Collection of theoretical discussions and case studies paper by B. Spurling and B. Hayden seperately annotated.

A full coverage of the possible applications of statistical approaches to material scatters within mainly gatherer-hunter assemblages. Blankholm attempts to leven the content with a useful review of the history and aims of intrasite analysis, but the core of the book are two chapters covering relevant statistics and simulation studies. A useful feature is a fully worked example of application to the archaeological data from Mesolithic Barmose, in South Zealand; backed up by included overlays. Appendix B is a guide to the operation of the computer package, Arcospace 2.0. Dense, but written with an awareness of the reader's and practitioner's problems.

Investigations of archaeological intrasite spatial patterns have generally taken one of two directions: studies that introduced and explored methods for the analysis of archaeological spatial patterns or those that described and analyzed the for mation of spatial patterns in actuaiistic-ethnographic, experimental, or natu ral-contexts. The archaeological studies were largely quantitative in nature, concerned with the recognition and definition of patterns; the actualistic efforts were often oriented more toward interpretation, dealing with how patterns formed and what they meant. Our research group on archaeological spatial analysis at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has been working for several years on both quantitative and interpretive problems. Both lines of investigation are closely related and are important complements. In order to demonstrate the convergence of archaeological and actualistic studies for the understanding of intrasite spatial patterns, we organized a sympo sium at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the Society of American Archaeology in Toronto, Canada, in May 1987. The symposium, titled "The Interpretation of Stone Age Archaeological Spatial Patterns," was organized into two sessions. The six papers presented in the morning session, five of which comprise Part I of this volume, focused on ethnoarchaeological and experimental research. Michael Schiffer was the discussant for this half of the symposium. Our intention for the ethnoarchaeological contributions to the symposium and volume was the delin eation of some of the significant accomplishments achieved thus far by actualistic studies regarding the formation of spatial patterns.

Effective spatial analysis is an essential element of archaeological research; this book is a unique guide to choosing the appropriate technique, applying it correctly and understanding its implications both theoretically and practically. Focusing upon the key techniques used in archaeological spatial analysis, this book provides the authoritative, yet accessible, methodological guide to the subject which has thus far been missing from the corpus. Each chapter tackles a specific technique or application area and follows a clear and coherent structure. First is a richly referenced introduction to the particular technique, followed by a detailed description of the methodology, then an archaeological case study to illustrate the application of the technique, and conclusions that point to the implications and potential of the technique within archaeology. The book is designed to function as the main textbook for archaeological spatial analysis courses at undergraduate and post-graduate level, while its user-friendly structure makes it also suitable for self-learning by archaeology students as well as researchers and professionals.

Groups of people abandoned sites in different ways, and for different reasons. And what they did when they left a settlement or area had a direct bearing on the kind and quality of cultural remains that entered the archaeological record, for example, whether buildings were dismantled or left standing, or tools buried, destroyed or removed from the site. Contributors to this unique collection on site abandonment draw on ethnoarchaeological and archaeological data from North and South America, Europe, Africa, and the Near East.

Article by Annie Nicholson and Scott Cane annotated separately.

A View from Western Europe Most archaeologists would agree that the emergence of stone tool manufacture and the m- agement of fre are the two most signifcant events in the cultural evolution of early humans. The oldest known stone artifacts are securely dated to 2. 6–2. 5 Ma at several localities in Ethiopia; their association with ungulate remains and observations of cut marks prove that one of their main functions was for butchery (Domínguez-Rodrigo et al. 2005). The record of early stone tools from a number of sites in the time span 2. 5–2. 0 Ma is unequivocal; tool use and manufacture were a regular activity with evidence of planning, foresight and considerable technical skills (Delagnes and Roche 2005). In contrast, the timing of the human control of fre is not fully resolved and the antiquity of its habitual use has been debated until now. This book provides very strong evidence of the habitual use of fre by early humans at the Acheulian site of Gesher Benot Ya‘aqov (Israel). The sedimentary sequence at the site is 34 m thick, and it represents different depositional environments, mainly beaches along the margins of a paleo-lake. The Matuyama-Brunhes chron boundary, dated to 0. 78 Ma, occurs in the lower part of the sequence.