient tool technology. Binford (1979, 1989) characterized early modern humans as using a poorly organized technology that tends “toward the expedient manufacture, use, and abandonment of instrumental items in the immediate context of use” (Binford 1977:34).This idea, in com- bination with an interpretation of faunal remains showing that early modern humans had limited predatory abilities (Binford 1981), has been used to argue that Neandertal soci- eties were much less complex than modern ones (Binford 1981, 1989;White 1982). From this, it was further concluded that there was a difference, even a clear inferiority, in the