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The microburin technique is a special procedure for cutting up
lithic blade In archaeology, a blade is a type of stone tool created by striking a long narrow flake from a stone core. This process of reducing the stone and producing the blades is called lithic reduction. Archaeologists use this process of flintknapping to ...
s which yields fragments that can be used in the manufacture of utensils. The usable fragments are basically geometric
microlith A microlith is a small stone tool usually made of flint or chert and typically a centimetre or so in length and half a centimetre wide. They were made by humans from around 35,000 to 3,000 years ago, across Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia. Th ...
s. This technique has been recorded through the Old World, from at least the Mesolithic. It has also been recorded from the later phases of the
Upper Paleolithic The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...
, as triangular and trapeze shaped microliths have been found from the end of the French Magdalenian although they are very rare. The microburin blow technique has not been found, at present, in the
New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. ...
. The technique consists of taking a blade (a
flake Flake or Flakes may refer to: People * Floyd H. Flake (born 1945), A.M.E. minister, university administrator, former U.S. representative * Jeff Flake (born 1962), American politician * Christian "Flake" Lorenz, German musician and member of ...
can also be used) and placing its upper end against a support with a sharp edge (as occurs in the use of an anvil). A notch is then made and enlarged using light blows or by pressing the edge of the piece against the angled edge of the support. The notch is enlarged until the lithic blade snaps with a gentle but positive action ( flection). If the technique is carried out effectively, the break should be oblique to the axis of the blade and near to its proximal zone, giving two different pieces: which are called respectively the proximal
microburin A microburin is a characteristic waste product from manufacture of lithic tools — sometimes confused with an authentic burin — which is characteristic of the Mesolithic, but which has been recorded from the end of the Upper Paleolithic until ...
, which is the smaller of the two pieces and which retains the heel and conchoidal flakes from the original piece; and the ''trihedral apex'', that is the larger part of the blade. The flexion break is also slightly curved and oblique to the faces of the blade: the plane of the break is curved such that it can be seen in the upper face of the ''trihedral apex'' and its negative can be seen in the lower face of the ''microburin''. It is thought that the microburin blow technique was born from the repetition of an accident that occurs when forming laminar microliths. The accident, which causes the unwanted breaking of the microlith, can occur when the blade is subjected to abrupt retouches on one of its sides. Therefore the technique is more comparable to a technological evolution than it is to a new invention.
Image:Microburil 1.png, Notch in the proximal zone of the blade, just before the microburin flection Image:Microburil 2.png, Product of the microburin flection: a proximal microburin and a trihedral apex Image:Microburil 3.png, Creation of a second distal notch by the same technique already described Image:Microburil 4.png, Second flection resulting in a double trihedral apex and a distal microburin The microburin is a characteristic waste product of this technique, such that no function can be attributed to it (although some authors do not discount that these waste pieces were not later put to some use, this has not been demonstrated irrefutably). On the other hand the ''trihedral apex'' is the raw material used for the manufacture of microliths, such as backed edge blades. Usually the trihedral apex is subjected to the technique again until another flection yields another two pieces, known as the ''distal microburin'' (another characteristic waste product) and the central part of the worked piece that possesses a double trihedral apex, with converging fracture lines.
This double trihedral apex can then be used to form
geometric microliths A microlith is a small stone tool usually made of flint or chert and typically a centimetre or so in length and half a centimetre wide. They were made by humans from around 35,000 to 3,000 years ago, across Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia. The ...
(''triangles'', ''trapezes'' or ''lunate-shaped'') following abrupt retouching of both worked edges. Often the retouching does not cover the whole edge and it is possible to see part of the fracture plain on these microliths. This has allowed researchers to reconstruct with a great deal of certainty the actions of the artisans who made these microliths. Image:Microburil 5.png, It is possible to form many types of microliths from the same blade Image:Microlito Trapecio.png,
Trapeze A trapeze is a short horizontal bar hung by ropes or metal straps from a ceiling support. It is an aerial apparatus commonly found in circus performances. Trapeze acts may be static, spinning (rigged from a single point), swinging or flying, an ...
Image:Microlito Triángulo.png, Triangle Image:Microlito Segmento de-círculo.png,
Lunate Lunate is a crescent or moon-shaped microlith. In the specialized terminology of lithic reduction, a lunate flake is a small, crescent-shaped flake removed from a stone tool during the process of pressure flaking. In the Natufian period, a lun ...
The same microburin blow technique can be used to form other types of non-geometric microliths, such as, for example, the Tardenois tips.


See also

*
Microlith A microlith is a small stone tool usually made of flint or chert and typically a centimetre or so in length and half a centimetre wide. They were made by humans from around 35,000 to 3,000 years ago, across Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia. Th ...


References

:* (pages 127-130) :* (pages 144-147) {{DEFAULTSORT:Microburin Technique Archaeological artefact types