ABSTRACT
Criteria for measuring artifacts in a manner relevant to artifact classification have not been discussed extensively in the literature. Individual researchers have reported on their measurement systems (e.g., Bonnichsen 1977; Dibble and Chase 1981; Thomas 1981; Andrefsky 2005), including pre-computer digitization methods for taking measurements (Benfer 1967; Gunn and Prewitt 1975; Burgess and Kvamme 1978; Dibble and Bernard 1980), but the relationship between choice of measurements and type formation (e.g., Binford 1963; Benfer and Benfer 1981; Whallon 1982) has not been widely discussed. Comments that authors have made about measurement and formation of types are often less a prescription for what one should measure than platitudes or generalities—such as that measurements should be done systematically to permit meaningful comparison of artifacts (Deetz 1967), the connection between measurement and typologies is not clear cut (Sheets 1975), and the choice of variables is framed by the researcher’s cultural heritage (Voorrips 1982: 113)—or even based on invalid assertions, such as that there is no connection between types and quantitative variables (Adams and Adams 1991: 88).
