A Milks
Biographic Data
| ID | 42488 |
|---|---|
| NAME | A Milks |
| GIVEN NAMES | A |
| FAMILY NAME | Milks |
| SIGNATURE | MILKS A |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Reading |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0779-6200 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 12 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 87 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 12 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2013 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
In Search of the Origins of Distance Hunting—The Use and Misuse of Tip Cross-sectional Geometry of Wooden Spears
The origins of weapons, and subsequent innovations, constitute a significant focus of archaeological research, particularly for the Pleistocene period. Due to preservation challenges, inorganic components of early weapons, such as lithic points, are often the only artefacts to survive. As a result, archaeologists rely on proxies for understanding performance and function of these lasting components including experimental research and ethnographic…
A reanalysis of the ‘perforated’ scapula from the Boxgrove Horse Butchery Site
Pleistocene Weaponry
Weaponry coevolved with the genus Homo , providing a means with which to actively hunt. This review of the evidence of the use of weapons in the Pleistocene traces the development from one‐piece wooden spears and throwing sticks through to innovative technologies such as harpoons and the bow. While hunting tools provide pathways for understanding subsistence strategies, they also are significant for mapping shifts in cognitive evolution, technolo…
Hunting lessons: Ethnography, archaeology and ‘raising the curtain’ to reveal how forager kids learn(ed) to hunt
The deep time record indicates that hunting played a key role in human evolution, including in the development of the life history of humans. The archaeological record preserves many different avenues for understanding early hunting including hunting gear, butchered prey, and art. As a complex skill, hunting likely involved a long learning period to develop competencies. While rare, there are some exceptional circumstances in which the toys and t…
Reassessing the Interpretative Potential of Ethnographic Collections for Early Hunting Technologies
Archaeological studies of early weaponry have relied for decades on ethnographic parallels—whether from ethnohistorical accounts, ethnographic literature, or from objects studied in museum collections. While such accounts and collected objects provided key data in the past, including of morphometrics and functionality, few studies have explored the quality of such data. In this paper, we critically assess a dominant theoretical paradigm, namely t…
Hunter-gatherer children in the past: An archaeological review
BaYaka Adolescent Boys Nominate Accessible Adult Men as Preferred Spear Hunting Models
Humans are selective social learners. In a cultural landscape with many potential models, learners must balance the cost associated with learning from successful models with learning from accessible ones. Using structured interviews, we investigate the model selection biases of Congolese BaYaka adolescent boys learning to hunt with spears (n = 24; mean age [mage] = 15.79 years; range, 12-20 years). Results from social relations models suggest tha…
A Review of Ethnographic Use of Wooden Spears and Implications for Pleistocene Hominin Hunting
Wooden spears are amongst the earliest weapons known from the archaeological record, with broken and complete examples known from Middle and Late Pleistocene Eurasian, Australian and South American sites. They were manufactured and used by multiple species of Homo , including H. sapiens . This paper comprises the first systematic review of ethnographic data on the recent use of wooden spears for hunting and human violence. It confronts the histor…
Where innovations flourish: An Ethnographic and Archaeological Overview of Hunter–gatherer Learning Contexts
Morpho-Metric Variability of Early Gravettian Tanged “Font-Robert” Points, and Functional Implications
Early spears as thrusting weapons: Isolating force and impact velocities in human performance trials
A Middle Palaeolithic to Early Upper Palaeolithic succession from an open air site at Beedings, West Sussex
The collection of flintwork from the site of Beedings, West Sussex (England) contains by far the largest number of stone tools from the earliest Upper Palaeolithic of Britain, and is one of the two largest assemblages of its type in Europe. Despite its obvious importance, its analysis has been hindered by several factors resulting from its early excavation. Chief amongst these is the almost total lack of stratigraphic or contextual information: i…
Early spears as thrusting weapons: Isolating force and impact velocities in human performance trials
Where innovations flourish: An Ethnographic and Archaeological Overview of Hunter–gatherer Learning Contexts
Hunter-gatherer children in the past: An archaeological review
BaYaka Adolescent Boys Nominate Accessible Adult Men as Preferred Spear Hunting Models
Humans are selective social learners. In a cultural landscape with many potential models, learners must balance the cost associated with learning from successful models with learning from accessible ones. Using structured interviews, we investigate the model selection biases of Congolese BaYaka adolescent boys learning to hunt with spears (n = 24; mean age [mage] = 15.79 years; range, 12-20 years). Results from social relations models suggest tha…
A Middle Palaeolithic to Early Upper Palaeolithic succession from an open air site at Beedings, West Sussex
The collection of flintwork from the site of Beedings, West Sussex (England) contains by far the largest number of stone tools from the earliest Upper Palaeolithic of Britain, and is one of the two largest assemblages of its type in Europe. Despite its obvious importance, its analysis has been hindered by several factors resulting from its early excavation. Chief amongst these is the almost total lack of stratigraphic or contextual information: i…
Reassessing the Interpretative Potential of Ethnographic Collections for Early Hunting Technologies
