Abstract

The following essay documents several important developments in hominin technical cognition. Using Osiurak and Reynaud’s (Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 43, e183, 2020) theory of technical cognition and Ross Pain’s (2021) method of cognitive transition inference, we identify four technical innovations evident in the Palaeolithic archaeological record – advent of stone tools, development of handaxes, invention of hafting, and invention of the bow-and-arrow – and discuss their implications for the evolution of technical thinking. In doing so we demonstrate the role and importance of explicit theories in evolutionary cognitive archaeology.