Fülöp Éva – Cseh Julianna szerk.: „Die aktuellen Fragen des Mittelpaläolithikums in Mitteleuropa”. „Topical issues of the research of Middle Palaeolithic period in Central Europe”. Tata, 20-23 October 2003. (Tudományos Füzetek 12. Tata, 2004)

Viola T. Dobosi: Pebble tools from Tata-Porhanyó

rial with the Lower Palaeolithic finds of Vértesszőlős. These types, the proportion of pebble tools, the measurements of the artefacts and the identical/similar settlement patterns affiliate the two sites with a Central European cultural entity understood in a broad sense that encompasses wide chronological frames yet it can be definitely outlined. The determinant pebble products of the pebble industries are the half and quarter pebbles, which were often split with geometrical exactitude, and the orange-slice and bread-slice shaped flakes coming from further segmentation (Fig. i, 4-9). These last two groups are functionally identical with the blades (or flake blanks). They are the blanks of tools, or adhoc tools where the natural surface of cleavage facing the cortical back provided the working edge. More than half of the tools preserved pebble cortex in the Tata material on a larger or a smaller surface. The application of the "wechselseitege gleichgerichtete Kantenbearbeitung" on a few tools led to the differentiation of the "hand-axe" type (Fig, 2,1.), which is contradictory in itself in the case of objects measuring 30-40 mm, even though they appear to be perfect hand-axes in a miniature form. The proportion of scrapers is especially high (74%) in the middle palaeolithic material. They were made with reduction technique as well as on blanks (Fig. 3.), The working edge could be simple: the shape was straight, convex, concave or lobed. Tools on which a notch created with a single blow are grouped among the scrapers. They could be used for the smoothing of cylindrical objects having the same radius as the arch of the notch. At double scrapers the convergent working edges can meet at 90 or more degrees (angular) or at an acute angle. The difference between points and pointed scrapers is subjective. Beside tools having straight edges running symmetrically at an acute angle to a narrowing point and having a very flat lateral retouching, most of the tools of this group are asymmetrical along the longitudinal axis and have a short and widening proximal end. Although we often cannot tell what practical purpose the scrapers in the length group between 30 and 40 mm could serve (however perfect they appear to be), they were even less suitable for the function of a weapon or a projectile point despite the morphological perfection. László Vértes called the bifacially elaborated scrapers on foliate, fine flat flakes scraper-knives. From the mathematical-statistic analysis of the metric data of the type Vértes arrived to the conclusion that the differentiation was justified and its function was different from that of the classical scrapers. Series containing a couple of items can be differentiated among the scrapers, which are very diverse in shapes and execution. These series show a nearly perfect morphological matching with the types named after classical sites. The convergence in this case can only be morphological and/or functional. The communities that produced a given type or tool shape according to their own needs lived in drastically different environments and in significant distances from each other both in a chronological and in a topographic sense. Neither lineage nor kinship ties can be supposed between them. 69