Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-ndw9j Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-02T18:57:39.627Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Primitive Bone Fracturing: A Method of Research

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Hind Sadek-Kooros
Hind Sadek-Kooros*
Affiliation:
Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

A preliminary study of the form and fracture patterns of sheep metatarsals from Jaguar Cave is used to illustrate a method for the quantitative analysis of primitive bone fracturing techniques. Criteria of form, fracture, and function are defined and weighted, on the basis of experiments with green bone, and the aid of computers is enlisted to process the archaeological specimens via these criteria. The data is searched for: a. the definition of a technique of intentional fracture, b. the formation of classes of intentionally fractured and retouched bone fragments, and c. the identification of statistically perfect tools and not-tools, determined by higher or lower correlations of weighted sums. Conclusions are drawn from the analysis of the Jaguar Cave bone and bone from other early collections. The application of linear decision theory to the analysis of bone fractures was first attempted in a Ph.D. dissertation (Sadek-Kooros 1966), and a shorter version of the present paper was read at the Thirty-Fourth Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, on May 2, 1969.

Type
Articles
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 37 , Issue 3 , July 1972 , pp. 369 - 382
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1972

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Brain, C. K. 1967 Bone weathering and the problem of bone pseudo-tools. The South African Journal of Science 63:97–99.Google Scholar
Breuil, Abbe Henri 1939 Bone and antler industry of the Choukoutien Sinanthropus site. Palaeontologica Sinica 6.Google Scholar
Chmielewsky, Waldemar 1958 Etat de conservation des ossements d’animaux receuillis dans la Grotte de Nietopersowa de Jerzmahovice Biuletyn Peryglacjalny 6:279–283.Google Scholar
Clark, J. G. D. 1953 The economic approach to prehistory. Albert Reckitt Archaeological Lecture, British Academy, London.Google Scholar
Evans, F. G. 1956 Stress and strain in bones. Charles C. Thomas Public. Bannerstone House, Springfield.Google Scholar
Kitching, James 1963 Bone tooth and horn tools of palaolithic man: an account of the osteodontokeratic discoveries in Pin Hole Cave. Manchester University Press, Derbyshire.Google Scholar
Muhlhover, Franz 1937 Zur Frage der protolithischen Knochenwerkzeuge. Wiener Prahistorische Zeitschrift; 24 Jahrgang: 1–9, Wien.Google Scholar
Quigley, Thomas Bartlett 1963 Fractures, dislocations and sprains. Surgery Ch 32:1217–1264.Google Scholar
Sadek, Hind 1965 Distribution of bird remains at Jaguar Cave. Tebiwa. 8:20–29.Google Scholar
Sadek-Kooros, Hind 1966 Jaguar Cave: an Early Man site in the Beaverhead Mountains of Idaho. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation. Department of Anthropology, Harvard University.Google Scholar
Schmid, Elisabeth 1964 Uber gerundete Knochenbruchstucke aus dem rdmischen Strassenkies von Augusta Raurica. Separatabdruck aus Festschrift Alfred Buhler. Basel.Google Scholar
Schmidt, Alfred 1937 Uber die Entstehung protolitischer Knochenwerkzeuge Weiner Prahistorische Zeitschrift 24 Jahrgang: 1–14. Wien.Google Scholar
Semenov, S. A. 1964 Prehistoric technology. Cory, Adams and Mackay, London.Google Scholar
Sutcliffe, Anthony 1970 Spotted hyena: crusher, gnawer, digester and collector of bones. Nature 227:1110–1113.CrossRefGoogle Scholar