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PREMIUM GRADE LARGE ROBUST NEANDERTHAL MOUSTERIAN END SCRAPER WITH DOUBLE-ENDED CUTTING EDGES Rock Shelter - Dordogne (Village of Plazac), France MIDDLE PALEOLITHIC PERIOD (MOUSTERIAN): 80,000 - 40,000 years ago This authentic stone tool was fashioned by Neanderthals over 40,000 years ago out of flint and discovered in the world famous region of Dordogne, France, considered to be the "Capitol of Prehistory". The site this specimen was excavated from is now closed and protected by the government. This rare artifact was legally collected with the landowner's permission decades ago before the area was sealed. Dordogne is one of the world's most famous Neanderthal regions and the fact that this archeological site is off-limits to any collecting, makes this wonderful stone tool artifact exceedingly rare and desirable! Because collecting these artifacts has been off-limits for decades, genuine fine grade Mousterian tools such as this specimen are most certain to continue to appreciate in value as time goes on. This rare Neanderthal flint tool is classified as a DOUBLE END SCRAPER. It is a very large and extremely robust example designed for heavy-duty cutting tasks. This is an atypical design as most endscrapers have only one cutting edge. The maker of this tool utilized ingenious thought since you could rotate the flake and use the other end when the one would begin to dull. Both ends of this flake are sharpened into steep planing cutting edges with excellent secondary retouching. Intact original sediments from the layer in which it was dug are still attached to the surface of the tool. It was discovered in a rock shelter with other tools and some broken fossil animal bones, mostly likely fractured for the prized marrow inside, a valuable Neanderthal food source. A superb example from this famous site. NO RESTORATION OR REPAIR. Our fortunate purchase of a very old private collection from the original excavator allows us to offer this artifact at a price WELL BELOW ITS BOOK VALUE. The MOUSTERIAN tool tradition gets its name from artifacts discovered at a primitive rock shelter named Le Moustier located in southwestern France. Compared to the bulkier tools of the Acheulian produced by the Levallois technique, Mousterian tools are comprised of smaller flakes from an exhaustively worked core which are then retouched on the edges to make a large variety of tools. These tools are not only smaller than Acheulian specimens, but they are more specialized for their various tasks. Mousterian tools can be broadly put into four classes: 1) SAWS (Denticulate Tools) and KNIVES, 2) SCRAPERS 3) BORERS 4) HANDAXES, CHOPPERS and CLEAVERS. Mousterian tool-makers were the primitive humans knows as the NEANDERTHALS. Neanderthals had massive skeletons and teeth, flat foreheads and heavy brow ridges. Their skulls were larger than a modern man and contained an average brain capacity of 1500 cc, averaging slightly larger than humans of today. THE MOST IMPRESSIVE NEANDERTHAL FLAKE SCRAPER WE HAVE EVER OFFERED! - PERFECT AND INTACT! 2.7" in length $375 M209 INCLUDES DISPLAY BOX Actual Item - One Only |
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