Les grandes pointes foliacées du type « Ponsonby » : un traceur culturel en Patagonie australe

Abstract

The large foliaceous points of Ponsonby type : a cultural marker in Southern Patagonia. Large and very spectacular foliaceous bifacial points were discovered in Ponsonby, southern Patagonia, about fifty years ago by Emperaire. The multiplication of this kind of discoveries in several sites (presently more than ten), calls into question the significance and the epistemological value of these objects. Beyond the question of their function, the description of personalized diagnostic criteria (« chaîne opératoire », technical automatism, morphological standard, very careful execution, social value…) makes these objects the undeniable markers of a cultural facies. That allow us to speculate about their origin (technical tranfer ? technical innovation ?) and to track the evolution of a social group representative of the maritime nomads in the archipelagoes of Patagonia during the 5th millennium BP.

Keywords

• bifacial point
• cultural marker