The Use of Quartz During the Upper Paleolithic and Early Mesolithic in Sabor Valley (NW Iberia): the Foz Do Medal Case

The use of quartz is well documented during prehistory, being the predominant raw material in the Upper Paleolithic sites located in NW Iberia. The prehistoric occupations from Sabor valley also present a preference for this lithology through the long occupation sequence, although a large range of regional and exogenous lithic raw materials are also knapped.Within the quartz varieties rock crystal seems to have an important role in some chronologies, especially since the Solutrean phase, regarding elongated products and small flake production. Several reduction strategies were applied to rock crystal although the unifacial exploitation from a 45 degrees degree striking platform using the crystal natural edges as guidelines is the most common. Though there are some similarities within the use of this type of cores throughout the chronological sequence we can observe some differences, especially during the Early Mesolithic phase.In a regional perspective, it is possible to compare the quartz economy from occupations in Sabor valley to the ones from Coa valley, to the south, and discuss the role of rock crystal in Late Pleistocene inland human groups. It is clear that there was a technical ability to maximize a local lithic resource such as rock crystal which was exploited in order to achieve blanks similar to those obtained from flint cores. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved.