... by Francois Bordes

4 The Abbevillian and Acheulean developments in Europe.
According to our present knowledge, it would seem that the Oldowan stage was followed by the first branching out of the palaeolithic industries, one branch containing the pebble-tool tradition, the other developing the handaxe tradition, following along the Abbevillian-Acheulean lines.

Olduvai industries -- the upper part of Bed II will furnish us with valuable documentation on the transition of the chopping-tool to the true handaxe (see figure 13).

Olduvai evolution of handaxe industries ... ... the transition would appear to have taken place as follows:

first, a development of retouching all around the pebble, except at the butt, giving proto-handaxes;

then the extension of this retouching to the whole upper and lower surface of the pebble;

and finally a total retouching doing away with the butt altogether. Incidentally, this last feature is by no means constant, and right into the Mousterian period some handaxes keep their unchipped butt (figure 36,11).

Europe****************************Africa
**********************************whole handaxe,
**********************************series 'Acheulean'
Pre-Chellean-Abbevillian**********Lower Acheulean
Chellean

Lower Acheulean
The distinction between the Abbevillian (former Pre-Chellean) and the Aceulean is often given as the appearance of flaking with a soft hammer. This divding line is as good as any other -- in fact, it is the only psossible one; but we must be able to distinguish between soft-hammer and stone-hammer flaking, though this is not always easy.
*****Calico hammerstone
It is at the Abbevillian stage that the handaxe industries are known in Europe, where for a long time -- before the discovery of the Vallonet-- they were the most ancient forms to be recognised with certainty. The principal site is at Abbeville (hence the name Abbevillian). There, in the forty-five metre terrace of the Somme, there was a site, though it was unfortunately discovered too early on by gravel exploitation. In fact, the gravel-pit yielded signs of industry around the 1880s, at a time when only the most characteristic objects were collected, rough tools and flakes being then unrecognised. Reading from bottom to top, in simplified form, it produced:
1 On the chalk, red fluviatile gravels, with an ancient fauna. D'Ault du Mesnil has recognised among them some 'coups de poing', (handaxes), much-worn and rounded.
2 Sandy greenish Marls
3 White Marl with an ancient fauna, containing amongst others Elephas meridionalis, and archaic Elephas antiguus, the Etruscan rhinoceros, Merck's rhinoceros, hippopotamus, the archaic E. stenonis, the sabre-toothed tiger, Cervus Solhilacus, the Somme Deer, the giant beaver (Trogontherium). D'Ault du Mesnil found 'abundant' signs of industry in the lower part of this marl. At the top there were traces of an ancient peaty soil, and then after a period of erosion came traces of a more recent cycle.

The fauna, although ancient, is more evolved than Villafranchian, and probably belongs to an interstadial period of the Mindelian ice-age. The industry consists of fairly rough handaxes, chipped with a stone hammer, often leaving a butt and having wavy edges. These objects are often thick, and of uncertain morphology, for the form of the lump of flint has often had a strong influence upon it. Some of the handaxes are roughly pointed; others have a broad square end meant for cutting, and may be the ancestors of the bifacil Acheulean cleavers. These objects often carry broad cortex areas.

from Science Online
North American and European Glaciations
75-10*****Wisconsin*****Wurm
265-125***Illinoian*****Riss
435-300***Kansan********Mindel
650-500***Nebraskan*****Gunz
Encyclopedia of Evolution - "glacial period"

Anglian*****Britain*****350-250
Elsterian***northern Europe
Mindel******European Alps

Kansan******North America*****480-230
Encyclopedia of Weather and Climate, Revised Edition - "glacial period"

Basing himself on Courtier's stone-working experiments, Breuil put forth the idea (which, like all over-generalised ideas, became the rage) that these handaxes had been flaked against an anvil. It is indeed possible that his technique was used, but my own personal experiments have shown me that the same results can be produced with a hard-hammer.

The Abbevillian deposits must have contained flakes, but very few were at that time recovered. We do not know whether there were also stone tools of the Oldowan type; at this period, they would not in any case have been recognised. It es therefore very difficult to strike a parallel between Abbeville and any of the Olduvai layers. At present, Abbeville is the only known deposit in situ. Now and again bifacial implements of the Abbevillian type are found at various places, but they may be later than the Abbevillian. Yet there is not doubt at all that the Abbevillian does not represent an isolated group. In England in particular, sites are noted that may be Abbevillian, in a derived context. There is probably also some Abbevillian in the Upper Garonne valley.

What human type was responsible for this industry? At Olduvai, it was a Pithecanthropus. But Abbeville has not yielded any human remains. At Mauer, in Germany, a human mandible was discovered in 1907, alongside a probably Mindelian fauna, but without any archaelogical context. Without being precisely identical with the Pithecanthropus finds, it fits into this same general type. It represents a human type living during the Abbevillian period, about 500,000 years ago (see figure 14).

After the Abbevillian there is a gap in Europe, not due to an absence of population but to the scarcity of deposits during the interglacial periods. The implements left by man on the surface of the ground were carried away by the solifluctions of the next ice age, and we come across them in derived positions in the river gravels.

We therefore know very little about the transition from the Abbevillian to the Acheulean, and about the Lower Acheulean stage. There are a few deposits dating from the end of the Mindel/Riss interglacial, which lasted a long time.