SAINT-ACHEUL

locality near Amiens in the Somme River valley, Somme dpartement, Picardie region, northern France. Saint-Acheul is the type locality at which a number of distinctive early Paleolithic hand axes were found. These axes characteristically are large, bifacially flaked, ovoid stone tools and are widely assumed to have been manufactured mostly by Homo erectus, though they are only rarely associated with Homo erectus fossils. Following their early discovery at Saint-Acheul, a number of Acheulian (Acheulean) hand axes were identified in England (notably Swanscombe) and other parts of Europe, Africa (especially at Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania and Swartkrans in South Africa), and Asia.