Key Alastair, Stephen Lycett
School of Anthropology and Conservation, University of Kent, Canterbury, Kent, CT2 7NR, United Kingdom,
Department of Anthropology (Evolutionary Anthropology Laboratory), University at Buffalo, SUNY, Amherst, NY 14261, U.S.A.
J Anthropol Sci. 2017 Dec 30;95:67-108. doi: 10.4436/JASS.95017. Epub 2017 Jul 31.
Percussively flaked stone artefacts constitute a major source of evidence relating to hominin behavioural strategies and are, essentially, a product or byproduct of a past individual's decision to create a tool with respect to some broader goal. Moreover, it has long been noted that both differences and recurrent regularities exist within and between Palaeolithic stone artefact forms. Accordingly, archaeologists have frequently drawn links between form and functionality, with functional objectives and performance often being regarded consequential to a stone tool's morphological properties. Despite these factors, extensive reviews of the related concepts of form and function with respect to the Lower Palaeolithic remain surprisingly sparse. We attempt to redress this issue. First we stress the historical place of form-function concepts, and their role in establishing basic ideas that echo to this day. We then highlight methodological and conceptual progress in determining artefactual function in more recent years. Thereafter, we evaluate four specific issues that are of direct consequence for evaluating the ongoing relevance of form-function concepts, especially with respect to their relevance for understanding human evolution more generally. Our discussion highlights specifically how recent developments have been able to build on a long historical legacy, and demonstrate that direct, indirect, experimental, and evolutionary perspectives intersect in crucial ways, with each providing specific but essential insights for ongoing questions. We conclude by emphasising that our understanding of these issues and their interaction, has been, and will be, essential to accurately interpret the Lower Palaeolithic archaeological record, tool-form related behaviours of Lower Palaeolithic hominins, and their consequences for (and relationship to) wider questions of human evolution.
通过敲击剥落法制作的石器是与古人类行为策略相关的主要证据来源，本质上，它是过去个体为了某个更广泛目标而制作工具这一决策的产物或副产品。此外，长期以来人们注意到，旧石器时代石器形式内部以及不同形式之间既存在差异，也存在反复出现的规律。因此，考古学家经常将形式与功能联系起来，功能目标和性能往往被视为取决于石器的形态特征。尽管有这些因素，但关于旧石器时代早期形式和功能相关概念的广泛综述仍然惊人地稀少。我们试图纠正这一问题。首先我们强调形式 - 功能概念的历史地位，以及它们在确立至今仍有影响的基本观念方面所起的作用。然后我们突出近年来在确定人工制品功能方面的方法和概念进展。此后，我们评估四个具体问题，这些问题对于评估形式 - 功能概念的持续相关性具有直接影响，特别是对于更全面地理解人类进化的相关性。我们的讨论特别强调了近期的发展如何能够建立在悠久的历史遗产之上，并表明直接、间接、实验和进化的观点以关键方式相互交叉，每个观点都为当前的问题提供了具体但必不可少的见解。我们在结论中强调，我们对这些问题及其相互作用的理解，过去是、将来也仍将是准确解读旧石器时代早期考古记录、旧石器时代古人类与工具形式相关行为，以及这些行为对更广泛的人类进化问题的影响（及其与这些问题的关系）的关键。
