The emergence of clearly recognizable modern culture in our prehistoric past, as reflected by the observable cultural characteristics of modern hunter-gatherer groups, has long eluded scientists and has been a subject of debate for years. But now, an international team of researchers has uncovered material evidence that indicates a culture, much like that of the modern hunter-gatherer San people of Africa, existed as much as 44,000 years ago.
Led by Francesco d’Errico, Director of Research at the French National Research Centre, and a team of scientists that included Lucinda Backwell and Marion Bamford of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, they have dated and analyzed objects recovered from archaeological strata, or layers, at the Border Cave. The site has yielded exceptionally well-preserved organic material, making it well-situated for the application of a variety of time-tested dating techniques.
“The dating and analysis of archaeological material discovered at Border Cave in South Africa, has allowed us to demonstrate that many elements of material culture that characterise the lifestyle of San hunter-gatherers in southern Africa, were part of the culture and technology of the inhabitants of this site 44,000 years ago,” says Backwell.
Until now, most archaeologists thought that the earliest evidence of San hunter-gatherer culture in southern Africa dates back at most 20,000 years.
The artifacts revealed uses and practices very similar to that of modern San applications. Some of them:
Digging sticks weighted with perforated stones, dated to about 44,000 years ago;
A wooden stick decorated with incisions, used to hold and carry a poison containing ricinoleic acid found in castor beans;
Dated to about 40,000 years ago, a lump of beeswax, mixed with the resin of toxic Euphorbia, and possibly egg, wrapped in vegetal fibres made from the inner bark of a woody plant. Like the modern San equivalent, it was likely used for hafting arrowheads or tools;
Warthog tusks shaped into awls and possibly spear heads; and
The similarities did not stop there. Says Backwell, “they adorned themselves with ostrich egg and marine shell beads, and notched bones for notational purposes. They fashioned fine bone points for use as awls and poisoned arrowheads. One point is decorated with a spiral groove filled with red ochre, which closely parallels similar marks that San make to identify their arrowheads when hunting."
Another key research team leader, Paola Villa, (University of Colorado Museum of Natural History) lead study author of another report based on the same research, suggests that the finds indicate that the Later Stone Age thus emerged in South Africa more than 20,000 years earlier than previously believed -- coinciding with the time when humans were migrating from Africa to the European continent.
Said Villa. "But differences in technology and culture between the two areas are very strong, showing the people of the two regions chose very different paths to the evolution of technology and society."
The research by the team, consisting of scientists from South Africa, France, Italy, Norway, the USA and Britain, is published in two articles online in the prestigious journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The paper titled Early evidence of San material culture represented by organic artifacts from Border Cave, South Africa. The other paper, titled Border Cave and the Beginning of the Later Stone Age in South Africa.
Thanks to coldrum for the link. For more, including photograsphs of the most recent finds, see popular-archaeology.com/issue/june-2012.
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