Flint Daggers in Prehistoric Europe

by Catherine Frieman, Berit Valentin Eriksen

Overview

For more than a century flint daggers have been among the most closely studied and most heavily published later prehistoric lithic tools. It is well established that they are found across Europe and beyond, and that many were widely circulated over many generations. Yet, few researchers have attempted to discuss the entirety of the flint dagger phenomenon. The present volume brings together papers that address questions of the regional variability and socio-technical complexity of flint daggers and their production. It focuses on the typology, chronology, technology, functionality and meaning of flint and other lithic daggers produced primarily in Europe, but also in the Eastern Mediterranean and East Asia, in prehistory. The 14 papers by leading researchers provide a comprehensive overview of the state of knowledge concerning various flint dagger corpora as well as potential avenues for the development of a research agenda across national, regional and disciplinary boundaries. The volume originates from a session held at the 2011 meeting of the European Association of Archaeology but includes additional commissioned contributions.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781785700194
Publisher:	Oxbow Books
Publication date:	12/31/2015
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	48 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Catherine J Frieman is the Lecturer in European Archaeology at the Australian National University. Her research primarily concerns the transition from Stone Age to Metal Age via the close study of Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age lithic artefacts. She has ongoing collaborations in Australia, Japan, Vietnam and Britain where she is currently coordinating the excavation and survey of later prehistoric sites in south-eastern Cornwall.

Table of Contents

Contents
1. Foreword
2. Introduction. Flint daggers: A historical, typological and methodological primer (Frieman & Eriksen)
3. Lithic Daggers in the Ancient Near East – Whence and Whither? (Zimmermann)
4. Dagger-like flint implements in Bronze Age Egypt (Graves-Brown)
5. Origins and Development of Flint Daggers in Italy (Guilbeau)
6. On flint and copper daggers in Chalcolithic Italy (Steiniger)
7. The Pressigny Phenomenon (Ihuel, Pelegrin, Mallet & Verjux)
8. The cultural biography of the Scandinavian daggers in the northern Netherlands (Van Gijn)
9. A parallel-flaked Scandinavian type flint dagger from Lent: an indicator of contacts between the central Netherlands and northern Jutland during Bell Beaker times (Drenth)
10. Bloody Daggers. A discussion of the function of Late Neolithic flint daggers from a South Scandinavian point of view (Varberg)
11. Making a point: Re-evaluating British flint daggers in their cultural and technological contexts (Frieman)
12. Bifacial flint daggers from the Early Bronze Age in Volhynia – Lesser Poland (Grużdź, Migal & Pyżewicz)
13. Silicite daggers from the territories of the Czech Republic and Slovakia (a preliminary study) (Přichystal and Šebela)
14. Metal Adoption and the Emergence of Stone Daggers in Northeast Asia (Shoda)
15. ‘Art thou but a dagger of the mind?’ Understanding lithic daggers in Europe and beyond (Frieman)

Editorial Reviews

…a well-produced volume with a range of papers that will appeal not only to those interested in lithics but also to researchers engaged in the wider aspects of material culture, the interaction of flint and metal technologies and changes in social structures during the Late Neolithic and Bronze Age ... overall the editors are to be congratulated for an interesting and informative volume which will provides much direction for future research.

Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society - Philippa Bradley