Table 1.

Comparison of terminology and formation hypotheses for post-depositional polishes (as observed at high magnification under different microscopes) on flint artifacts

	Magnification	Microscope	Terminology used	Hypothesis of formation	Reference authors
Post-depositional polishes	100× to 500×	Optical	Soil sheen	Mechanical abrasion	Moss (1983); Vaughan (1981); Levi-Sala (1986a, 1986b)
	100× to 5000×	Optical + SEM	Soil sheen	Chemical or mechanical action	Anderson-Gerfaud (1981); Mansur (1986)
	100× to 5000×	Optical + SEM	Surface sheen	Chemical or mechanical action	Plisson (1985); Plisson and Mauger (1988)
	100× to 500×	Optical	Gloss/shiny surface polish/lustre	Chemical or mechanical action	Semenov (1964)
	100× to 500×	Optical	Patination	Chemical or mechanical action	Keeley (1980)
	1000× to 5000×	SEM	Natural gloss/glaze	Chemical action	Meeks et al. (1982)
	100× to 500×	Optical	Soil sheen/veil	Mechanical abrasion	Michel et al. (2019)
	100× to 500×	Optical	Surface polish	Mechanical abrasion	Vallin et al. (2001); Caspar et al. (2003)
	100× to 500×	Optical	Sheen surface/polished surface/glossy surface	Chemical or mechanical action	Burroni et al. (2002)
	100× to 500×	Optical	Glossy patina	Chemical action	Bradley et al. (1993)
	100× to 500×	Optical	Glossy patina/soil sheen	Gloss = chemical action; sheen = mechanical action	Moncel et al. (2023)
	Undetermined	Undetermined	Solution gloss	Chemical action	Shepherd (1972)
	145×	Dino-Lite	Abrasive smoothing	Mechanical abrasion	Bustos-Pérez et al. (2019); Bustos-Pérez and Ollé (2023)
	100× to 500×	Optical	Lustre	Mechanical abrasion	Mazzucco et al. (2013)
	100× to 5000×	Optical + SEM	Lustré de sol	Mechanical abrasion	Masson et al. (1981)
	100× to 5000×	Optical + SEM	Gloss patina	Chemical action	Stapert (1976)
	1000× to 5000×	SEM	Glaçage siliceux	Chemical action	Aubry et al. (1975)
	1000× to 5000×	SEM	Glossy patina	Chemical action	Rottländer (1975)
	1000×	SEM	Surface sheen polish	Mechanical abrasion	Chu et al. (2015)
	1000× to 2000×	SEM	Secondary silica film	Chemical action	Thiry et al. (2014)
	100× to 500×	Confocal	Lustred surface	Chemical or mechanical action	Galland et al. (2019)