ABSTRACT BURNED FLINT: INDIRECT EVIDENCE OF FIRE USE FOR UNDERSTANDING NEANDERTALS’ BEHAVIORAL VARIABILITY IN USING FIRE IN LATE PLEISTOCENE EUROPEAylar Abdolahzadeh Theodore G. Schurr Deborah I. Olszewski Pyrotechnology is an ancient technology. Similar to stone tool technology, the role of fire in the lives of early hominins has changed over time—from the opportunistic acquisition of fire through natural causes such as lightning strikes to the habitual production and use of pyrotechnology for warmth and subsistence. One difference between stone tool technology and pyrotechnology, however, is that the emergence of new lithic technology evolved roughly chronologically. While there is abundant evidence of fire use during the Mesolithic and Neolithic, our understanding of pyrotechnology in the Paleolithic is not straightforward because environmental variables, such as climate and geography, have significantly affected fire use across different archaeological contexts. Analyzing burned flint as one indirect evidence of fire use in this dissertation, I examined how environmental variables, such as geography (e.g., latitude and altitude) and climatic regimes (cold vs. temperate) influenced the use of fire by Neandertals and modern humans. Additionally, analyzing burned flints from a wide range of late Pleistocene archaeological sites, I addressed some of the questions regarding post-depositional impacts on burned flints. First, through conducting a pilot freeze-thaw experiment using knapped flint flakes, I justified criteria used to identify burned flints in this dissertation. Second, I conducted a pilot heat experiment to examine a) under what heating conditions one of the most visible thermal characteristics of burned flint, potlids, are formed on flake surfaces, and also to b) examine the breakage pattern of burned flakes. Furthermore, to strengthen the count method of burned flint, I applied an aggregate weight method to archaeological flints, which is applicable to any lithic assemblage with size distribution variability and thermal breakage. Finally, the analysis of archaeological lithic collections and pilot experimental studies indicate that burned flints provide more reliable evidence for fire use, with which we were able to measure one of the early hominins’ adaptive behaviors (i.e., fire use) regarding the location they occupied and climatic conditions that they experienced.