Split-based points are characteristic of the earliest phase of the late Old Stone Age or Upper Palaeolithic known as the Aurignacian. Appearing about 40 000 years ago, they are the first distinctive spear tips to be made from bone antler and ivory and show the use of composite weapons made of more than one piece. In use for about ten thousand years, they were replaced later in the Aurignacian by rod-like spear tips with round and oval cross-sections, thinned or bevelled to fit the shaft.