Exploring the Later Stone Age at a micro-scale: New high-resolution excavations at Wonderwerk Cave

New ages for Middle and Later Stone Age deposits at Mumba rockshelter, Tanzania: Optically stimulated luminescence dating of quartz and feldspar grains

Taphonomic and paleoecological change in the large mammal sequence from Boomplaas Cave, western Cape, South Africa

Sediment biomarkers are important archives of regional, and global climate signatures, particularly in regions which lack continuous terrestrial archives such as the semi-arid deserts of Africa. We measured carbon and hydrogen stable isotopes from plant wax n-alkanes recovered from the Holocene Later Stone Age (LSA) sedimentary sequence at Wonderwerk Cave (South Africa), that comprises several technocomplexes (Kuruman/Oakhurst, Wilton, Ceramic Wilton and Historic). The plant wax n-alkane results were integrated with published palaeoenvironment reconstructions from the cave based on faunal, botanical, geological and sedimentological proxies which provides a robust comparative framework. The findings match well with other proxy records from the same strata and indicate a semi-arid to semi-humid early Holocene, with a mix of woody C3 plants and C4 grasses. In contrast, the mid-late Holocene environment was increasingly arid, open and dominated by C4 grasses. A distinct humid period at 5300–6200 cal. BP is evident, associated with a high density of archaeological material and a change in cultural expression in the Wonderwerk record. This study provides a step forward in using stable isotopes from biomarkers to create terrestrial environmental records in semi-arid regions.

This research at the Nsongezi open-air site examines the intergenerational artefacts at a site where the first Stone Age artefacts were identified in Uganda. The purpose was to examine the nature and cause of the mixed Later Stone Age (LSA) and Iron Age (IA) artefacts in the same stratigraphic context at Nsongezi. The specific objectives included examining the ceramic assemblage, discussing the nature of interactions between the Later Stone Age and Iron Age people and accounting for why and how the mixture of artefacts occurs at Nsongezi. Using a documentary review, archaeological survey, and excavation, the research re-examines the theories of displacement and coexistence concerning theLSAandIAmaterial mixture, which has always been dismissed as a disturbance of stratigraphic contexts. Guided by the Law of superimposition, the association of archaeological material from different cultural periods such as the Later Stone Age and Iron Age artefacts at Nsongezi is attributed to four phenomena. First is the cultural interaction of distinctLSAandIApopulations. Secondly, theLSApopulations may have adopted Iron Age technology and pottery while continuing with some of theLSAtechnology and pottery. Thirdly, the Iron Age populations occupied theLSAsites previously abandoned, and some of theLSApeoples occupied the old Iron Age sites as the two groups crisscrossed the region in shifting agricultural and hunter-gatherer economies. Finally, the mixedLSAand Iron Age deposits might have resulted from post-abandonment taphonomic processes. Therefore, the social interactions between theLSAandIAat Nsongezi challenge the dominant narrative that theIApopulations used their metal technology’s superiority to displace and absorb theLSApeople.

The Middle and Later Stone Age faunal remains from Diepkloof Rock Shelter, Western Cape, South Africa

Moshebi's shelter at fifty: Reinvestigating the Later Stone Age of the Sehlabathebe Basin, Lesotho

Middle and Later Stone Age large mammal and tortoise remains from Die Kelders Cave 1, Western Cape Province, South Africa

The abundance of eland, buffalo, and wild pigs in Middle and Later Stone Age sites

The Middle and Later Stone Age in the Iringa Region of southern Tanzania

The Middle Stone Age (MSA) to Later Stone Age (LSA) transition has roots in the MSA, and the latter is thus a watershed for many of the behavioral and technological transformations seen in the LSA. These include modern behavioral traits of miniaturization of artifacts in the Later Pleistocene, personal adornment, and long-distance exchange of obsidian. Population expansion in and out of Africa also occurs in the Later Pleistocene. The MSA/LSA transition not only exhibits most of the technological and behavioral traits of the MSA but also introduces microlithic technological components and increases modern behavior practices introduced in the MSA. For example, the bow and arrow can be argued to be an improvement of projectile weapons first introduced in the MSA during the Mid-Later Pleistocene. After approximately 40 ka, transition assemblages in eastern Africa lose most MSA elements, including the large Howiesons Poort–type backed microliths, and blade and microblade technologies dominate toolkits, heralding a distinct technology phase—the LSA. While unified by small backed blade–based tools, the LSA remains a complex technological phase with regional and temporal variations. Across the continent, the LSA lasts up to the end of the Last Glacial Maximum, although it persisted in some sites up to the mid-Holocene. At the end of the last glacial period (10–12 ka), some LSA foragers around Lake Turkana began to fish intensively. At approximately 5.5 ka, local forager populations in the Turkana Basin adopted domestic animals—cattle, goats, and sheep—heralding the start of a food production era in the region known as the Pastoralist Neolithic. This transition to food production by former foragers is recorded at some sites with MSA/LSA transition and LSA assemblages, reinforcing the essential role of cultural innovation in hominin adaptation.

