A dihedral burin and a scraper (9 and 10 cm) from the Moravany region (“Willendorf-Kostenki culture”), The elegant dihedral burin shows marginal retouching on the proximal end, very probably for faciliating hafting of the artifact. The burin resembles similar artifacts from the Frech Protomagdalenian and the Late Gravettian at Willendorf 2/9
Barton recently stated, that burination is functionally more effective when practized on long straight edges such as found on blades and less common on flakes. This observation may explain the increasing frequency of burins found during the Upper Paleolithic, compared to earlier times.
Use wear traces on burins showed that they were used for multiple tasks beyond graving. These activities include scraping, carving, shaving and cutting. Occasionally burins were used as drills.
There is a considerable functional diversity among burinated tools. A burin blow can be both: a creator of a tool or an eliminator of a used edge from a tool (Vaughan 1985). Many burins (carinated burins from the envolved Aurignacian, polyhedral burins during the Gravettian) can be seen as bladelet cores. Others (especially dihedral and angle burins) may indeed have been used as gravers. Burination could be also a step in the production process of a tanged instrument.
Suggested reading: http://www.public.asu.edu/~cmbarton/CMB_iWeb/Publications.html