protolithicadj.n.

1863 P. B. Randolph Pre-Adamite Man iii. iii. 320 It is supposed to belong to the early part of the Stone period. This period might be called the protolithic (from prótos, first, and lithos, stone).

1883 Trans. Anthropol. Soc. Washington 3 160 As writers have agreed upon the name palæolithic to indicate the age marked by the first traces of human workmanship in stone implements, we must recognize the protolithic age, in which stone fragments showing no trace of such workmanship were the common implements of mankind.

1930 Amer. Anthropologist 32 303 The Amygdaloid and retouched Flake..industries, which had their origin in the Protolithic.

1931 Antiquity 5 518 In the new terminology three major divisions are recognised, the old Lower and Middle Palaeolithic being grouped together as ‘Protolithic’, the Upper Palaeolithic and Mesolithic as ‘Miolithic’, the ‘Neolithic’ continuing as usual though now including the old Aeneolithic.

1964 Amer. Antiq. 30 229/1 A percussion pebble-and-flake tool industry which is characterized as ‘protolithic’ (Lower Paleolithic or Lower Paleolithic-derived).

1896 W. J. McGee in Amer. Anthropologist 9 318 An exceedingly crude type of implement is produced, which differs from both the paleolithic and the neolithic type... It might be desireable to distinguish this primitive type as protolithic.

1898 W. J. McGee in 17th Ann. Rep. Bureau Amer. Ethnol. 1895–6 i. 295 None other so well represents protolithic culture.

1967 Current Anthropol. 8 307/3 There are cultures of true Protolithic tradition (lower hunters with rude lithic and bone industry).