A Study On Prehistoric Grinding Tools In Liaoxi

Ground stone tools mainly contain two types: agricultural production tools and agricultural processing tools.There into,grinding tools,mainly used to process food,are one of the most important part of ground stone tools.The development of grinding tools is closely related to the progress of prehistoric agriculture,especially in the process of processing plant food.In the past,there were few researches on the stone tools specialized in food processing.Our research object mainly contains metates,manos,motars,pestles,discoids,stone pies and grinding tools.The large quantities of grinding tools found in the Liaoxi area,have provided the material foundation for ours research.On base of the classification on the grinding stone tools,combined with the theory of life story of stone tools,this paper makes an effort to reveal the development of the grinding stones and the livelihood strategy in Liaoxi area.And also it goes a step further to discuss the important role the grinding tools played in prehistoric Liaoxi area.This article is divided into 8 chapters:Chapter 1 Introduction.This chapter explicits the reason of selecting this topic,and defined the research object,namely the grinding tools in prehistoric Liaoxi area.Besides,a brief introduction on the grinding tools is also presented.Chapter 2 The research methods used in the paper.Our research methods are based on the classification on the grinding stone tools,combined with the theory of life story of stone tools.We try to make a contextual analysis on the grinding tools to investigate the livelihood strategy of prehistoric man in this district in perspective of processing tools.We call this method hierarchical-contextual approach.Chapter 3 The use background of grinding tools in Liaoxi Area.This part introduces the natural environment in prehistoric Liaoxi Area and the space-time framework in this district founded by the archaeological cultures.Liaoxi Area is typical ecological transition belt.Therefore,the livelihood strategy of this area is strongly influenced by the natural environment.In this paper,Liaoxi Area is into two parts,namely traditional Liaoxi area and the southern area of watershed between Songhua River and Liao River.A brief introduction of the typical sites of different cultures in each area is presented.Chapter 4 The classification of the grinding tools in Liaoxi Area.This part taking archaeological culture as unit,makes an classification on the grinding tools in this area,such as feature description,statistical analysis et al.Chapter 5 Research on the form change of grinding tools in the archaeological cultures of Liaoxi Area.A summary on the characteristics and distribution of grinding tools in Liaoxi Area is made in this part.At the same time,combined with the settlement pattern and organization form,we make a discussion on the livelihood strategy in this area.Then we propose there are 5 developing periods,corresponding to economic development modes of mixed economy-mainly farming-mixed economy-mainly farming-mainly on animal husbandry from Hunter-Hather Period to Early Agriculture Period.Chapter 6 Life history analysis on grinding tools of Liaoxi Area.This part mainly analyses the material selection,manufacture,use,the function,the wear intensity,unearthed environment in the whole life of the tools.Chapter 7 Discussion.This part discusses the reuse of the tools,the relationship between form and region on the metate the framework in the research of grinding tools and so on.Chapter 8 Summary.This part summarizes the main points of this paper and also points out the shortcomings and future research directions.