An Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology v1.c9.s3.8

v1.c9.s3.8

The chief finished tool types occurring in this culture are: 1, scrapers of various types, (a) straight edge (single), (b) straight edge (double), (c) concave edge, (d) convex edge, (e) concavo-convex edge, (f) transverse edge, and (g) all-round edge; 2, points, (a) simple points, (b) tanged or shouldered points, and (c) bifacial points; 3, borers; 4, combination tools like scraper-borers and borer-points; 5, knives; 6, denticulate tools; 7, burins (the last three of sporadic occurrence); and 8, handaxes, cleavers and chopping tools (confined to a few sites only). As scrapers, borers and points occur at almost all the known sites, the culture can be called the scraper-borer-point culture. At the same time it should be made clear that it betrays marked regional differences in the size of artefacts, determined by the nature of raw material as in the composition of types and their percentages. As an example it may be noted that the Middle Palaeolithic industries of w. Rajasthan and Dt Chittoor still have Lower Palaeolithic types like the handaxe and cleaver, while these types are completely absent in some regions like the Shorapur doab of Karnataka. Likewise, the Late Sohan of Punjab contains a high percentage of chopping tools.