Abstract:

In summer 2014, we excavated the Fuyihegeliang Locality Pit 3(named QX2014T3, 35°26′22′′N, 112°0′43′′E) for 6 m² in area, which is an important locality of the Xiachuan site. There were 1036 stone artifacts recovered from the pit, with 853 pieces from the Lower Cultural Layer and 183 from the Upper Cultural Layer. The lower layer dated to 40~30 kaBP with the upper layer formed after 30 kaBP.

Exotic black flint was the predominant raw material, and included light-duty tools such as scrapers, pièces esquillées, denticulates, endscrapers and backed segments. In the Lower Cultural Layer, heavy-duty implements such as grinding tools, stone axes and adze-like tools were mostly of local quartz sandstone. There was also a small amount of agate and siliceous mudstone used.

The Lower Cultural Layer objects were formed directly from hard hammer percussion without prepared cores. Products lacked standardization. In the Upper Cultural Layer, pressure flaking was widely used in producing microblades and retouched tools.

Heavy-duty tools (stone axes and adze-like tools) were missing from the Upper Cultural Layer, which also showed different retouching methods. For example, endscapers were mostly processed by hard hammer in the Lower Cultural Layer, in contrast to pressure flaking of the Upper Cultural Layer.

In general, the cultural technology of these two layers was different. The Lower Culture Layer belonged to a simple core-flake technology with heavy-duty tools (stone axes, grinding tools, stone hammers) and light-duty tools (scrapers, notches, points, denticulates, pièces esquillées, endscrapers, spur-like tools, backed segments). The Upper Cultural Layer was mostly microblade technology, with burins, endscraper and pièces esquillées as the main tool types. These findings offer new materials for research of the Middle-Upper Paleolithic transition and the emergence of microblade technology in China.

Key words: Xiachuan, Lithics, Microblade, Upper Paleolithic