Stone tools were used throughout the Paleolithic, divided into Lower, Middle, and Upper periods based on cultural trends and tool complexity. Different stone tool industries are divided into four “modes” based on their sophistication, with Mode 1 being simple choppers and flake-based tools, Mode 2 being double-sided axes, Mode 3 being produced using the Levallois technique, and Mode 4 being grainy rocks. The Paleolithic is followed by the Mesolithic and the Neolithic, and then the Bronze Age.
Prehistoric stone tools were used throughout the Paleolithic (Early Stone Age), which characterizes the period. The Paleolithic spans from 2.5 million years ago (mya), when the ancestors of Homo sapiens (early homonids, i.e., Homo habilis) began using stone tools and continues until the establishment of agriculture around 10,000 BC.
The Paleolithic is divided into the Lower Paleolithic, Middle Paleolithic, and Upper Paleolithic based on cultural trends, including the complexity of tools. The Lower Paleolithic ranges from 2.5 million years ago to approximately 120,000 years ago, the Middle Paleolithic ranges from approximately 300,000 years ago to 30,000 years ago, and the Upper Paleolithic ranges from 40,000 to 10,000 years ago.
The end and start dates of the eras do not match because people in different areas of the world made cultural transitions at different times. The Paleolithic is followed by the Mesolithic and the Neolithic, meaning Middle and Neolithic. The Stone Age is then followed by the Bronze Age.
Different stone tool industries are divided into four “modes” based on their sophistication. The first is mode 1, of which the Olduwan tool industry is the most famous example, and lasted from 2.5 million years to about 25 million years. Another tool industry in this category was the Clactonian, which arrived much later (about 300,000), but was simplistic for its time, used by Homo erectus rather than modern humans.
Mode 1 tools are simple choppers and flake-based tools such as scrapers, cleavers, and primitive awls. They were made of any stone that could retain an edge, were “untouched” (edges made by a few big strokes, no huge effort to make them very sharp or straight), and relatively simplistic, usually with only one worked (single-sided) edge. Olduwan instruments were called Abbevillian when found in Europe, and only Olduwan when found in Africa, but now the name Olduwan has been adopted for both.
Mode 2 stone tools are part of the Acheulian tool industries, probably the most famous of the stone tool industries due to their combination of age and relative sophistication. These are the double-sided axes, considered a critical division between the old stone tools and the new stone tools. Broadly speaking, Mode 2 tools were used from about 1.65 million years ago to 100,000 years ago. It was Acheulian tool users who originally left Africa and colonized Europe for about 1.5 million years.
The Acheulian tools are distinct because it was the cores themselves that were valued, rather than flakes detached from the core. Soft hammers made of wood and bone were used to achieve greater control over the final product. Acheulian tools required more effort and were probably used for longer periods, perhaps being among the first true “human possession”. A citizen thrown into an environment where he was forced to use stone tools might think about making stone tools right away in Mode 2.
Mode 3 stone tools are characterized by being produced using the Levallois technique, which involved flaking off a central core only to produce a regularly shaped “Levallois core” which was then carefully broken to produce a “Levallois point”. – a range of sharp points and regular stone tools that look almost like they were made by machines rather than man. Short lithic blades were produced. Mode 3 tools are most prominently associated with the Neanderthal Mousterian tool industry in the Middle Paleolithic.
Mode 4 stone tools are grainy rocks such as basalt and are produced by a process of grounding with the help of water to create arbitrary shapes. The stone furniture found in The Flintstones would have required the creation of Mode 4 technology. This mode of tool making was adopted shortly before the arrival of modern history, found mainly in Neolithic sites, which have existed since the advent of agriculture 10,000 years ago until the Bronze Age, which began about 3,500 years ago.
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