Handaxe enigmas
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3919277 |
|---|---|
| Authors | T Wynn (0000-0002-4341-3564, University of Colorado Colorado Springs, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1995 |
| Volume | 27 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 10-24 |
| Publication date | 1995-06-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | World Archaeology (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0043-8243 • E-ISSN: 1470-1375 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/00438243.1995.9980290 |
| OpenAlex | W4250090019 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 84 |
| References cited | 29 |
This article discusses the implications handaxes have for symbolic behavior. After arguing that handaxes were, in fact, intentional products of prehistoric minds, and not simply cores, the article discusses the form‐function fallacy, the possible semiotic role of handaxes, the role of rule‐governed behavior in handaxe manufacture, and the nature of technological learning. The conclusions are negative: handaxes were not signs, did not require grammar‐like rules and did not require symbolic instruction. They would, however, have been consistent with a 'mimetic' culture
Biology · Cognitive science · Epistemology · Fallacy · Function (biology · Grammar · Linguistics · Semiotics · History · Language and cultural evolution · Philosophy · Psychology
Theory of mind as a proxy for Palaeolithic language ability
Modeling the Past
Handaxes and Biface Technology
Modeling the Past
Cultural Evolution in Africa and Eurasia During the Middle and Late Pleistocene
Modeling the Past
The Early Acheulean inAfrica
Agmt3-D
Stone tools, language and the brain in human evolution
The Origin of The Acheulean
Rethinking the “we” in “we” intentionality
The Consequences of Human Behavior
Handaxes
Cultural Evolution During the Middle and Late Pleistocene in Africa and Eurasia
A Geometric Morphometric Assessment of Plan Shape in Bone and Stone Acheulean Bifaces from the Middle Pleistocene Site of Castel di Guido, Latium, Italy
Cultural Evolution in Africa and Eurasia During the Middle and Late Pleistocene
Learning in the Acheulean
The Acheulean of peninsular India with special reference to the Hungsi and Baichbal valleys of the lower Deccan
Stone Age Visiting Cards Revisited
Neanderthal Language
The Application of Elliptic Fourier Analysis in Understanding Biface Shape and Symmetry Through the British Acheulean
Use-Wear Analysis Shows Changing Handaxe Grip and Use Across Time at la Noira (France)
Homo faber Revisited
The semiotic coevolution of mind and culture
The handaxe reconsidered
Further Thoughts on the Genetic Argument for Handaxes
Measuring behavioural and cognitive complexity in lithic technology throughout human evolution
Obviously sequential, but continuous or staged? Refits and cognition in three late paleolithic assemblages from Japan
Lithic Modes A–I
Testing the Effect of Learning Conditions and Individual Motor/Cognitive Differences on Knapping Skill Acquisition
The Information Animal and the Super-brain
Representation and Recursion in the Archaeological Record
What is a Burin? Typology, Technology, and Interregional Comparison
The influence of cognitive evolution on handaxe making skill in the Acheulean
The Movius Line and the Bamboo Hypothesis
Bits and pieces
South African handaxes reloaded
Making and Using Stone Tools
Handaxes and the Pick-Chopper Industry of Pleistocene China
A faltering origin for the Acheulean? Technological and cognitive implications from FLK West (Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania)
Torque creation and force variation along the cutting edges of Acheulean handaxes
Materiality, Agency and Evolution of Lithic Technology
Influence of Handaxe Size and Shape on Cutting Efficiency
Cueva Negra del Estrecho del Río Quípar (Murcia, Spain)
The symmetry of handaxes from the Danjiangkou Reservoir Region (central China)
Beyond a Cutting Edge
Handaxes in South Africa
Factors affecting Acheulean handaxe variation
The function and role of bifaces in the Late Middle Paleolithic of southwestern France
The Mental Template in Handaxe Manufacture
Large flake Acheulian
Handaxes as a Measure of the Mental Capabilities of Early Hominids
Biface Knapping Skill in the East African Acheulean
Acheulean variation and selection
Why are some handaxes symmetrical? Testing the influence of handaxe morphology on butchery effectiveness
On the Significance of Acheulean Biface Variability in Southern Britain
Acheulean variability and hominin dispersals
Introducing Lithikos 2 - a novel volumetric morphometric analyser via a volume-based approach to handaxe refinement
Introducing Lithikos 1 – A novel volumetric morphometric analyser via comparative analyses of Acheulean handaxe mirror asymmetry
When less is more
The Skills of Handaxe Making
Imposed Form in the Early Acheulean? Evidence from Gona, Afar, Ethiopia
Stone tool shaping without direct cultural transmission
Pronounced increase in biface knapping skill half a million years ago in Britain
Were Acheulean Bifaces Deliberately Made Symmetrical? Archaeological and Experimental Evidence
Hominin Stone Flaking and the Emergence of ‘Top-down’ Design in Human Evolution
Is Acheulean Handaxe Shape the Result of Imposed ‘Mental Templates’ or Emergent in Manufacture? Dissolving the Dichotomy through Exploring ‘Communities of Practice’ at Boxgrove, UK
Middle Pleistocene handaxes from the Korean Peninsula
Artefacts of apes, humans, and others
Are Victoria West cores "proto-Levallois"? A phylogenetic assessment
Scraper reduction and "imposed form" at the Lower Palaeolithic site of High Lodge, England
Reassessing the production of handaxes versus flakes from a functional perspective
Goodwill hunting? Debates over the 'meaning' of Lower Palaeolithic handaxe form revisited
The design space of stone flaking
Making hands and tools
On questions surrounding the Acheulean 'tradition
Symmetry is its own reward
A large handaxe from Wadi Dabsa and early hominin adaptations within the Arabian Peninsula
Handaxes
Peirce and Archaeology
Acheulian Giant-Core Technology
The Large Cutting Tools from the South African Acheulean and the Question of Social Traditions
Psychological components of middle paleolithic technology
Why is there a lack of Mode 3 Levallois technologies in East Asia? A phylogenetic test of the Movius-Schick hypothesis
Directions in cognitive anthropology
Tools, language, and cognition in human evolution
Chimpanzee Material Culture
How Monkeys See the World
Cultural learning
On the Nature and Evolution of Imitation in the Animal Kingdom
Experimental determination of stone tool uses
Apprenticeship
Companion Encyclopedia of Anthropology
Reduction Sequences in the Manufacture of Mousterian Implements of France
The study of material culture today
Symbols and paleolithic artifacts
Two Developments in the Mind of Early Homo
The use of canonical variates for determination of biface manufacturing technology at boxgrove lower palaeolithic site and the behavioural implications of this technology
Pan the Tool-Maker
Archaeology
The Lower and Middle Palaeolithic Periods in Britain
Technology and Society during the Middle Pleistocene
The Archaeology of Perception
Primate Calls, Human Language, and Nonverbal Communication [and Comments and Reply]
Behavioral inferences from Early Stone artifact assemblages
Allometry and multidimensional form in Acheulean bifaces from Kilombe, Kenya
Hominid Evolution and Community Ecology
Regional Comparison of the Shapes of Later Acheulean Handaxes
Symboling and the Middle-Upper Palaeolithic Transition
The Projectile Capabilities of an Acheulian Handaxe From Olorgesailie
Culture
Approaches to style in lithic archaeology
| Unique citing works | 84 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 3 |
| Citation span | 1998 - 2026 (29) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 83 |