Use and maintenance of trapezoids in the initial Early Upper Paleolithic of the Japanese Islands

This paper presents a case study about trapezoids from the initial Early Upper Paleolithic Period in the Japanese Islands. The use and the maintenance of trapezoids (or tools equipped with trapezoids) from Layer BBV of the Doteue site Loc. d and Loc. e in Shizuoka Prefecture are discussed through study of their breakage patterns. The results indicate that trapezoids were designed to be basally hafted and used as multifunctional tools for hunting and processing. The accumulation of discarded broken trapezoids by retooling at the site suggests repeated occupations of the site by planned hunting activities, proposed as an indication of modern human behavior of the initial Early Upper Paleolithic in the Japanese Islands.