Abstract:

In May 2016, a short survey of Shanting District, Zaozhuang City was carried out and two technological types of lithic assemblage were collected, including 161 stone artifacts. About one third of the artifacts were collected from in situ positions within the stratigraphy and two thirds from surface. Four Paleolithic localities with clear stratigraphy were discovered at the foot of the mountain. The stone artifacts of WMM (WYZ, MW, MT) sites included flakes (n=30), chunks (n=25) and debitage (n=13), followed by cores (n=11), microblade cores (n =5) and retouched items (n=3). Raw materials are primarily quartz and chert. Fangshan site (FS) included flakes (n=21), debitage (n=15), cores (n=14), followed by chunks (n=12) and retouched items (n=12). All raw material was quartz derived from local sources, and all raw material at the four locations derived from outcrops of mountain rock around the sites. The stone artifacts from the WMM sites were buried in a similar layer of cinnamon soil. These included microblade cores, similar to components of microblade technology in the Yishuhe River Basin in southeast Shandong Province. Hard hammer percussion was the main flaking technique,followed by bipolar technique. Retouched tools are small in number and include a notch, a burin, and an end-scraper manufactured on flakes. Stratigraphic observations and the absolute age of the known lithic assemblage in Yishuhe River Basin suggest that these three newly discovered localities belong to the late Pleistocene. FS site shows strong characteristics of the bi-polar flaking technique. The retouched tool assemblage includes notches and scrapers. The geological age of the site by stratigraphic observations is speculated to be late Pleistocene.

Key words: Shanting District, Zaozhuang City, Paleolithic, Microblade cores, Bipolar technique