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Ancient Technology Tools of the Trade Ancient Technology Tools of the Trade Lesson 3A 3 What Is Ancient Stone Technology? Stone technology uses raw materials to provide tools for daily survival. Arch Activity: Tool Time 8 Lesson 3B 13 What Non-stone Materials Were Used for Ancient Technology? Bone, antler, and shell were non-stone materials used for ancient technology- Arch Activity: Toot Time II (Antler and Bone) 16 Lesson 3C 21 What Technology Did Ancient People Use to Harvest and Process Plants? Ancient people used stone, bone, wood, and antler tools to harvest and process plants. Arch Activity: Making Pemmican 24 Lesson 3D 25 What Ancient Technology Assisted in Food Preparation? Pottery and containers made of animal hides assisted in food preparation. Arch Activity: Ancient Pottery 28 Lesson 3E 31 How Was Ancient Art Created? Ancient people used technology to create art to express themselves. Arch Activity: Ancient Artists 35 Lesson 3F 37 How Do Archaeologists Analyze and Date Ancient Technology? Several scientific methods of analysis and dating assist archaeol ogists in their study of ancient technology. Arch Activity: Determining the Age of Artifacts 42 Lesson 3G 45 Who Is an Archaeologist Who Studies Ancient Technology? Ann M. Johnson is an archaeologist who studies ancient technology. Lesson 3H 49 Who Is an Archaeologist Who Studies Ancient Technology? Troy Helmick is an archaeologist who studies ancient technology. Lesson 3A—Narrative: What Stone technology uses raw materials Is Ancient Stone Technology? to provide tools for daily survival. Technology is the manufacture stone hand-axe. and use of tools to cope with One end of the daily life. Today, technology hand-axe was includes everything from kitchen shaped into a knives to computers. It includes the point. It was used processing and packaging of foods in in hunting, food our grocery stores. It is responsible for preparation, and our society's ability to land a space many other tasks. craft on Mars. Tools make our lives Later, prehistoric easier, more efficient, and better. people made more In the prehistoric past, tools gave refined stone blade and core tools, in This large block of black people the ability to survive, just as which long, narrow flakes (blades) basalt shows evidence they do today. Their needs for food, were created from a prepared piece of of percussion flaking. It comes from a prehis shelter, safety, and expression were lithic raw material (core). The earliest toric quarry near exactly the same as ours. But past prehistoric groups who migrated to McAllister in south technology relied on raw materials that North America and Montana brought western Montana. are quite different from those this sophisticated stone tool tech Courtesy Montana Archaeological Society. commonly used in our modern world. nology with them. Ancient technology depended The earliest Montana stone tools heavily upon the use of stone. Stone is are about twelve thousand years old. an inorganic material that survives in They are beautiful spear points. soil for thousands of years. Stone tools Stone tool use continued here until are found in archaeological sites about two hundred years ago. Great throughout the world, including skill was required to make stone tools. Montana. Tools made of stone are the Ancient people selected special kinds most common kind of artifacts studied of stone that were easy to work, but by archaeologists. The word lithic kept a sharp edge. Chert (sometimes (from the Greek word lithos) refers to referred to as "chalcedony," "flint" or objects made of stone, as in "agate") is such a stone. Raw chert Paleolithic, the Old Stone Age. comes in a variety of colors—brown, The earliest known stone tools in yellow, red, green, and even blue. A the world were pebble tools. They useful quality of chert is that even- were made by very primitive humans in sized flakes can be removed from it— Africa some two million years ago. in a controlled manner—by carefully They are intentionally broken rocks striking its edge with another rock or with edges that indicate that they were piece of antler. Prehistoric people used as tools. These early humans used sometimes baked or heated chert in pebble tools for crushing animal bones. fire pits dug into the ground. This About five hundred thousand years process of heat treatment drew out ago, more advanced human groups in the water in the rock and made it Europe and Asia depended on the easier to work. Obsidian, basalt, and Montana Historical Society Ancient Teachings 3-3 tool. Then the flintknappers used antler tools in pressure flaking the stone into a finished, sharp tool. If a piece of flint broke in the wrong place while being worked, it was either reworked or discarded. Archaeologists find waste flakes or "chips" at sites where ancient people knapped stone. Many primitive-looking tools found near quarries were probably made by children