Forbidden Archeology: The Hidden History of the Human Race

Another type similar to a common variety of eolith was the nosed scraper. About this type of tool, Leakey stated: “There is a median projection on the working edge, either bluntly pointed, rounded, or occasionally spatulate, flanked on either side by a trimmed notch or, more rarely, by straight convergent trimmed edges” (M. Leakey 1971, p. 6). Hollow scrapers, with a broad curved indentation on one side of the stone forming the working edge, are another type common both to the Eolithic and Oldowan assemblages. Leakey described this type as follows: “Specimens in which the notch is unquestionably prepared are relatively scarce in both the heavyand light-duty groups, although light-duty flakes and other fragments with notches apparently caused by utilisation are common” (M. Leakey 1971, p. 6). In other words, on these Oldowan specimens, as in the case of eoliths, the working edge of the stone had simply been modified by slight chipping or use.

One of the more remarkable coincidences of form may be found in the presence of tools called awls or borers in both Eolithic and Oldowan assemblages. Of the awls in the Developed Oldowan, Mary Leakey (1971, p. 7) stated: “They are characterized by short, rather thick, pointed projections, generally at the distal ends of flakes, but sometimes on a lateral edge. In the majority, the points are formed by a trimmed notch, on either one or both sides, but occasionally by straight convergent trimmed edges. The points are often blunted by use and have sometimes been snapped off at the base.” This description perfectly applies to the awls collected and displayed by both Harrison and Moir. The identity of the Oldowan and English specimens is very much evident in Figure 3.5 (p. 96).

About the above-mentioned light-duty flakes and fragments, Leakey wrote: “Flakes and other small fragments with chipping and blunting on the edges occur in both the Oldowan and developed Oldowan but are more common in the latter. They fall into three groups: (a) with straight edges; (b) with concave or notched edges; (c) with convex edges. There is also a miscellaneous group with indeterminate chipping. In specimens with straight edges, chipping is usually evident on both sides, while in the notched and convex series it is usually only present on one face” (M. Leakey 1971, pp. 7–8). Leakey also described “lightduty utilised flakes” (Figure 3.29). Of these, she stated: “The utilised edges are sharp, with ‘nibbled’ one-directional flaking, which is sometimes present on two of the edges” (M. Leakey 1971, p. 37). The above descriptions could also apply to many of the European eoliths.

3.7.3 Who Made the Eolithic and Oldowan Implements?

Now comes a crucial question: to what sort of being should the manufacture of the quite similar Oldowan and Eolithic tool types be assigned? Most of the tools in both the Oldowan and Eolithic assemblages are very crude. Scientists are prepared to accept practically without question that the Oldowan implements were made by Homo habilis, a primitive hominid species which, according to modern paleoanthropological thought, marks the initial transition from the australopithecine hominids to the genus Homo. It should not, therefore, be completely unthinkable for scientists to entertain the possibility that a creature like Homo habilis might also have made the eoliths from East Anglia and the Kent Plateau, some of which are roughly comparable in age to the Oldowan tools.

Figure 3.29. Top: Light-duty utilized flakes from Olduvai Gorge, Africa (M. Leakey 1971, p. 38). Bottom: Flaked flint implements from the Red Crag formation at Foxhall, England (Moir 1927, p. 34). The Olduvai specimens appear cruder and look less like implements than the specimens from England.

But of some of the Oldowan tools J. Desmond Clark wrote in his forward to Mary Leakey’s study: “Here are artefacts that conventional usage associates typologically with much later times (the late Paleolithic or even later)—diminutive scraper forms, awls, burins . . . and a grooved and pecked cobble” (M. Leakey 1971, p. xvi). The same is true of the European Eolithic assemblages. As we noted in our introduction to this chapter, implements of a more advanced character sometimes turn up in even the crudest of industries.