‘What sort of thing is an elephant?’ Reviewing the evidence for a ‘generic’ MSA in Central Africa

Abstract

ABSTRACT Despite a 100-year scientific research legacy, the Middle Stone Age (MSA) record of Central Africa remains poorly known and is stubbornly peripheral to debates on the timing, pace and nature of technological change in relation to the evolutionary origins of Homo sapiens. The MSA Lupemban industry is often characterised as the singular representative of the MSA across the region, but the details of its chrono-stratigraphic relationship with preceding and particularly succeeding industries are still unclear. To archaeologists working with longer records on the margins of Central Africa, the Lupemban has been principally conceptualised in relation to the preceding Acheulean/MSA transition, and as a specifically early MSA, late Middle Pleistocene (MIS 7?) entity. Evidence presented here suggests that it was subsequently replaced or graded into a ‘generic’ or ‘undifferentiated’ MSA, or into a sub-regional ‘Lupembo-Tshitolian’ industry. By contrast, the shorter records of Lowland Atlantic Central Africa mean that there archaeologists have instead reported the Lupemban as a probably late-persisting Upper Pleistocene (MIS 3/2?) industry that temporally abuts the Later Stone Age (LSA) without any ‘generic MSA’. This paper reviews key sequences from the periphery and core of Central Africa and explores these differing perspectives to address the reality and complexities of a Central African ‘generic MSA’.