Mousterian Implements

[Robert Henvell]

Early Homo sapiens in Israel made Mousterian tools.Where is the nearest site in Africa,that used a similar technique to manufacture lithic implements?

[Jacques Cinq-Mars]

Early Homo sapiens in Israel made Mousterian tools.Where is the nearest site in Africa,that used a similar technique to manufacture lithic implements?

Hello Bob,

Being in the process of reorganizing my computer files, I cannot send you copies of the few articles I have on this, but a quick Google search (Mousterian in Africa and/or Aterian) should provide you with some answers.

Sorry for not being able to do better at this time.

Jacques

[aggsbach]

Hello Bob,

The next sites are in Syria ( Jabrud, El Kowm: http://pages.unibas.ch/arch/urgesch/ElKowm/index.htm with very nice pictures and reports) and in the Nile-Valley and Nubia (see some of the papers that can be found i n the book:  Soressi M. and Dibble H.L. 2003 Multiple approaches to the study of bifacial technologies. Publication of The University of Pennsylvania Museum, Philadelphia, USA Monograph 115, 290 p. and are available on Marie Soressis hompage as a pdf-file: http://www.eva.mpg.de/evolution/staff/soressi/publications.htm
papers

Hope this helps
Johannes

[Robert Henvell]

Hello Bob,

The next sites are in Syria ( Jabrud, El Kowm: http://pages.unibas.ch/arch/urgesch/ElKowm/index.htm with very nice pictures and reports) and in the Nile-Valley and Nubia (see some of the papers that can be found i n the book:  Soressi M. and Dibble H.L. 2003 Multiple approaches to the study of bifacial technologies. Publication of The University of Pennsylvania Museum, Philadelphia, USA Monograph 115, 290 p. and are available on Marie Soressis hompage as a pdf-file: http://www.eva.mpg.de/evolution/staff/soressi/publications.htm
papers

Hope this helps
Johannes

Johannes,
Mega thanks for the link and the references.
Bob

[lagarvelho]

To whoever made this file available:

About all I can say is, thank you.  That was some abstract!  It looked very, very useful!
Anne G

[Mikey Brass]

While some archaeologists continue to use the term Mousterian for North African stone artifacts, there is an increasing dissenting voice pointing out significant differences.

There are many MSA sites in the Eastern Desert.

[aggsbach]

I agree to your statment because  the African MSA seems to be distinguished from most Middle Palaeolithic industries of Europe by the complexity, small size and number of certain projectile points but the basic reduction sequences and techniques ( dicoidal,  Levallois and even early blade reduction / cores) are very similar

Johannes

[Mikey Brass]

Have you read Elena Garcea's work on the Aterian?

[aggsbach]

Have you read Elena Garcea's work on the Aterian?

I only know the  outlines of her findings in Uan Tabu. Are her results contradictory to my statment?  Do you know a source with open access where detailed information about her work can be found in the net?

A good exemple about similarities between the technology of the MSA ( Sibudu cave) and the technology of the European middle paleolithic has recently published by  P. Villa in the Journal of Archaeological Science 32 (2005) 399–422. She states: "Detailed comparisons with Middle Paleolithic assemblages of Western Europe show that the late Middle Stone Age technology in South Africa is very similar to that of the Middle Paleolithic; in fact we see no fundamental differences between the two entities, as far as lithic technology is concerned".

Johannes

[Jacques Cinq-Mars]

While some archaeologists continue to use the term Mousterian for North African stone artifacts, there is an increasing dissenting voice pointing out significant differences.

There are many MSA sites in the Eastern Desert.

Mikey,

Opposing Afrocentric views of prehistory to Eurocentric ones (essentially a sterile, modern political stance) will certainly not facilitate our understanding of the very complex cultural dynamics that are likely to have manifested themselves, in those early days of humanity, between or around the shores of the Mediterranean sea.

Jacques

[Mikey Brass]

Jacques, understanding those very complex cultural dynamics involves untangling the mess created by the application of Eurocentric terminologies and examining the cultural remains in their own context.

Johannes, I'll respond in detail to your query as soon as I have some time this weekend.

[Jacques Cinq-Mars]

Jacques, understanding those very complex cultural dynamics involves untangling the mess created by the application of Eurocentric terminologies and examining the cultural remains in their own context.

If you say so, Mikey. But it would be nice if you could be a bit more specific about the exact nature of the "mess" [that was] created by the application of Eurocentric terminologies".

Jacques

[Mikey Brass]

Garcea's views have been articulated in various articles:

Garcea, E. 2001. A Reconsideration of the Middle Palaeolithic/Middle Stone Age in North Africa after the Evidence from the Libyan Sahara. In Garcea, E. (ed.) Uan Tabu in the Settlement History of the Libyan Sahara. Firenze: All'insegna del giglio, 25-50.

Barich, B., Garcea, E. and Giraudi, C. 2006. Between the Mditerranean and the Sahara: Geoarchaeological Reconnaissance in the Jebel Gharbi, Libya. Antiquity 80, 567-582.

But the main article in which she articulated the results of her investigation into the affinities and spread of the Aterian is:

Garcea, E. 2004. Crossing Deserts and Avoiding Seas. Aterian North African-European Relations. Journal of Archaeological Research 60.

