North Africa is a key area for understanding cultural processes that led to the Acheulean pan - African emergence and expressions and the related hominin population dynamics. Unfortunately, little is known about the early Acheulean in this vast area of the African continent due to the scarceness of archaeological sites in stratigraphic context with reliable chronometric data, human remains, and technological analyses of the lithic industries. Here, we present the first comprehensive techno-economic analysis of the early Acheulean assemblage from Thomas Quarry I - Unit L1 (ThI-L1, Casablanca, Morocco), which is the earliest Acheulean site of North Africa, unambiguously dated to 1.3 Ma. Fieldwork has unearthed faunal remains and a lithic collection containing over 3800 artefacts, which represents one of the largest series for the early African Acheulean. The assemblage is mainly composed of quartzites and to a lesser extent of silicites, both abundantly available near the site. Previously published results of the silicite study revealed two different productions for the extraction of small flakes and of bladelet-like flakes. In this work, we analyse the techno-economic systems of the quartzite assemblage. Two distinct quartzite productions co-occur, one devoted to the manufacture of Large Cutting Tools (LCTs), the other focused on the extraction of small-medium sized flakes. LCTs were usually produced from large cobbles, less often from large flakes detached mainly using the entame core method. The main technical objective was to obtain large pointed tools and, more rarely, large tools with a transversal cutting edge. Results support the existence of a strong synergy between conceptual and operational schemes regulated by the ability to anticipate the final tool morphology and to apply standardized shaping procedures to manufacture recurrent morphotypes. Quartzite small-medium sized flakes were produced by a diversity of flaking methods adapted to the cobble blank morphologies and were not retouched. The results allow to assess that the earliest technical expression of the Acheulean in North Africa is characterised by a high diversification of the stone knapping outcomes, the complexity of the mental templates, and the flexible structure of the operational schemes.

中文翻译：

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托马斯采石场 I - L1（摩洛哥卡萨布兰卡）的早期北非阿舍利技术经济系统。

北非是了解导致阿舍利泛非出现和表达以及相关古人类种群动态的文化进程的关键地区。不幸的是，由于缺乏可靠的计时数据、人类遗骸和石器工业技术分析的地层考古遗址，人们对非洲大陆这一广大地区的早期阿舍利人知之甚少。在这里，我们对来自 Thomas Quarry I - Unit L1（ThI-L1，卡萨布兰卡，摩洛哥）的早期阿舍利组合进行了首次全面的技术经济分析，该组合是北非最早的阿舍利遗址，可明确追溯到 1.3 Ma。实地考察出土了动物遗骸和石器藏品，其中包含 3800 多件文物，这是早期非洲阿舍利人最大的系列之一。该组合主要由石英岩和少量硅岩组成，这两种物质在该地点附近都大量存在。先前发表的硅酸盐研究结果揭示了两种不同的产品用于提取小片和叶片状片。在这项工作中，我们分析了石英岩组合的技术经济系统。两种不同的石英岩生产同时发生，一种致力于制造大型切削工具 (LCT)，另一种专注于中小尺寸薄片的提取。LCT 通常是由大卵石生产的，很少是由主要使用 ename core 方法分离的大薄片生产的。主要技术目标是获得大型尖头刀具，以及更罕见的具有横向切削刃的大型刀具。结果支持概念方案和操作方案之间存在强大的协同作用，该方案受预测最终工具形态和应用标准化成型程序来制造循环形态类型的能力的调节。石英岩中小尺寸薄片是通过适应鹅卵石毛坯形态的多种压片方法生产的，并且未经修饰。结果可以评估，北非阿舍利最早的技术表达的特点是敲石结果的高度多样化、心理模板的复杂性和操作方案的灵活结构。