Paleolithic Epipalaeolithic Mesolithic Neolithic In archaeology, lithic technology includes a broad array of techniques used to produce usable tools from various types of stone.
By analysing modern stone tool usage within an ethnoarchaeological context, insight into the breadth of factors influencing lithic technologies in general may be studied.
These characteristics allow the person forming the stone (the flintknapper) to control the reduction precisely to make a wide variety of tools.
[3] However, Mackay and Marwick (2011) found that this pattern does not always hold true in their application of this theory to the South African Pleistocene record.
The technique with the least detail is conducted using a hammerstone, in which a hard rock (often sandstone) is struck against the raw material to chip off large flakes and begin to shape the stone.
The next technique allows for an increased level of detail; using a soft hammer (often made of wood or bone), one can chip away flakes of material with more precision.
Another technique, known as indirect percussion, combines the use of a punch and a hammer to apply pressure to a precise area of the stone.
Many early Middle Eastern and American civilizations used obsidian as a basis for tools as its internal structure made it easier to chip away than most of the other stones in the area.
During an experiment conducted by Dibble and Whittaker, they found that the angle hit at the exterior platform would produce different flake types.