or adults who were just learning to make stone tools. Some stone tools were designed specifically for hunting, butchering, "Knapping" is the porcelanite are other types of stone hide working, or cutting. Others served process of making stone used by prehistoric people in Montana. multiple purposes. Unshaped flakes of tools by flaking special Obsidian and basalt are volcanic in chert and obsidian were often used for kinds of rocks. origin and are usually black in color. a single task, and then discarded. Percussion flaking involves using a Many kinds of raw toolstone are Hunting weapons required stone hammerstone (left found throughout Montana. A quarry projectile points, often called hand) to strike a block is a specific place where people "arrowheads." Stone projectile points of stone that can be obtained this toolstone. Prehistoric were hafted, or tied with sinew, onto chipped, sometimes called a "core" (right people often traveled great distances a wooden shaft. The earliest people in hand). Courtesy Kootenai to collect particular kinds of toolstone. Montana used spear points from National Forest. One of the places they got obsidian, twelve thousand to nine thousand for example, was Obsidian Cliff in years ago. These hunters needed to get Yellowstone National Park. But these very close to animals in order to kill early people also gathered other tool them with a spear. Some archeological stone, especially chert, on mountain sites with very old spear points have sides and in riverbeds wherever they been found in Montana. These include encountered it in Montana. the Anzick Site near Wilsall, the Mill The crafting of stone tools by Iron Site near Broadus, and the carefully removing pieces of material McHaffie Site near Helena. is called knapping, or sometimes About nine thousand years ago, "flintknapping" (even though other Montana's prehistoric groups began to stones besides flint were used). use the atlatl, or dart thrower, to Prehistoric people used a fist-sized throw long narrow darts tipped with rock called a hammerstone to craft projectile points. The atlatl featured a raw stone into tools. With a hammer wooden throwing board in which the stone or large piece of antler, prehis dart was placed. Throwing an atlatl toric flintknappers carefully chipped was like swinging a tennis racket over away excess material like modern-day one's head and propelling the dart at a sculptors. This is called percussion target. A hunter had to stand and put flaking. It gave a rough shape to the his entire body into motion to propel Montana Historical Society 3-4 Ancient Teachings the dart. Because it had a much greater range than earlier weapons, the atlatl allowed hunters to distance them selves from their prey, making hunting much safer. Parts of atlatls have been found in a few cave sites in Montana, but usually only the stone tips have been preserved. Prehistoric people made stone atlatl projectile points of many shapes. Some styles relate to particular time periods. Depending on and used again and again. Ancient How to make a projec the style or styles found at a particular hunters also resharpened and tile point Select a piece of chert, obsidian, or any site, archaeologists can then estimate reshaped their points until they were other fine-grained stone the site's age and chronology—its beyond repair. Only then did they that, when broken, placement in time. Today, atlatl enthu throw the points away. exhibits a conchoidal siasts hold contests to test their skill Stone tools served many purposes. fracture (a technical term meaning that it using this ancient weapon. When a game animal was killed, breaks just right!). Strike Prehistoric people in Montana used ancient people used stone butchering the stone with a harder the atlatl until about two thousand knives and sharp flakes to cut up the stone to break off a years ago. Then the bow and arrow animal. They used stone scrapers to large flake, or relatively flat piece like the one on (using true "arrowheads") replaced it clean animal hides. And they used the left. Then shape the as the preferred hunting weapon. The stone drills to make holes in wood, flake by chipping off bow and arrow had advantages over bone, and leather. Archaeologists have smaller flakes from the the atlatl. This new weapon could many technical names for the various sides and surfaces with a rock, a bone fragment, shoot longer distances with greater types of stone tools. or an antler tip. To finish accuracy. And it required less move Because stone is an inorganic the point, chip the sides ment by the hunter, making it less material—that is, it does not decay finely to create sharp likely that the animals being hunted easily—stone artifacts are more abun edges. Asa final step, Clovis points were would be startled and run away. dant than other types of prehistoric "fluted" by popping a Montana Indians continued to use the artifacts.
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