Research Items

Abstract

The Capsian Industry A preliminary reconsideration of the Capsian phase of the Stone Age in North Africa is put forward by M. R. Vaufrey in L'Anthropologie, 43, Nos. 5–6 in the light of the results of investigations in the shell-heaps of southern Tunisia in 1931–32. The evidence then collected gives an entirely different (view of the Capsian industry from that generally accepted, according to which the Capsian is regarded as the ancestor of the Upper Palæolithic and the Mesolithic of Europe, and an upper and lower Capsian are distinguished, microliths being rare in the latter, the older culture. These investigations, which have been conducted in accordance with a more stringent method than that employed by previous investigators, show that the conception of an ancient Capsian composed almost exclusively of large implements is entirely due to an incomplete view of the evidence. More exacting methods of investigation show that the microlith is abundant in this early stage, and is already highly developed. The Capsian, it appears, is essentially one, but is divisible into three chronological stages—a homogeneous body in which the microlith forms the binding material. The three stages are: typical Capsian in which points, burins and scrapers occur with a typical microlithic industry; (2) interogetulian neolithic or upper Capsian, in which the burin becomes exceptional, though scrapers are more or less numerous, while among the microliths, triangles and scalene points predominate, but true geometrical forms are rare, geometrical forms, however, characterising a divergent development in Algeria; (3) neolithic of Capsian tradition, in which shell heaps are rare, the characteristic Capsian implement, the point à dos rabattu disappears, and evidence of Saharan influence appears. Typologically the Capsian is late Palæolithic or Mesolithic, and does not belong to geologically ancient deposits. Hence it could not be the ancestor of Aurignacian, nor does it lend support to the African origin of Homo sapiens.