Waisted axes of the Huon Peninsula
Hachas con cintura de la península de Huon
- Date
- c. 40 ka · confidence medium
- Place
- Huon Peninsula, Morobe, Papua New Guinea
- Credited to
- Pleistocene hunter-gatherers of New Guinea
- Field
- Tools
What it is
Flaked stone tools with a central waist designed for hafting, among the oldest in the western Pacific. They are linked to the use of montane forests and selective clearing of vegetation.
The c. 40 ka date (uncalibrated radiocarbon, Groube et al., 1986) calibrates today to about 44-49 ka. Their exact function (forest clearing or woodworking) is debated.
What it led to
- adaptation of early people to the tropical forests of Sahul
- a tradition of axes and adzes that leads to the polished stone axes of the New Guinea Neolithic
- the technical basis for highland horticulture millennia later