Ancient Explorers of Cyprus: Traversing Land and Sea in the Epipalaeolithic

The Ancient Seafaring Explorers in Cyprus (ASEC) project conducted its inaugural field season from September 10-September 20, 2019. The goals of the project are to investigate the earliest occupation of the island, specifically the Late Epi-Palaeolithic through early Neolithic periods, (ca. 10,000 -8000 years ago). The project aims to reveal evidence for the nature of these early hunter-gatherer occupations at sites on the south coast of Cyprus, both on land and those submerged by rising sea levels over subsequent millennia.

Communities of Practice at Kharaneh IV: Flintknapping and Skill Acquisition

During the summer of 2019, I conducted a raw material survey to ground truth previous work that had identified various flint outcrops in the region as the sources for flint at Kharaneh IV and to collect said flint for experimental flintknapping. With a small team, we collected over 300lbs of flint and worked to reproduce the stone tool technologies while in Jordan. Both high and low quality flint was brought back to Berkeley for future experimentation with novice flintknappers. This experiment is designed to help identify skilled vs unskilled flintknappers in the archaeological record.