fiReproxies: A computational model providing insight into heat-affected archaeological lithic assemblages

PloS One
Andrew C Sorensen, Fulco Scherjon

Abstract

Evidence for fire use becomes increasingly sparse the further back in time one looks. This is especially true for Palaeolithic assemblages. Primary evidence of fire use in the form of hearth features tends to give way to clusters or sparse scatters of more durable heated stone fragments. In the absence of intact fireplaces, these thermally altered lithic remains have been used as a proxy for discerning relative degrees of fire use between archaeological layers and deposits. While previous experimental studies have demonstrated the physical effects of heat on stony artefacts, the mechanisms influencing the proportion of fire proxy evidence within archaeological layers remain understudied. This fundamental study is the first to apply a computer-based model (fiReproxies) in an attempt to simulate and quantify the complex interplay of factors that ultimately determine when and in what proportions lithic artefacts are heated by (anthropogenic) fires. As an illustrative example, we apply our model to two hypothetical archaeological layers that reflect glacial and interglacial conditions during the late Middle Palaeolithic within a generic simulated cave site to demonstrate how different environmental, behavioural and depositional fac...Continue Reading

References

Jul 23, 1971·Science·B A Purdy, H K Brooks
Mar 16, 2011·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·Wil Roebroeks, Paola Villa
Apr 5, 2012·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·Francesco BernaMichael Chazan
Dec 3, 2014·Journal of Human Evolution·Ron ShimelmitzMina Weinstein-Evron
Jun 20, 2015·Journal of Human Evolution·Mareike C StahlschmidtNicholas J Conard

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Citations

Jul 22, 2018·Scientific Reports·A C SorensenM Soressi
Apr 29, 2020·Journal of Human Evolution·Ron ShimelmitzMina Weinstein-Evron

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Software Mentioned

RStudio
fiReproxies
R

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