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Dating Shuidonggou and the Upper Palaeolithic blade industry in North China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

David B. Madsen ,
Li Jingzen ,
P. Jeffrey Brantingham ,
Gao Xing ,
Robert G. Elston  and
Robert L. Bettinger
David B. Madsen
Affiliation:
Utah Geological Survey, 1594 West North Temple, Salt Lake City, UT 84114, USA
Li Jingzen
Affiliation:
Ningxia Archaeological Institute, 113 Li Ming Street, Yinchuan 75001, Ningxia, PRC
P. Jeffrey Brantingham
Affiliation:
Santa Fe Institute, 1399 Hyde Park Road, Santa Fe NM 87501, USA
Gao Xing
Affiliation:
Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology & Paleoanthropology, PO Box 142, Beijing 100044, PRC
Robert G. Elston
Affiliation:
PO Box 500, Silver City, NV 89428, USA
Robert L. Bettinger
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of California, Davis CA 95616, USA
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Abstract

Shuidonggou is unique within the Chinese Palaeolithic sequence and its assemblage is reminiscent of Upper Palaeolithic core-and-blade technologies in Mongolia and southern Siberia. Limited chronological controls have prevented evaluation of this technology in both the Chinese and greater Eurasian Palaeolithic. Dating of recently discovered hearths at Locality 2 places Shuidonggou firmly at 29,000–24,000 BP, and suggests the spread of the Eurasian large blade technology was primarily from north to south. The concurrent production of small microblade-like bipolar bladelets at the site may also presage the development of a microlithic industry.

Keywords

Chinalithic technologymicrolithicShuidonggouUpper Palaeolithic
Type
Papers
Information
Antiquity , Volume 75 , Issue 290 , December 2001 , pp. 706 - 716
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 2001

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