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The Tip Cross-sectional Area (TCSA) Method Strengthened and Constrained with Ethno-historical Material from Sub-Saharan Africa

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Abstract

Work on large samples of southern African archaeological lithics, probably used to tip hunting weapons amongst other things, and ethno-historical bone and iron weapon tips of known use exposed limitations in the tip cross-sectional area (TCSA) method’s robustness for hypothesising about variation in ancient weapon-delivery systems. Here, we list some of the limitations and discuss a few recently published improvements in tip cross-sectional area ranges and data presentation. Our main contribution is the meaningful enlargement of datasets obtained from hafted weapon tips and/or weapon tips of known use mostly from sub-Saharan Africa. We briefly discuss why this region is relevant for studying trends in the evolution and development of hunting weapons. Our new data are used to strengthen and constrain the different TCSA ranges used as proxies for poisoned arrow tips, un-poisoned arrow tips, javelin tips, stabbing-spear tips, and to suggest a working TCSA range for thrusting-spear tips. We demonstrate that the calibrated TCSA ranges have robust statistical integrity as proxies for the different weapon-delivery systems they represent. Apart from the dart-tip category, the TCSA method has now been improved to accommodate more nuanced and accurate interpretations, while further strengthening hypothesis building about ancient weapon systems.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the staff of the KwaZulu-Natal Museum for their assistance in accessing and processing the material on which this paper is based. Gavin Whitelaw gave valuable insight into sources for spear use amongst local groups, and the final manuscript benefitted from the thoughtful comments of two anonymous reviewers.

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  1. Palaeo-Research Institute, University of Johannesburg, P.O. Box 524, Auckland Park, ZA-2006, South Africa

    Marlize Lombard, Matt G. Lotter & Matthew V. Caruana

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  1. Marlize Lombard
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  2. Matt G. Lotter
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  3. Matthew V. Caruana
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Contributions

All authors contributed equally to generating the data used for this project. M. Lombard analysed the data and drafted the text. M. Caruana conducted the statistical tests. M. Lotter prepared images. All authors contributed to the final editing of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Marlize Lombard.

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Lombard, M., Lotter, M.G. & Caruana, M.V. The Tip Cross-sectional Area (TCSA) Method Strengthened and Constrained with Ethno-historical Material from Sub-Saharan Africa. J Archaeol Method Theory 31, 26–50 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10816-022-09595-1

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