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This paper discusses the technological and microscopic use-wear analyses of the chert debitage excavated from Deep Valley Rockshelter. This rockshelter, located in the Caves Branch River Valley of central Belize, was primarily used by the ancient Maya from the Late Preclassic to Terminal Classic periods (AD 80-950) and may demonstrate a pattern of rockshelter usage by the Classic periodMaya. To test whether such a pattern exists, lithic data from Caves Branch Rockshelter and other rockshelters in Belize, specifically those in the Sibun Valley and the Ek Xux Valley, are compared. Interpretations are complicated, however, by the severe mixing of deposits, which makes segregating the lithic artifacts into different reduction or use events nearly impossible. Moreover, this mixing severely hampers reconstructions of diachronic change in stone-tool use in the rockshelter. While acknowledging these limitations, our analysis suggests that the lithics in the rockshelter are primarily the result of reduction and use-related activities that originally occurred at other nearby surface sites rather than in the rockshelter itself. Consequently, the chipped-stone artifacts recovered from this rockshelter most likely result from secondary deposition of debitage for ritual purposes and represent accumulation over many years. We suspect this type of secondary deposition of debitage was also occurring at other rockshelters in Belize, based on comparisons to the chipped stone assemblages from these locations. We cannot discount the possibility that some stone tool production and use may have originally occurred in Deep Valley Rockshelter, but support for this is minimal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although previous use-wear studies involving quartz and quartzite have been undertaken by archaeologists, these are comparatively few in number. Moreover, there has been relatively little effort to quantify use-wear on stone tools made from quartzite. The purpose of this article is to determine the effectiveness of a measurement system, laser scanning confocal microscopy ( LSCM), to document the surface roughness or texture of experimental Mistassini quartzite scrapers used on two different contact materials (fresh and dry deer hide). As in previous studies using LSCM on chert, flint, and obsidian, this exploratory study incorporates a mathematical algorithm that permits the discrimination of surface roughness based on comparisons at multiple scales. Specifically, we employ measures of relative area ( Rel A) coupled with the F-test to discriminate used from unused stone tool surfaces, as well as surfaces of quartzite scrapers used on dry and fresh deer hide. Our results further demonstrate the effect of raw material variation on use-wear formation and its documentation using LSCM and Rel A. SCANNING 35:28-39, 2013. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on previous research using a UBM laser profilometry technique that proved successful in recognizing and quantitatively documenting different wear polishes on stone tools used to work different contact materials and the identification of a fractal dimension (Dr) on some used tool surfaces, additional experiments using the same technique have been undertaken to elaborate upon this work. The focus of these experiments using the same technique concerns the study of wear polish development and associated changes in stone surface microtopography. Questions relating to the stage at which the first identification of different contact material polishes is possible and when the fractal dimension (Dr) is manifested on tool surfaces are investigated. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]