New Tools and Old Stones: The Use of 3D Microscopy on Stone Tools to Understand Prehistoric Behaviour and Social Change

公众对石器的常见问题是，它们是用来做什么的？或者，对于那些人，“他们在那里做什么？”这个项目的主要目的是开发和演示一种技术，使这些问题能够得到可靠的回答和说明。本项目以一个考古组合的分析为例，旨在介绍高分辨率三维激光扫描显微镜研究考古石器的新方法。这体现了将工程学的方法整合到遗产研究中，通过对现有方法的数字化改造来提高考古研究的质量。石器微磨损分析是一种研究石器使用情况的技术。它涉及到使用显微镜来研究石器的边缘，以找到在使用过程中磨损的区域。这种方法使考古学家能够洞察史前活动，但也存在一些已知的缺陷，专家们打算加以改进。主要的问题是该方法依赖于表面磨损的视觉识别。对该方法的测试表明，这种对工具功能的定性评估是高度不准确和不一致的。石器是我们的祖先在过去450万年的进化过程中留下的主要文物。因此，对石器的理解是理解进化和社会变革的基础。石器分析的一个重要方面是了解它们是如何使用的。这种水平的理解有助于了解社会发展、气候变化对环境的适应以及技术专长。研究的组合是旧石器时代晚期的一套石器，来自萨里郡保存完好的威马纳农场遗址。它是在英国发现的少数几个保存完好并经过精心挖掘的文物之一，为匹配来自遗址工具位置和史前使用者活动的数据提供了一个独特的机会。汇编的良好保存使其非常适合该项目，因为能够从工具和说明各种不同工具用途的高质量图形中收集有用的数据，这将有助于突出所使用的方法的能力。该项目引入的新技术旨在通过增加定量分析、磨损和计算机解释来改变所使用的方法。这种方法改变了考古数据可视化的方式，并允许将重点从方法转移到解释。以这种新的方式可视化数据降低了解释问题的复杂性。专家将不再需要在视觉上辨别复杂且往往微妙的纹理信息。纹理表征的任务由计算系统承担，解释这对工具的使用意味着什么。这减少了识别中的错误，提高了一致性，并增强了该方法的整体声誉。这使得专家可以将重点转移到对结果的解释和这些结果在手头考古问题的更广泛背景下的影响上。减少了对专家为未来分析目的记忆和编目磨损表面类型的视觉系统的需要，也大大减少了对相关广泛培训的要求(4-8年目前被认为是正常的)。使用这一新系统的培训要求将在几个月的范围内进行；与应用科学中使用的其他分析系统更接近。这将使这项技术在各学科中更容易获得；其复合效果是产生与遗址功能有关的更大数据集，随后为遗产解释提供更大的基础。

Common questions asked by the public of stone tools are 'what were they used for?' or, of the people, 'what were they doing there?' The primary aim of this project is to develop and demonstrate a technique that allows these questions to be reliably answered and illustrated.This project presents the analysis of an archaeological assemblage as a case study, designed to introduce new methods of high resolution three dimensional laser scanning microscopes to study archaeological stone tools. This presents the integration of methods from engineering into the study of heritage to improve the quality of archaeological research by digital transformation of current approaches.Lithic microwear analysis is a technique that has been developed to study stone tool use. It involves the use of microscopes to study edges of stone tools to find areas that have been worn through use. This method has allowed archaeologists to gain insight into prehistoric activities but there are known flaws which experts aim to improve. The main problem is the method relies on visual discrimination of surface wear. Testing of the method shows that this qualitative assessment of tool function is highly inaccurate and inconsistent.Stone tools are the primary artefact left by our ancestors as they have evolved over the last 4.5 million years. An understanding of stone tools is therefore fundamental to understanding evolution and social change. An important aspect of stone tool analysis is understanding how they were used. This level of understanding can help up learn about social development, environmental adaptation through climate change, and technological specialisation.The assemblage studied is an Upper Palaeolithic set of stone tools from the site of Wey Manor Farm, a well preserved site from surrey. It represents one of only a few discovered in the UK that show a good degree of preservation and was meticulously excavated, presenting a unique opportunity to match data from the location of tools at the site and activities carried out by their prehistoric users. The good preservation of the assemblage makes it highly suitable for the project as the ability to gather useful data from the tools and high quality graphics illustrating a variety of different tool uses will serve to highlight the capabilities of the approach used.The new technology introduced by this project aims to transform the approaches used through the addition of quantitative analysis wear and computed interpretation. The method changes the way that archaeological data is visualised and allows a shift of focus from method to interpretation.The visualisation of data in this new way reduces the complexity of the interpretative problem. Experts will no longer needs to visually discern complex and often subtle textural information. The task of textural characterisation is taken up by the computing system as is the interpretation of what this implies for tool use. This reduces error in identification, improves consistency, and strengthens the reputation of the method as a whole. This allows the expert to shift focus to the interpretation of results and the implications of these in the broader context of the archaeological question at hand.The reduction in need for the expert to be familiar with the visual system of remembering and cataloguing worn surface types for the purpose of future analysis also dramatically reduces the requirement for the associated extensive training (4-8 years is currently considered normal). Training requirements to use this new system will be on the scale of months; closer in line to other analytical systems in use across the applied sciences. This will make the technique more accessible across the discipline; a compound effect being the production of larger datasets pertaining to site function and subsequently a greater base for interpretation of heritage.