Blades (lames) were long narrow stone tools and were at least twice as long as broad. To produce blades, rocks of good quality like flint and obsidian were required. Upon these hard rocks, using the technique Levallois, prismatic cores were formed and subsequently, the flakes with parallel edges, the so-called blades, were removed from these cores. Their cutting sides were particularly sharp and therefore appropriate for cutting vegetables or animal food.

Blades were procuced for the first time in the Middle Palaeolithic (100,000-35,000 BP), but were widely used during the Upper Palaeolithic Period (35,000-11,000 BP). Homo sapiens sapiens advanced the production techniques of blades to produce several types of tools like arrowheads (for hunting) or burins (for working of bone and antler). Such tools are included in stone industries, typical for the Upper Palaeolithic Period: Aurignacian, Gravettian, Solutrean and Magdalenian.