Lithics
Macroscopic Approaches to Analysis

A completely updated and revised edition of the groundbreaking manual on stone artifact analysis, Lithics.

William Andrefsky, Jr (Author)

9780521615006, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 8 December 2005

326 pages, 103 b/w illus. 36 tables
24.4 x 16.8 x 1.5 cm, 0.52 kg

' … for a mostly technical reference work, the text is highly readable and well-illustrated. the book must be recommended as an indispensable and relatively comprehensive overview of lithic analysis.This edition of Lithics clearly illustrates that the discipline is growing stronger with increase emphasis on theoretical and methodological rigour.' South African Archaeological Bulletin

This book is a fully updated and revised edition of William Andrefsky Jr's ground-breaking manual on lithic analysis. Designed for students and professional archaeologists, this highly illustrated book explains the fundamental principles of the measurement, recording and analysis of stone tools and stone tool production debris. Introducing the reader to lithic raw materials, classification, terminology and key concepts, it comprehensively explores methods and techniques, presenting detailed case studies of lithic analysis from around the world. It examines new emerging techniques, such as the advances being made in lithic debitage analysis and lithic tool analysis, and includes a new section on stone tool functional studies. An extensive and expanded glossary makes this book an invaluable reference for archaeologists at all levels.

1. A brief introduction to lithic analysis
2. Basics of stone tool production
3. Lithic raw materials
4. Getting started in lithic analysis: identification and classification
5. Flake debitage attributes
6. Approaches to debitage analysis
7. Approaches to stone tool analysis
8. Artifact diversity and site function
9. Lithic analysis and prehistoric sedentism
10. Concluding remarks.

Subject Areas: Archaeological science, methodology & techniques [HDW], Archaeological theory [HDA]