ABSTRACT
When the topic of children in the Upper Palaeolithic is discussed, it is often in terms of the most spectacular kinds of evidence, such as the elaborate (and highly atypical) Sungir burials (Bader 1978), or the preservation of a child’s footprint in the clay floor of a painted cave (Garcia and Courtaud 1990). These kinds of evidence are extremely rare and their very scarcity serves to reinforce the view that knowledge about children in prehistory is inaccessible (Lillehammer 1989; Sofaer Derevenski 1994a; Moore and Scott 1997). However, this is not an accurate picture of either our present or prospective knowledge of the activities of children in late glacial prehistory. As I hope this discussion will make clear, lithic technology has a unique potential, among all the technologies employed by Upper Palaeolithic peoples, for aiding us in our efforts both to identify children and to investigate their world.