Archaeological studies of early weaponry have relied for decades on ethnographic parallels—whether from ethnohistorical accounts, ethnographic literature, or from objects studied in museum collections. While such accounts and collected objects provided key data in the past, including of morphometrics and functionality, few studies have explored the quality of such data. In this paper, we critically assess a dominant theoretical paradigm, namely t…
Hunting lessons: Ethnography, archaeology and ‘raising the curtain’ to reveal how forager kids learn(ed) to hunt
The deep time record indicates that hunting played a key role in human evolution, including in the development of the life history of humans. The archaeological record preserves many different avenues for understanding early hunting including hunting gear, butchered prey, and art. As a complex skill, hunting likely involved a long learning period to develop competencies. While rare, there are some exceptional circumstances in which the toys and t…
In Search of the Origins of Distance Hunting—The Use and Misuse of Tip Cross-sectional Geometry of Wooden Spears
The origins of weapons, and subsequent innovations, constitute a significant focus of archaeological research, particularly for the Pleistocene period. Due to preservation challenges, inorganic components of early weapons, such as lithic points, are often the only artefacts to survive. As a result, archaeologists rely on proxies for understanding performance and function of these lasting components including experimental research and ethnographic…
A Middle Palaeolithic to Early Upper Palaeolithic succession from an open air site at Beedings, West Sussex
The collection of flintwork from the site of Beedings, West Sussex (England) contains by far the largest number of stone tools from the earliest Upper Palaeolithic of Britain, and is one of the two largest assemblages of its type in Europe. Despite its obvious importance, its analysis has been hindered by several factors resulting from its early excavation. Chief amongst these is the almost total lack of stratigraphic or contextual information: i…
Morpho-Metric Variability of Early Gravettian Tanged “Font-Robert” Points, and Functional Implications
Early spears as thrusting weapons: Isolating force and impact velocities in human performance trials
A Review of Ethnographic Use of Wooden Spears and Implications for Pleistocene Hominin Hunting
Wooden spears are amongst the earliest weapons known from the archaeological record, with broken and complete examples known from Middle and Late Pleistocene Eurasian, Australian and South American sites. They were manufactured and used by multiple species of Homo , including H. sapiens . This paper comprises the first systematic review of ethnographic data on the recent use of wooden spears for hunting and human violence. It confronts the histor…
Where innovations flourish: An Ethnographic and Archaeological Overview of Hunter–gatherer Learning Contexts
Hunter-gatherer children in the past: An archaeological review
BaYaka Adolescent Boys Nominate Accessible Adult Men as Preferred Spear Hunting Models
Humans are selective social learners. In a cultural landscape with many potential models, learners must balance the cost associated with learning from successful models with learning from accessible ones. Using structured interviews, we investigate the model selection biases of Congolese BaYaka adolescent boys learning to hunt with spears (n = 24; mean age [mage] = 15.79 years; range, 12-20 years). Results from social relations models suggest tha…
Reassessing the Interpretative Potential of Ethnographic Collections for Early Hunting Technologies
Archaeological studies of early weaponry have relied for decades on ethnographic parallels—whether from ethnohistorical accounts, ethnographic literature, or from objects studied in museum collections. While such accounts and collected objects provided key data in the past, including of morphometrics and functionality, few studies have explored the quality of such data. In this paper, we critically assess a dominant theoretical paradigm, namely t…
Pleistocene Weaponry
Weaponry coevolved with the genus Homo , providing a means with which to actively hunt. This review of the evidence of the use of weapons in the Pleistocene traces the development from one‐piece wooden spears and throwing sticks through to innovative technologies such as harpoons and the bow. While hunting tools provide pathways for understanding subsistence strategies, they also are significant for mapping shifts in cognitive evolution, technolo…
Hunting lessons: Ethnography, archaeology and ‘raising the curtain’ to reveal how forager kids learn(ed) to hunt
The deep time record indicates that hunting played a key role in human evolution, including in the development of the life history of humans. The archaeological record preserves many different avenues for understanding early hunting including hunting gear, butchered prey, and art. As a complex skill, hunting likely involved a long learning period to develop competencies. While rare, there are some exceptional circumstances in which the toys and t…
In Search of the Origins of Distance Hunting—The Use and Misuse of Tip Cross-sectional Geometry of Wooden Spears
The origins of weapons, and subsequent innovations, constitute a significant focus of archaeological research, particularly for the Pleistocene period. Due to preservation challenges, inorganic components of early weapons, such as lithic points, are often the only artefacts to survive. As a result, archaeologists rely on proxies for understanding performance and function of these lasting components including experimental research and ethnographic…
A reanalysis of the ‘perforated’ scapula from the Boxgrove Horse Butchery Site
Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology (9 works) · Archaeology (8 works) · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies (8 works) · Geography (8 works) · Forensic Anthropology and Bioarchaeology Studies (5 works) · History (5 works) · Biology (4 works) · Engineering (4 works) · History (4 works) · Anthropology (3 works)