Extraordinary large Hoabinhian tools from Xiaodong rockshelter, southwest China

Abstract

The Hoabinhian phenomenon was long considered a late Paleolithic technocomplex in Southeast Asia. Recently, the discovery of several Hoabinhian sites in southwest China largely expanded its tempo-spatial distributions and enriched the toolkit of Hoabinhian hunter-gatherers. The Hoabinbian stone tools are often made with river cobbles of large to medium size and rarely reach over 150 mm and 1 kg. However, this perspective towards Hoabinhian cutting tools can be updated with recurring tools made on massive and even giant boulders discovered at Chinese Hoabinhian sites. Here we present the mega lithic tools (> 150 mm, 2 kg) from the first and also the currently known earliest Hoabinhian site – Xiaodong rockshelter in southwest China. These tools’ productional and techno-functional characteristics were described and illustrated, and whether they have utilitarian purposes was discussed. Although these massive, giant, heavy-duty Hoabinhian tools are morpho-typologically similar to those large-medium ones found at the site, their original size may endow new aspects (cognitive, technical, symbolic, social, etc.) to these tools that are still poorly understood.