By Tim Stevens
Lithics Analyst
and Brian V. Hunt
Many people think of stone tools as strictly Stone Age technology. The fact
that people used chert and other stone for tools is what defines
prehistory as the Stone Age. This has led to an under-appreciation
of the role of stone tools in sophisticated, literate societies, such as
that of Old Kingdom Egypt (2575-2134 BC).
To date, Giza Plateau Mapping Project specialists
have examined over 33,500 flint artifacts
(flint and chert are geologically distinct but "flint" is often used to refer to
objects made from chert) from the Lost City of the Pyramids. Chert
can be shaped into very effective tools and its
presence in huge quantities on the desert surface made it a natural resource
for the pyramid builders.
The Bronze-Age Egyptians' introduction of metals and other materials certainly
changed the relative importance of chert, but it continued to be used during the
Old Kingdom and later. Chert is perhaps so common that archaeologists sometimes
ignore this simple material in favor of artifacts like pots, which are familiar
because we still use pottery, and inscribed sealings because hieroglyphic texts
speak more directly than material like chert.
GPMP specialists consider all material valuable to our analysis.
The occupants of the Lost City not only used chert in a wide variety
of situations, domestic and industrial, but it was also a raw material
integral to economic networks extending far beyond the Giza site.
Composition and use
Chert is a very fine crystalline material often found in limestone.
Geologists think that at Giza it formed as deposits on the desert surface from
dissolved limestone or from another as yet unidentified source.
Chert differs from other materials formed of silicon dioxide (silicas
such as glass, quartz, opal, and agate). Its crystal structure is so fine
that it allows the chert to be flaked into pieces which are not only strong,
but retain razor-sharp cutting edges. This differs from quartz, in which
large crystals allow only crude edges to be formed.
Two stories
There are two kinds of chert at Giza and each has its own implications
for social and economic activity.
- Locally abundant, poorer-quality raw material (knapped by Giza
inhabitants for immediate use and then discarded).
- Imported, good quality raw material (acquired and
distributed in the form of refined tools requiring preservation and maintenance).
Local industry
The first industry is numerically more significant. The most common type of
chert artifact at Giza is the simple flake, which ancient toolmakers removed
from a larger core using a hammer stone.
It takes no more than a few seconds to produce a viable cutting edge from a
chert pebble once some basic skills are acquired. These flakes are used for
cutting, scraping, trimming, etc., and their usefulness is not inhibited by
the crudeness of their manufacture.
Many of the pieces we've excavated appear to have been used; the edges show
small flake removals known as "edge damage." Other pieces have evidence of
retouching to strengthen or re-shape the edge and are classed "flake tools."
The examples of this group are made of local chert, found as pebbles in or
on the desert surface or possibly quarried in small amounts from the great
quarries on the Giza plateau.
This material is not of particularly good quality because it is naturally
quite coarse and does not flake well. Or, as a result of desert weathering, it
is liable to split unpredictably when struck. This combination of features
seems to have dictated the types of artifacts that the inhabitants produced
from local chert.
Imported industry
The second flint industry at Giza was comprised of good quality chert
from sources outside of Giza or sources that have not yet been identified at Giza.
These types of chert occur naturally at Giza but in negligible quantities.
But we do not find cores of these materials at the site, which further suggests
that the settlement inhabitants imported tools and partially finished cores,
possibly from sites like Abu Roash, just north of Giza.
This imported chert was used to produce:
- Bifaces (flaked on both faces)
- Triangular scrapers (usually dark chert)
- Blades and blade tools (usually pale pinkish-brown or light grey)
The production of blades, blade tools, and bifaces are difficult tasks,
even for modern knappers. Ancient producers would have been skilled
artisans with a good knowledge of the raw material and the technology
required to produce the artifact types we find as exotic (imported) material
at Giza.
The strong edges produced from these materials were more suitable for
repeated scraping of things like animal hides. They were also more amenable
for use in composite tools, such as a sickle or knife, because they did not
snap as easily as the inferior chert did when used.
Whilst the imported chert is less significant quantitatively, its presence
suggests three things:
- There were economic networks in which chert was an important commodity.
- There were specialists in chert mining and manufacture working at sites
economically connected to Giza.
- Similar, or even perhaps the same, technicians operated at Giza itself.
Implications
It seems reasonable to suggest that chert blades may have been imported in
bundles as raw material, and the bifaces as partially worked blanks. The absence
of cores of exotic chert suggests that the tools were imported, but we do not
yet know whether they were transported as raw material or finished tools.
We find distinctive flakes from the retouching of blade tools and scrapers
and the thinning of bifaces distributed across the settlement site in varying
quantities. They were formed from the initial refinement of raw material or
from the inhabitants' maintenance of used pieces.
One area where flakes from good tools were common is the courtyard
of the Royal Administration Building (RAB). The ancient Giza
workers may have refined or maintained some tools for distribution from the RAB, a structure possibly
associated with a centralized distribution system of the royal house
(as indicated by other artifacts). It is conceivable that someone controlled access
to good quality tools in that these were not as disposable as tools made from
local chert.
We also find good quality blade tools, bifacial knives, and waste flakes in
another area in relatively large quantities, where sealings
are also abundant. It is possible that the control over good tools extended
to their distribution only to workers of higher status or skill. It is worth noting
that almost no chert of the good, imported type occur north of the
Wall of the Crow, where a scrappy local chert
assemblage predominates.
Conclusions
The presence of a vibrant flint industry at Old Kingdom Giza again shows that
even in a sophisticated age of metal and writing, the ancient Egyptians made use
of all available technologies to achieve domestic and industrial ends. The greater
abundance of imported chert in the Royal Administration Building and the Western
Town areas of the pyramid settlement reinforces the emerging picture of higher-status
occupants in these areas.
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