@article{303624d7a4be4de1a54ffbf3e67b0263,
title = "Raw material selectivity of the earliest stone toolmakers at Gona, Afar, Ethiopia",
abstract = "Published evidence of Oldowan stone exploitation generally supports the conclusion that patterns of raw material use were determined by local availability. This is contradicted by the results of systematic studies of raw material availability and use among the earliest known archaeological sites from Gona, Afar, Ethiopia. Artifact assemblages from six Pliocene archaeological sites were compared with six random cobble samples taken from associated conglomerates that record pene-contemporaneous raw material availability. Artifacts and cobbles were evaluated according to four variables intended to capture major elements of material quality: rock type, phenocryst percentage, average phenocryst size, and groundmass texture. Analyses of these variables provide evidence of hominid selectivity for raw material quality. These results demonstrate that raw material selectivity was a potential component of Oldowan technological organization from its earliest appearance and document a level of technological sophistication that is not always attributed to Pliocene hominids.",
keywords = "Cognition, Gona, Lithic technology, Oldowan, Pliocene, Raw materials",
author = "Dietrich Stout and Jay Quade and Sileshi Semaw and Rogers, {Michael J.} and Levin, {Naomi E.}",
note = "Funding Information: This research was made possible by the generous support of the L.S.B. Leakey Foundation. Additional funding came from the National Science Foundation (Award-0004103), the Wenner-Gren Foundation and the National Geographic Society. Essential permits and facilities were provided by the ARCCH of the Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture of Ethiopia, the National Museum of Ethiopia and the Afar Administration. The research was organized from the Stone Age Institute and CRAFT Research Center at Indiana University, and we would like to thank Kathy Schick and Nicholas Toth (the Co-Directors) for their support and comments on a draft of this paper. We would also like to thank Berhane Asfaw and Yonas Beyene for advice, Alemu Admasu and Menkir Bitew for general assistance and facilitation, and our Afar colleagues at Eloha for friendship and work in the field. DS thanks the CRAFT Research Center and the Office of the Vice President of Research (formerly RUGS) at Indiana University for graduate research fellowships which made his participation possible. SS thanks the CRAFT Research Center and Stone Age Institute for providing a Research Associate position and other institutional support during this research, and Mr. Rogers and Friends for their support. MR thanks the Fulbright Program for support during the 2000 field season. The field participation of Manuel Dominguez-Rodrigo, Travis Pickering, Melanie Everett and Leslie Harlacker is acknowledged. We also thank three anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestion ",
year = "2005",
month = apr,
doi = "10.1016/j.jhevol.2004.10.006",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "48",
pages = "365--380",
journal = "Journal of human evolution",
issn = "0047-2484",
publisher = "Academic Press",
number = "4",
}