Using morphometrics to reappraise old collections: The study case of the Congo Basin Middle Stone Age bifacial industry

Despite its strategic location within the continent, Central Africa is rarely integrated into the reconstruction of population dynamics during the Middle Stone Age (MSA) of Africa, especially in terms of the emergence, diffusion and behavioural patterns of Homo sapiens. However, hundreds of sites have been discovered in Central Africa during the 20th century and attributed to the Lupemban, one of the main MSA technological complexes of the region. This complex is mainly characterised by typological criteria based on the numerous bifacial pieces found in the Congo Basin and interpreted as an adaption to the rainforest environment. Most of these Lupemban assemblages have not been studied for decades and thus it is particularly difficult to assess their diversity. This paper presents a detailed combined morphometrical approach (linear measurements and indices, Log Shape Ratio, Elliptic Fourier Analysis) to take a fresh and rigorous look at the Lupemban bifacial tools. We discuss the comparison of different morphometrical approaches to deal with “old” collections for which contexts, particularly chronological ones, are partially missing. We present the results of this approach on three assemblages of bifacial pieces gathered in the 1930s and late 1960s. We quantify their variability and discuss not only their homogeneity but also the variation of a Lupemban hallmark, namely the “Lupemban point”

Le complexe Djruchula-Koudaro au sud Caucase (Géorgie). Remarques sur les assemblages lithiques pléistocènes de Koudaro I, Tsona et Djruchula

Georgia yielded numerous Middle Paleolithic sites dated of the end of Middle Pleistocene and Upper Pleistocene, located at the foot of the Great Caucasus barrier. Several cultural groups are based on local technical trends or on behaviours coming from other areas (Near-East, Zagros, Eastern Europe). One of these, named Djruchula-Koudaro, groups sites from the Imereti and southern Ossetie areas (north and north-west of Georgia). It yields lithic assemblages with common traits, such as the proportion of blades and the use of bifacial retouches, in particular to shape the tip of elongated artefacts. If the origin of these characters leads of think to a possible link with the Near-East, another hypothesis, developed in the 1960s–1970s by Georgian researchers, proposes a relationship between the Caucasian Acheulian and the Early Middle Paleolithic. In this way, the study of artefacts of reference sites of this complex (Koudaro, Tsona and Djruchula caves) has launched a discussion about the beginning of the Middle Paleolithic in southern Caucasus through the laminar flaking, trying to find the part of local technical behaviours and influences born from contacts or population movements from neighbouring areas.La Géorgie livre de nombreux gisements du Paléolithique moyen qui permettent d'appréhender les modesd'occupations humaines à la fin du Pléistocène moyen et début du Pléistocène supérieur au pied de la barrière montagneuse du Grand Caucase. Plusieurs complexes industriels sont basés sur des traits techniques originaux ou emprunts d'influences régionales (Proche-Orient, Zagros, Europe orientale). Un d'entre eux, le groupe Djruchula-Koudaro rassemble des sites de la région d'Imereti et d'Ossetie du Sud (Nord et Nord Ouest du pays) avec des assemblages lithiques présentant des caractéristiques morpho-techniques communes avec une tendance laminaire très marquée et l'emploi de retouchesbifaciales, notamment pour appointer les supports allongés. Si l'origine de ces traits permet indéniablement de penser à une influence probable du Proche-orient, l'hypothèse, développée dans les années 1960-1970 par des chercheurs géorgiens proposant également une filiation locale à partir du substrat acheuléen du Caucase, n'est pas à exclure. C'est dans ce cadre que l'examen ou le ré-examen de séries lithiques issues des sites éponymes de ce complexe (grotte de Koudaro, Djruchula et Tsona) permet de discuter de cette genèse laminaire au Paléolithique moyen dans le Sud-Caucase,en essayant de faire la part d'un "endémisme" techno-culturel et des influences nées de contacts ou de mouvements populationnels depuis les zones avoisinantes

The Middle Stone Age of Atlantic Africa: A critical review

Evidence of early Homo sapiens populations at the Atlantic coast of Africa remains relatively poorly known in relation to other regions of the continent. Nevertheless, available data across the continent provides a good starting point for current and future research investigations. The many sites known, documented and studied contribute in an increasingly way to the global understanding of the human emergence, including evidence of human evolutionary and technological advances, specific adaptations to diverse environments, the diffusion of Homo species and how humans interacted with each other from the “Early Stone Age (ESA)” through to the Middle Stone Age (MSA) from northern and southern Africa to the West. The differences of knowledge between the Atlantic coast in regard to other regions might be attributed to a number of reasons including but not limited to the history of scientific interest, site formation processes or economic, institutional and political constraints. However, the region received a renewed attention and funds that, combined with new methods and techniques, has been allowing an increased training of new researchers and the acquisition of high-resolution archaeological, paleoenvironmental and chronological data. Together, these inputs will reduce the differences of knowledge between the Atlantic coast and the Northern, Southern and Eastern Africa regions. The African Atlantic Coast represents more than 40% of the continent's perimeter, covering all Africa's climate zones, the hot arid environments, mountainous regions, and tropical rainforest could become relevant barriers for human mobility, but the shallow continental platform, and the great number of river basins allowed mobility between north and south coastal biomes into the continental interiors. These may have provided predictable patchy clusters of resources allowing human populations to thrive, enabling greater mobility and consequent diffusion of cultural traits, resources, and DNA. In this paper we review the record about the prehistory, paleoenvironments and paleoanthropological visibility and potentiality of Atlantic Africa

