The Nihewan Basin in North China is one of the most important palaeoanthropological archives in Asia as it preserves an abundance of mammal fossils and lithic assemblages. In particular, a series of sites are dated to between the Gauss-Matuyama and Matuyama-Brunhes geomagnetic reversals (2.58~0.78 Ma), making the Nihewan Basin an ideal region to examine Early Pleistocene archaeological sites and technological trends in eastern Asia. Here we describe the lithic assemblage from the Banshan site in the Nihewan Basin, which is dated to 1.32 Ma by paleo-magnetic dating.

The Banshan site (114°39′47″E, 40°13′32″N, 858 m asl) is located in the northern upper part of the Majuangou site, about 1.5 km southwest of the Cenjiawan village in Yangyuan County, Hebei Province. The site was discovered and test excavated in 1990 and yielded a few remains. In order to reveal cultural features of the site integrally, formal excavation was undertaken in 2003. A total of 42 m² was exposed, uncovering 421 stone artifacts and more than 1600 pieces of animal fossils.

In terms of the Banshan lithic assemblage, raw materials were procured from the adjacent areas and predominated by chert and volcanic breccia, in addition to a small amount of andesite porphyry, quartz, dacite, andesite, and rhyolite porphyry, and so on. The artifact types of the site mainly include cores, flakes, tools, pebbles, blocks, angular fragments and shatters, etc. The artifacts are predominantly small (20≤L<50 mm) in size. Artifacts (L≥100 mm) are present in rather small amounts. The flaking technique is dominated by direct hard hammer percussion, and bipolar technique is used occasionally. There are almost no special platform preparation and shaping out of the core-to-be, indicating a simple debitage method at the site. The tools include scrapers, borers, notches and unidentified pieces. These pieces are primarily made on flakes and casually retouched by direct hammer percussion. Overall, the lithic industry of Banshan is characterized by local raw material exploitation strategy, simple core-flake debitage and expedient small flake-based tool inventory. Comparison of Banshan with other Early Pleistocene sites (e.g., Xiaochangliang, Donggutuo and Cenjiawan) indicates a flexible approach in the raw material utilization and a noticeable technological development tendency in the Nihewan Basin.