Early Acheulian & Developed OldowanB / j)oldef-hrbiffig63

Lava biface with denticulated edge on side-struck flake from waterworn cobble. Site EF-HR, Upper Middle Bed II, Olduvai Gorge (c. 1.3 MYA).

This Early Acheulian biface from Olduvai Gorge is comparable to the previous biface Gallery Image (e) [= Wynn Fig. 16] from Peninj which has a 'one-tiered', 4-faceted set of a mirror pair of convex shapes on either side and an opposition between the pointy shape(s) at top and a rounded shape at the bottom. Actually, this piece exactly reverses the top/bottom opposition; it's rounded at the top and pointy at the bottom. I've included it in the sequence as evidence confirming that the Early Acheulian artisan was more interested in mirror symmetry patterns of similar and opposite shapes than in some general notion of an object with a point at the top. The latter is more typical of later Acheulian bifaces which virtually never have the point at what would generally be considered the 'bottom' of the object. (Apparent symmetry in the cross-sectional third dimension is accidental and this accidental shape does have the point at the top, reversing the plan view pattern.)

Photo © Leakey, M. (1971). Olduvai Gorge, Vol. 3. Cambridge: At the University Press: fig. 63.