Cloth-Clad Clovis

[Minimalist]

Yeah, once an animals is down the quickest way to finish it off is to go for the throat. You don't even need a spear for that, a knife will suffice.

[Digit]

This is the discovery that I referred to earlier...

http://www.nytimes.com/1997/03/04/scien ... gewanted=1

Roy.

[Frank Harrist]

I find it hard to believe that there was ever a time when the heavy spear was man's only weapon. I imagine that they made whatever weapon they needed for the game they happened to be going after at the time. Even if there was a time when the spear, (and the stone for throwing) were the only technology available they surely had different sizes and types to suit the game. There is never one answer to these questions. Just as every person is different, they all have different solutions to problems. Generalizing about this type of thing is simply a waste of time and intelligence. No one knows for sure, but people are and were people and very adaptable and able to improvise as the situation dictates. So rigid rules about "the time when the spear was their only tool" are self-imposed and limiting. They had innumerable methods of killing game...large or small. Most have been mentioned here. Using fire, assuming they were able to use available fire sources even if they couldn't yet create it themselves, as a method of herding beasts off a cliff or driving them into an enclosed area so they could spear them up close and more safely are methods which have not been mentioned yet. Herd them with fire into a box canyon then close off the exit and drop big rocks on them, for instance. Herd them into a bog or quicksand so they are pinned in place and can be easily speared and butchered. Early humans weren't stupid. They had the same brain we do. Setting fire to a field on one side is a sure way to get the critters to run the other way.

[Digit]

they surely had different sizes and types to suit the game

Agreed. That is why I asked what effect the development of such a weapon would have had on the choice of prey, possible tactics and even social structure.

Roy.

[Frank Harrist]

they surely had different sizes and types to suit the game

Agreed. That is why I asked what effect the development of such a weapon would have had on the choice of prey, possible tactics and even social structure.

Roy.

In the large sense, none, in that it was simply another adaptation in a series of adaptations. I'd think that prey would dictate the weapon, not the other way round. They made heavy spears when they needed them. They didn't invent them and then decide to find the proper prey to kill with them. Necessity is indeed the mother of invention.

[Digit]

Whilst every word of that strikes me as eminently sensible and logical Frank I still ponder on why they went for such large animals.
Their tactics and weapons must have been well upto the task as I can't see them making a habit of hunting such beasts if there was a high chance of death or injury.

Roy.

[Minimalist]

I imagine there was a "risk/reward" calculation worked in there somewhere, Dig.

A single mammoth would provide a lot of hide, meat, sinew, bone and fat for the group.

[Digit]

Yep! And I'm pretty damn sure they had the measure of the job Min, after all, it's the mammoth that's extinct, not us!

Roy.

[Frank Harrist]

As their groups got bigger they went after bigger prey, both because they could and because they needed to. I imagine that sometimes the killing of megafauna was considered a rite of passage, just as killing elephants and lions was for some African tribes. We'll never know all the answers, but speculating is fun and sometimes narrows down the list of possibilities, thereby imparting some knowledge.

Another thing to keep in mind is that many of the very large clovis and other spear points were meant solely as ceremonial/grave goods. And some were surely hafted as knives. So the number of large spear points found doesn't necessarily reflect how often they were used as spears for actually hunting megafauna. And yes I know many were found at kill sites. Some of them were surely knives used in butchering the carcass.

[Digit]

narrows down the list of possibilities,

Indeed Frank, and that is what I have been attempting to do, starting from the known fact that the early spear must have preceded the thrower and were quite hefty.

Roy.

[Frank Harrist]

I'm not sure the development was as linear as you seem to think. A person who can build a hefty spear is smart enough to build a light one too....as needed for the situation.

[Rokcet Scientist]

Is that avatar the young Frank? When he was still an anti Vietnam War hippie?

[Digit]

True Frank, but as you said, necessity is the mother of invention, so first we need the necessity.
If those noble experts are any thing like correct the hefty spear dates back nigh on 500000 yrs, but the lightweight plus thrower only one tenth of that.

Roy.

[wxsby]

But the three wooden spears appear definitely to have been designed for hunting big game, Dr. Thieme and other experts said. Each one, an average of six feet long and two inches in maximum diameter, was carved from the trunk of a spruce tree. A sharp tip was carved at the base of the trunk, where the wood is hardest.

And enough fossilized wood to tell what type of tree and which end was up. I assume this is a good thing and from previous remarks, rather uncommon. Could make one wonder if cloth, baskets and nets from other, younger cultures might be found.

Since they are heavy and were made with care along the same aerodynamic lines as a modern javelin, experts said, it is unlikely the spears would have been thrown at the occasional squirrel.

Duhh....

If this date is correct, the finding should further enhance the reputation of early Stone Age people as clever and venturesome occupants of an ever-widening share of the world's space.

Why would anyone have thought differently? Is that the typical line of thought?

As their groups got bigger they went after bigger prey, both because they could and because they needed to. I imagine that sometimes the killing of megafauna was considered a rite of passage, just as killing elephants and lions was for some African tribes.

Don't know why you'd limit that to 'some African tribes'. It's a regular human thing. I know people who still hunt big game. I have no interest in it, but I know they have the urge to whack something big and dangerous. I've gone to war and to many dangerous places just because I could. Why would they have been different? "I can kill a bigger animal than you can!" I guess I'm just naive, but I don't see why they were so different from us.

[Digit]

Is that the typical line of thought?

To some yes Barry, to others, no.
Many people are seduced by the technology that surrounds them into believing that they must be more intelligent than their predecessors.

Roy.