FLAKE TOOLS
The third tradition is the flake tradition. The idea was to get a tool with a good cutting edge by simply knocking a nice large flake off a big block of stone. You had to break off the flake in such a way that it was broad and thin, and also had a good sharp cutting edge. Once you really got on to the trick of doing it, this was probably a simpler way to make a good cutting tool than preparing a biface. You have to know how, though; I’ve tried it and have mashed my fingers more than once.
The flake tools look as if they were meant mainly for chopping, scraping, and cutting jobs. When one made a flake tool, the idea seems to have been to produce a broad, sharp, cutting edge.
CLACTONIAN FLAKE
The core-biface and the flake traditions were spread, from earliest times, over much of Europe, Africa, and western Asia. The map on [page 52] shows the general area. Over much of this great region there was flint. Both of these traditions seem well adapted to flint, although good core-bifaces and flakes were made from other kinds of stone, especially in Africa south of the Sahara.