Living with Flint (Paperback)

Our understanding of prehistoric life is shaped to a large degree by the study of stone tools. Their exceptional preservation makes flint tools ideally suited to reconstruct past lifeways. Use-wear analysis provides insights into the role of the ‘missing majority’ of perishable organic materials such as hide, wood, and plant fibres in past technologies. Reconstructing lithic biographies, from raw material procurement to use and recycling, reveals the complex dynamics of prehistoric life.

This book explores the lifeways of Vlaardingen Culture communities (3400-2500 BCE) in the Rhine-Meuse-Scheldt delta through the lens of such object biographies. A detailed study of flint assemblages from four key sites reconstructs past exchange networks, technological choices, and everyday activities. Flint was imported across considerable distances, often as finished tools such as polished axes. Once acquired, exotic material was fully appropriated and integrated into the local technological system. Use-wear evidence further reveals the emergence of part-time craft specialisation during the Vlaardingen Culture period.

Finally, the experimental research and use-wear analyses offer new insights into life in the delta, providing the earliest evidence in the Netherlands for the use of horn in craft production. These findings illuminate how communities lived and interacted in the dynamic wetland environment of the delta.