Abstract
In this chapter, I provide an overview of Portuguese Upper Paleolithic projectile points made from mammal bone and red deer antler. These artefacts were recovered from nine archaeological sites, located in two geographic regions: Estremadura and Algarve. The majority of the Upper Paleolithic osseous assemblages from Portugal come from old excavations, and as early studies of the points are rare or only preliminary in nature, our understanding of this industry in Portugal is poorly understood. Consequently, this chapter will address morphologic and functional variability of the Portuguese technology, and focus on several aspects including fracture and stigmata patterns remaining from their manufacture and use. As a preliminary conclusion, it appears that these osseous projectile points share features with similar others from the Southern Iberian region.
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Acknowledgments
I wish to thank all the people and Institutions who gave me the opportunity to study the osseous projectile points from the Upper Paleolithic archaeological sites in Portugal: N. Bicho, J. L. Cardoso, T. Aubry, F. Almeida, L. Raposo (Museu Nacional de Arqueologia, Lisbon), M. Ramalho (Museu Geológico, Lisbon) and J. Zilhão. I thank Nuno Bicho for his comments and for reviewing the manuscript. I also thank Célia Gonçalves for providing the map of Iberian Peninsula. I would like to thank Thierry Aubry and Jaime Abrunhosa for providing the images of a projectile point from Buraca Grande . I also thank the two anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions to the manuscript. All images were photographed by M.A. Évora except when mention otherwise.
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Évora, M.A. (2016). A Review of the Osseous Projectile Points from the Upper Paleolithic of Portugal. In: Langley, M. (eds) Osseous Projectile Weaponry. Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-0899-7_9
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