The Late Chalcolithic Canaanean blade system of Northern Mesopotamia: what were the connections with the Uruk phenomenon?

Canaanean blades are considered one of the hallmarks of Late Chalcolithic northern Mesopotamian lithic assemblages, and they are the products of a specialized production system. By adopting a technological perspective, this paper aims to shed light on the processes on innovation and adoptation of a new flint techno-type during the fifth-fourth millennium BCE. The emergence of the Canaanean blades system is not directly related either to the 'Uruk expansion', or to the emerging elites or political authorities. However, their production, distribution, and consumption system reflect the development of new socio-economic relationships which occurred concomitanlty with the development of proto-urban societies