Wonderwerk Cave has yielded one of the longest and most complete Holocene Later Stone Age (LSA) records for the arid interior of South Africa. This paper presents the results of a new radiocarbon dating program for Excavation 1 that is explored within a Bayesian model of all existing Wonderwerk Cave radiocarbon (14C) dates for the Holocene. The proposed model, usingPhaseswithin an OxCalSequencemodel, provides robust age estimates for changes in the technological and paleoenvironmental record at the site. The more precise dates allow a comparison of the timing of climate shifts across the interior of southern Africa and begin to allow us to identify whether hiatuses in human occupation, or cultural shifts, are synchronous across broader areas of the subcontinent, or not.

Southern Africa has a long and rich archaeological record, ranging from the Oldowan lithics in the Sterkfontein valley and Wonderwerk Cave (about 2 Ma) to Iron Age smelting (less than one thousand years ago) in Zimbabwe. A brief overview of charcoal analyses indicates applications in such areas as dating, vegetation and climate reconstructions, fuel use, medicinal use, and the interpretation of human behavior. Some of the research done in the 20th century mainly focused on charcoal for the purpose of dating, but this has diversified in the 21st century to include other applications. The focus is on South African sites, but research from Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe is included. Southern Africa has a very diverse woody component with more than fifteen hundred species from a flora of more than twenty-five thousand species so the establishment of regional modern reference collections of charcoalified woods has been instrumental in improving identifications of the archaeological taxa. Early Middle Stone Age charcoal records show that a diversity of woody species was burned. By Middle Stone Age times, records show the selection of woods for fuel, tinder, and medicinal use as well as cooking of starchy rhizomes. Late Stone Age and Iron Age records, in addition, show the use of woods for smelting and intense fires.

Backed pieces became widespread in the Upper Pleistocene and Holocene and are part of the classic definitions for the Later Stone Age in many parts of Africa. However, the association of backed pieces with Later Stone Age is not clear in the Horn of Africa. These pieces are present in both Middle Stone Age (MSA) and Later Stone Age (LSA) contexts. To what extent was the “backing phenomenon” homogeneous or diverse between and within the two periods? Here, we start with a review of the literature on backed pieces in the Horn of Africa, noting the lack of terminological consensus and the absence of a shared typology in the region. We then describe the variability of backed pieces using two complementary approaches: (1) multivariate statistical analysis on a set of 28 attributes of 188 artifacts from eight securely dated contexts and (2) 2D geometric morphometric analyses on the same dataset. The two approaches provide complementary results, which allow us to identify and discuss the chronological trends in backing technology and morphology, without introducing a new terminology or proposing a new formal “descriptive” typology.

The ‘Middle Stone Age’ and the ‘Late Stone Age’ Developments throughout Africa from rather more than 250,000 until about 10,000 years ago show an accelerated shift away from broad cultural uniformities towards the establishment of increasingly distinct regional traditions. These trends may most readily be traced in the archaeological record by study of stone-artefact typology; but it is sometimes possible to go beyond such investigations in an attempt to illuminate the nature of the ancient societies which, to an increasing extent, may be seen as ancestral to recent African populations. Despite this growing diversity, developments seem to have followed roughly parallel courses with inherent continuity in different parts of Africa and, indeed, in other regions of the Old World (J. G. D. Clark 1977). The reasons for this are not yet fully understood, and the various stages were not necessarily reached at the same time in different areas. In recent years, the study of the earlier part of this period has received increased international attention because of the realisation that it may have been particularly important in the physical and cultural development of modern people. The period with which this chapter is concerned has conventionally been divided by archaeologists of sub-Saharan Africa into the ‘Middle Stone Age’ and the ‘Late Stone Age’. As research has progressed, it has become apparent that there was no sharp divide between these, any more than there was between industries of the so-called Middle Stone Age and their predecessors; the distinctions have become increasingly hard to define on other than arbitrary grounds.

Eland, buffalo, and wild pigs: were Middle Stone Age humans ineffective hunters?