Homo sapiens

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Gestion des matières premières et comportements techniques dans le middle stone age africain (les assemblages lithiques de la grotte du Porc-Épic (Dire Dawa, Éthiopie))

Avec l'émergence d'Homo sapiens en Afrique, se dessine une nouvelle ère culturelle post-acheuléenne : le Middle stone age. Cette période, aux limites géographiques et chronologiques encore assez floues, est caractérisée, sinon par une série d'innovations comportementales, du moins par une modification importante des rapports entre l'homme et son environnement, entre l'homme et la matière. A travers les restes archéologiques, cette mutation paraît reposer en partie sur la diversification et la régionalisation des techniques de production des outils lithiques et des approches socio-économiques de l'homme sur son milieu. Les séries lithiques mises au jour dans des gisements témoins d'occupations de cette période montrent en particulier que, graduellement et dès 250 ka, les types de supports deviennent plus nombreux et le résultat de méthodes et d'exploitations de plus en plus organisées, dont les débitages Levallois, discoïdes et laminaires sont les plus représentatifs. Dans ce contexte, l'étude des assemblages lithiques présents au sein du remplissage de la grotte du Porc-Épic, près de Dire Dawa en Éthiopie, contribue à la connaissance des modes opératoires présents au Middle stone age. La production combinée d'éclat, lames, lamelles et pointes par différents processus opératoires, l'éc onomie plus ou moins différentielle des différentes matières premières (en particulier pour l'obsidienne) et les divers types d'outils fabriqués (comme les pointes ou les microlithes) mettent en évidence la variabilité technique importante des hommes de Porc-Épic. Les chaînes et schémas opératoires montrent que, au-delà de certaines différences dans l'acquisition des matières premières (roches sédimentaires locales et roches volcaniques allochtones), il existe une unité chronologique dans les modes de production et leur variabilité. Et cette absence apparente de changements majeurs tout au long du remplissage témoigne ainsi de toute la difficulté d'interpréter et de caractériser culturellement les assemblages de cette période.PARIS-Museum Hist.Naturelle (751052304) / SudocSudocFranceF

Changing environments and movements through transitions: Paleoanthropological and Prehistorical Research in Ethiopia: A Tribute to Prof. Mohammed Umer

The content of this volume originates in the organization of a special panel for the 18th International Conference of Ethiopian Studies (ICES) held in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia, in OctobereNovember 2012. This conference addressed the issue of “movements” in its broadest sense: studies on social, religious, political, and cultural movements but also on circulation of words, ideas and peoples; the dynamics of contacts and exchanges; the effect of intellectual or economic change on societies; as well as “movement ” in its concrete physical and spatial meaning at different time and geographical scales. Our contribution to this conference meant to address different levels of understanding of the concept of “movement” in prehistoric archaeology and human evolution, especially in Ethiopia that is alternately considered to be a cradle, point of origin for dispersal, or a refugium zone, of human populations. The concept of “movement” was tackled through multidisciplinary studies, using empirical data from researched sites, and focuses on the paleoenvironmental-palaeoclimatic background to Middle and Upper Pleistocene paleoanthropological record and on the archaeological expressions of the behavioral, chronological and territorial changes, their significance and implications within Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa

Using morphometrics to reappraise old collections: The study case of the Congo Basin Middle Stone Age bifacial industry

Despite its strategic location within the continent, Central Africa is rarely integrated into the reconstruction of population dynamics during the Middle Stone Age (MSA) of Africa, especially in terms of the emergence, diffusion and behavioural patterns of Homo sapiens. However, hundreds of sites have been discovered in Central Africa during the 20th century and attributed to the Lupemban, one of the main MSA technological complexes of the region. This complex is mainly characterised by typological criteria based on the numerous bifacial pieces found in the Congo Basin and interpreted as an adaption to the rainforest environment. Most of these Lupemban assemblages have not been studied for decades and thus it is particularly difficult to assess their diversity. This paper presents a detailed combinedmorphometrical approach (linear measurements and indices, Log Shape Ratio, Elliptic Fourier Analysis) to take a fresh and rigorous look at the Lupemban bifacial tools. We discuss the comparison of different morphometrical approaches to deal with “old” collections for which contexts, particularly chronological ones, are partially missing. We present the results of this approach on three assemblages of bifacial pieces gathered in the 1930s and late 1960s. We quantify their variability and discuss not only their homogeneity but also the variation of a Lupemban hallmark, namely the “Lupemban point”.http://journals.ed.ac.uk/lithicstudies/article/view/4329status: Published onlin

Synthèse sur le charognage de cétacés échoués en Afrique australe atlantique depuis l’Earlier Stone Age

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