The Micro-Endscraper: A New Tool Type of the Chalcolithic Period

Abstract

Although certain aspects of the material culture of the Chalco lithic period have been known for more than fifty years, the flint assemblages of this time-span have been studied only sporadically. The large samples of flint artifacts recovered in the large-scale excavations of Teleilat Ghassul and the Beer Sheva sites have been only briefly described or totally ignored. The flint assemblages of T. Ghassul were published in Ghassul I-II by Neuville (1934) and Mahan (1940). Probably the richest sample, the assemblage from this site is described by Neuville without specifying the frequencies of the various artifact types. Whereas for the potsherds, en raison de son importance (Ghassul 1:55),their provenance was mentioned, the less important flint artifacts were treated as a unit, ignoring their distribution in time and space. For the Beer Sheva Chalcolithic sites, which must have yielded thousands of flint artifacts, only a preliminary description of a small sample from l:Iorvat Beter is available (Yeivin 1959). Since many of these implements were thrown away, these pieces are not available for further study. Of the flint assemblages of Bir Safadi and Bir Abu-Matar (Perrot 1968) nothing is yet published. The Besor sites near Tell el-Far'ah (S) yielded rich flint assemblages, but these were published a long time ago (BP II). To summarize, the flint assemblages of the Chalcolithic sites from the southern half of Israel and from T. Ghassul, i.e. the largest, richest and best preserved sites, are inadequately known; the information is either partial, outdated or missing entirely. During the past three decades, advanced methods for the analysis of flint artifacts have been applied to the local Stone Age flint assemblages. The result has been a much better understanding of the Palaeolithic cultural development and distribution. However, these methods have barely been applied to the study of Chalcolithic assemblages. The large quantities of pottery sherds found at these sites are still generally considered to be more informative than their flint artifacts. Recent studies of the known assemblages from the Tell el-Far'ah area by Roshwalb (1981) and new assemblages from northeastern Sinai by Gilead (Oren and Gilead 1981) have shown that the flint artifacts are significant components of the material culture and merit serious attention. The systematic collection of these artifacts, sifting of deposits for the recovery of the minute elements in the assemblage and an attribute analysis of the finds are essential for the proper understanding of the material culture. A further contribution towards a better understanding of the Chalco lithic flint assemblages is provided below in presenting a new tool type: the micro-endscraper.

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