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hammerstone

 
Dictionary: ham·mer·stone   (hăm'ər-stōn') pronunciation
 
n. Archaeology.

A stone or cobble used as a pounding or pecking tool.


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[Ar]

In flintworking, the block of hard stone used to detach flakes from a core. Typically a conveniently shaped pebble or rounded stone is used; battering and cracking on the ends usually betray their use as hammerstones. See also maul.

 
Wikipedia: Hammerstone
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In archaeology, a hammerstone is a hard cobble used to strike lithic flakes off a lump of tool stone during the process of lithic reduction.[1] Often, a hammerstone is made of a material such as limestone or quartzite, is often ovoid in shape (to better fit the human hand), and develops telltale battering marks on one or both ends. Hammerstones are often found in archaeological recovery in association with other stone tool artifacts, debitage and/or objects of the hammer such as ore.[2][3] This technology was of major importance to prehistoric cultures before the age of metalworking; today, however, the use of hammerstones is mostly limited to flintknappers and others who wish to develop a better understanding of how stone tools were made.

An example of a cobble used as a hammerstone.

World regions

The hammerstone is a rather universal stone tool which appeared early in most regions of the world including Europe, India[4] and North America.

See also

References

  1. ^ Charles Joseph Singer, Richard Raper, Trevor Illtyd Williams, A History of Technology, 1954, Clarendon Press
  2. ^ Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, 1904
  3. ^ C. Michael Hogan, Los Osos Back Bay, Megalithic Portal, editor A. Burnham (2008)
  4. ^ Neelima Dahiya, Arts and Crafts in Northern India: From the Earliest Times to C. 200 B.C., 1986, D.K. Publishers

 
 
Learn More
pecking (in archaeology)
percussion flaking (in archaeology)
Eraillure

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Copyrights:

Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Archaeology Dictionary. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology. Copyright © 2002, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Hammerstone" Read more