Bevel-ended tools on large ungulate ribs during the Bronze Age in northern Italy: Preliminary result of functional and experimental analyses

Functional analyses and experimental works on animal hard materials artefacts have been sparsely applied in the Italian territory, especially in Bronze Age contexts. Recent researches, carried out on several sets of artefacts coming from sites dated between the Middle and Late Bronze Age in north-eastern Italy, have highlighted a good amount of bevel on large ungulate ribs. This paper aims at identifying the function of these objects through an experimental work, in order to reproduce the same category of artefacts that have been utilized on different materials and in different ways. The analyses of the archaeological remains and the experimental artefacts were performed at low magnification using a stereomicroscope Leica EC3 S6D with an integrated digital camera. Then, the surface analysis at high magnification was carried out by using a metallographic microscope in reflected and transmitted light (Optika Met: 50×–500×). The experiments were carried out using the experimental tools on various hard materials, such as wood (fresh and dry) and antler (dry and wet) and elastic ones (fresh and dry skin). During the testing phase, the time of use, the state of the material processed, the gestures employed (direction and quantity) were monitored and recorded. All the archaeological artefacts bear almost similar use-wear patterns. Some of them have fractures and micro-chipped areas on the distal margin that indicate contact with a hard and durable material. The remaining artefacts, however, present edges slightly smoothened and with less evident anomalies. On the upper face, use-wear ends after about 5 mm from the distal edge, while on the lower face it seems to be slightly larger, about 1 cm from the edge. Under the microscope, very dense longitudinally-oriented striations are visible on the distal edge, while in the mesial portion of the artefact, they proceed to become rarer and often oblique. Under high magnification, the analysed surfaces are fairly uniform near the edge and more irregular at farther distances from it. The experimental work has allowed us to hypothesize that some of these artefacts were used for the removal of fresh and dry bark. In fact, experimental use-wear presents macro-and micro-morphologies compatible with the ones detected on the archaeological remains.