Maglemosian in contact: The disruptive invention of stone pressure flaking on the curve crutch 7000 CAL BC
Résumé
When looking at archaeological pieces identified as pressure-flaker tools, the means and ways
of integrating a stone reduction technique into the production of regular lithic blades/bladelets, so called
‘termed’ products, in Denmark at the end of the Early Scandinavian Mesolithic period are taken into
consideration. In that, this paper examines the forms of interaction between territorially close populations
known as possessing distinct technologies: in the Eastern Baltic regions, populations using percussion
and pressure techniques in stone reduction as well as composite tools made of bone with lithic inserts,
whereas, in the most Western Baltic regions (Denmark), populations using percussion techniques only,
without having any knowledge of the composite tool. According to the lithic archaeological material,
it is in this latter area of Maglemosian culture that pressure flaking in debitage appears ca. 7300/7000
calBC, thus raising the question of whether this sudden new practice originated from the arrival of a
new population bringing with them the new (Eastern) technology, from a technological transfer between
groups of crafting traditions initially distinct, or from itinerant craftsmen?
The research is conducted using several interconnected fields of analysis which form the structure of this
paper, as following: 1) the physical principles inherent to the practice of the pressure debitage technique;
2) the ontology of the identified pressure technique as understood from a first experimental test; and,
3) the compatibility of shapes and use wear obtained from the replicated antler pressure-flaker tools
compared with the corresponding archaeological pieces. Note that the patterns of wear observed on
the used antler tools, and from which the pressure technique was identified and reproduced, are not
compared by analogy with the archaeological pieces but, rather, are considered in relation to the tool’s
dynamics in use, i.e. how the replicated antler tool is transformed from using it in pressure flaking. The
first field relates to the biography of archaeological pieces identified as Maglemosian pressure-flaker tools
represented by a sort of curve crutch made from removed red deer antler tine. The second field refers to
the experimental research presentation and an observation of flintknappers’ postures that vary during
the replication of the pressure debitage with this type of tool regardless of the production of bladelets,
extracted anyway on a regular basis. The third and last field are in line with the collected observations
and draw inferences based on the context of the findings for the Southwestern Scandinavian Mesolithic.
Our investigation shows that these crutches were certainly used in pressure debitage. Appearing as
suddenly as the pressure knapping, almost all the curve crutches derive from a single geographical
area: the Danish Zealand region, where they also are found together in considerable numbers. They also
come from archaeological dwelling sites which are markers of the beginning of the second great period
of the Maglemosian culture called the ‘Sværdborg phase’ dated around ca. 7000 calBC. It lasted several
centuries starting from after, or soon after, the transition from Boreal to Atlantic chronozones in Eastern
Denmark, when the Baltic Sea started to take its actual shape.
From a theoretical point of view, the study highlights the importance of the relationship to instrumentation
when searching into technical change mechanisms to seek explanations of cultural evolution in Prehistory.
In this paper, the appearance of a new (pressure) stone reduction technique seems to have no immediate
relationship with the flintknappers’ skills (social vector) nor with the profitability expected from the new
technique (economic vector), but rather, to be depending on its operability (technical vector). It was by
means of an experimental test and, when better considering material evidence with regard to the role
of the knapper in technical action—as a reflexive contra passive use of instrumentation regardless of
his modus operandi—that records of body motion during the task and according to the tool employed
gave new insights about transfer phenomenon: the actually possible inherent permeability in Stone Age
between techniques apparently distinct. For what concerns the Mesolithic, the sudden appearance of the
curve pressure-flaker tool used in debitage on the Maglemosian territory and almost unknown otherwise
than in Zealand would be a consequence of a convergence of ontological order between different stone
knapping techniques acquired which were concomitantly or diversely transported within the Southern
Scandinavian area between 7300 and 7000 calBC. As a result, the Danish technique—the pressure mode
on a (shoulder or chest) curve antler crutch—appears as a disruptive invention that would have arisen
out of an assimilation by impregnation or direct contacts with foreign neighbouring (technologically
Eastern-related) groups holding original techniques in stone reduction from a technological transfer
developed in Zealand within the Maglemosian culture. In this, the Mesolithic pressure technique for
flint reduction employed in Zealand and the culturally Maglemosian border-zone areas would have
resulted from using pressure mode on a reinvented punch tool: the antler tine was adopted for its
viscoelastic property while remaining long and curve in use, that is, adapted to pressure flaking on
a flexible mode. Its appearance would have emerged at the end of the classic Maglemosian (transition
between phases 2 and 3 with respectively Ulkestrup-Hut 1 and Sværdborg-1917) from using the antler
tine in reflexive motion as a flaking tool involved in pressure debitage for termed lithic production from
the new knowledge acquired in both the genuine punch technique and the standing pressure, then on
the flexible straight crutch.
It seems then that the driving force of human cultural evolution during this Mesolithic period in this
part of the Southern Scandinavia area might have arisen more from how things (pressure flaking) were
precisely achieved, rather than just replicated in practice. As a future research hypothesis, it follows that
technical change in the manufacture of common cultural products would arise only when techniques
are genuine adequate to regular behavior in technical task, although the ‘ignition’ factor for change
could have a social-origin. In this, how regular technical practices were conducted in intimate details
would considerably pertain to issues relative to socio-historical scenario reconstruction. But, since the
occupation layers in the Danish context involved are still badly dated when this technical shift occurred
in the Maglemosian transitional phase 2/3, scenario about specific, multiple or with multi-scale entryroutes
between neighbouring territories and the presumed established populations needs to be refined,
notably with the study of the lithic productions in its most conformity to such experimental records
(aspects of the bulb, characters of the bladelets’ lips according to the various modes highlighted through
the flexible contra the stiff used crutch, etc.).