Ivory debitage by fracture in the Aurignacian: experimental and archaeological examples

The recent focus on methods of osseous material transformation in the study of Upper Paleolithic technologies has shown that approaches to these materials vary between phases of the Upper Paleolithic. In the absence of the groove-and-splinter technique of blank extraction first widely documented in the Gravettian, production of ivory, bone, and antler blanks in the Aurignacian relied on processes of splitting and percussive fracture. The technological treatment of bone and antler in Aurignacian contexts has benefitted from renewed attention, but ivory processing and blank-production remains poorly understood in spite of the unique place that ivory occupies in many Aurignacian assemblages. In order to clarify the diagnostic features of ivory debitage, a series of experiments was conducted to produce ivory flakes under varying knapping conditions. These diagnostic features are products of the application of force to the complex internal morphology of proboscidean tusks, as explained in this article. Improved criteria for the identification of ivory flakes and manufacturing byproducts in the archaeological record are presented, and are illustrated with examples from two Aurignacian sites well known for ivory processing: Abri Castanet (Dordogne, France) and Hohle Fels Cave (Swabian Jura, Germany). A better understanding of ivory structure and improved identification of the products of ivory debitage in the Aurignacian will aid in the recovery and analysis of ivory artifacts and further efforts to reconstruct technological approaches to this complex material.