Her paper paper published argues that the Early MSA in North Africa was distant enough from the European Middle Palaeolithic to not be characterised as being part of the Mousterian. This, in itself, is interesting: A scholar (Sarah Wurz) who worked on material from Klasies River came to the conclusion that there was a
relationship between the MSA and MP, meaning that the two continents were not isolated from each other. In essence, that a terminology dichotomy has historical rather than factual origins. Wurz expanded on this in her 2002 JAS article on Klasies River. On the other hand, Garcea's work on Holocene and Palaeolithic African material has been  from North African sites and has led her to conclude, "Technologically,
the Early Middle Stone Age (MSA) exhibits a generalised stone industry occasionally (although incorrectly) called Mousterian or Middle Palaeolithic for its apparent similarities with Eurasian lithic industries."

While Levallois techniques were utilised in both Europe and North Africa, I am in agreement with Garcea when she states:
"The use of European-based terminologies for African contexts has created much confusion and biased understanding of the local African cultural horizons... These European terms are still in use today and, unfortunately, have brought with them meanings and assumptions that often limit and confuse substantial interpretation of African ancient cultures."

There are stone tools from sites dating to the Holocene, in West and southern Africa, which exhibit the Levallois technique.  For an example of the latter, see:
F.-X. Fauvelle-Aymar, K. Sadr, F. Bon & D. Gronenborn. 2006. The Visibility and Invisibility of Herders' Kraals in Southern Africa, with Reference to a Possible Early Contact Period Khoekhoe Kraal at KFS 5, Western Cape. Journal of African Archaeology 4(2).

[aggsbach]

Thank you for the references. Jacques sent me two papers of Garcea which were very interesting to read. Maybe we could agree that the MSA and the Mousterian are both middle Paleolithic but if you ask ten experts for their definition of these entities or even for the middle Paleolithic, you will get ten different answers.
Discussing the similarities and differences of the MSA and the European middle paleolitic has to take into account the full range of informations that has been gathered 
If we are only discussing about lithics (this was the beginning of the discussion) there is a common stock of techniques that are shared between MSA assemblages and the MP in Europe and the Middle East. Wurz and Villa are discussing this in detail which is a great step forward after so many years of claiming these similarities in a rather intuitive way. That the Levallois technique also can be found ( for exemple in Le Grand Pressigny) in the Holocene does not relativate the fact that this technique appears at allmost the same time in Africa and Europe.
Nobody at this moment can for a single inventory of stone tools differentiate if these techniques are ad-hoc innovations, that have been invented many times again and again during Paleolithic times, as it is argued for some inventories in the thesis of Patrick Bringmans about his work in multilayer site of Veldwezelt-Hezerwater (a very interesting discussion about middle paleolithic variability: https://repository.libis.kuleuven.be/dspace/handle/1979/270mode=simple&dc=description&dcAttr=abstractpop&dcLang=en), adaptations to the environment, the consequence of a restricted access to certain resources, climato-environmental conditions or the consequence of the groups mobility.
The example of the Aterien you cite seems to prove that in the MSA, socio cultural traditions in producing very specific lithics can last for at least 40 kyrs.  but similar longstanding trends are also known from central Europe (for example the so called middle European Micoquien)
 
Garcea  claims that the Aterians were very different from the Mousterians in Europe because they had the skills to adapt to different (especially arid) environments. Without referring to  the whole and a little bit wearisome discussion about “modern human behaviour” I think that that the difference is not so fundamental as it was once claimed. Neanderthal mastered their life in a cold and arid climate, had mobility patterns similar to that of the Aterians and hunted even large animals (Schöningen, Salzgitter Lebenstaedt, Mauran…) and sometimes buried their dead.
If we talk about  symbolism it seems to be clear now that the MSA people at some sites left traces that can be connected with some kind of symbolic communication and social / group identity. It is not clear if these findings are isolated in time and space or the beginning of a continous behaviour  but it is also a fact that such traces have not found in Europe despite a long history of research and maybe will never be found. In this respect some MSA people were indeed different from Mousterien people.

Johannes

[Mikey Brass]

Wurz's analyses of the Howiesonspoort levels at Klasies were the first real indepth showing (a) how the levels fit into the overall MSA context of the site and (b) showing new investigative approaches which could be applied to the other MSA stages at the same site. I have a copy of her MA and Ph.D. dissertations and her South African Archaeological Bulletin (1999) article. The way she tackled the question of variation and standardisation in the MSA I, II and IV levels in her subsequent JAS article was impressive, disputing conclusions formerly reached by Anne Thackeray.

Wurz did pick up subtle differences in the utilisation of the Levallois techniques and this, combined with differential regional end dates, makes for another interesting discussion in itself.

Garcea's understanding of the literature on the behavioural patterns (itself regionally differentiated) of Homo sapiens neanderthalensis is limited. It does make for a couple of weak statements in her JAR article. However, the thrust of her argument against Aterian-Mousterian interaction in Iberia is the lack of tangs and bifacial retouch in that locality.

The similarities between some Mousterian mobility patterns and those exhibited by the Aterians (which altered as desertification worsened) are most likely, imo, due to necessary survival strategies in their respective habitats: aridity and very cold conditions both require movement.

While the Levallois technique was utilised both in Europe and in Africa, the temporal and spatial contrasts in the end products, the social context in which they were manufactured and utilised, and how they inform on the behavioural patterns and inter-relationships between communities are matters which interest me more in a regional scale.