A Revised Typological Scheme of the Korean Palaeolithic Assemblages: The case of the Imjin-Hantan River Area, Korea

It is widely accepted the archaeological typology is one of the most important methodological instruments that can induce diverse research issues. Unfortunately, however, Korean palaeolithic research has witnessed few discussion and little endeavor to solve the ongoing typological problems. This article intends to establish a more refined Korean lithic typological scheme by addressing the conceptual issues and nature of archaeological types; and defines its role as a medium of communication among researchers. The Clark-Kleindienst scheme, widely accepted for the description of lithic assemblages from the Imjin-Hantan River area of Korea, is scrutinized and its major problems are articulated as: 1) over-emphasis of handaxe and its connection to other tools, 2) strong subjectivity of classifiers merely based on the “impresson” of lithic objects, and 3) semantic and grammatic fallacy of naming lithic types. In order to solve these problems, the reduction sequence and edge angles of lithic objects as well as the gestures to perform specific actions are taken into consideration in order to draw clearly defined types. As a result, total lithic objects can be integrated under a new typological scheme with hierarchical structure.