Contrast between Middle Stone Age and Late Stone Age?

A clean break does not exist between the Middle Stone Age and Late Stone Age. During the Middle Stone Age, people also lived by hunting and gathering. The terms are used for the convenience of archaeologists to distinguish between two cultures. The two groups may have existed at the same time and side by side and probably did. The people of the Middle Stone Age depended on hunting and fishing. Their tools reflect that lifestyle.

Then people adopted a life that focused on agriculture. When people worked in agriculture, they settled in one area and had more time. They made their tools of better quality and they made more of them. Among the tools they developed were scrapers. They would kill an animal for food and use his skin for clothes, and then use the scraper on his skin. That way the skin would last longer than one just pulled off the animal. They took the time to set up the equipment to make bows and arrows. They built kilns to cure the wood and make arrows that would fly straight. They made fish hooks and better axes. Thus the difference between Middle and New Stone Age was that between a society on the move and one settled down. The society that had settled down could have specialists in stone working. Arrow makers (fletchers) could set up kilns. Farmers could grow grain. They could leave far more stone artifacts behind.