Mammoth hunting – Impact traces on backed implements from a mammoth bone accumulation at Kraków Spadzista (southern Poland)

•We presents the results of a use-wear analysis of backed implements from Kraków Spadzista site.•Most of these tools (more than 57%) had been used as inserts of projectile hunting weapons.•Gravettian hunters used shouldered points and backed blades for mammoth hunting.

This article presents the results of use-wear analysis of the backed implements (shouldered points and backed blades) discovered at Kraków Spadzista, trench B + B1. Of the 197 examined tools, 113 specimens (55%) bear traces of use. In this group, 55 artefacts show a complete set of clear, characteristic impact traces and could be interpreted as the flint parts of thrown weapons. They were used in mammoth hunting at the Kraków Spadzista site 24 thousand years ago. The hafting method can be identified on the basis of the direction of linear traces and impact negatives. Most of these artefacts were placed at the top of wooden or bone shaft. Only single specimens were attached laterally.