Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Profile of Professor Tobias
- List of participants
- Foreword
- Address
- Keynote address
- Searching for common ground in palaeoanthropology, archaeology and genetics
- The history of a special relationship: prehistoric terminology and lithic technology between the French and South African research traditions
- Essential attributes of any technologically competent animal
- Significant tools and signifying monkeys: the question of body techniques and elementary actions on matter among apes and early hominids
- Tools and brains: which came first?
- Environmental changes and hominid evolution: what the vegetation tells us
- Implications of the presence of African ape-like teeth in the Miocene of Kenya
- Dawn of hominids: understanding the ape-hominid dichotomy
- The impact of new excavations from the Cradle of Humankind on our understanding of the evolution of hominins and their cultures
- Stone Age signatures in northernmost South Africa: early archaeology in the Mapungubwe National Park and vicinity
- Vertebral column, bipedalism and freedom of the hands
- Characterising early Homo: cladistic, morphological and metrical analyses of the original Plio-Pleistocene specimens
- Early Homo, ‘robust’ australopithecines and stone tools at Kromdraai, South Africa
- The origin of bone tool technology and the identification of early hominid cultural traditions
- Contribution of genetics to the study of human origins 276
- An overview of the patterns of behavioural change in Africa and Eurasia during the Middle and Late Pleistocene
- From the tropics to the colder climates: contrasting faunal exploitation adaptations of modern humans and Neanderthals
- New neighbours: interaction and image-making during the West European Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition
- Late Mousterian lithic technology: its implications for the pace of the emergence of behavioural modernity and the relationship between behavioural modernity and biological modernity
- Exploring and quantifying technological differences between the MSA I, MSA II and Howieson's Poort at Klasies River
- Stratigraphic integrity of the Middle Stone Age levels at Blombos Cave
- Testing and demonstrating the stratigraphic integrity of artefacts from MSA deposits at Blombos Cave, South Africa
- From tool to symbol: the behavioural context of intentionally marked ostrich eggshell from Diepkloof, Western Cape
- Chronology of the Howieson's Poort and Still Bay techno-complexes: assessment and new data from luminescence
- Subsistence strategies in the Middle Stone Age at Sibudu Cave: the microscopic evidence from stone tool residues
- Speaking with beads: the evolutionary significance of personal ornaments
- Personal names index
- Subject index
Chronology of the Howieson's Poort and Still Bay techno-complexes: assessment and new data from luminescence
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 June 2019
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Profile of Professor Tobias
- List of participants
- Foreword
- Address
- Keynote address
- Searching for common ground in palaeoanthropology, archaeology and genetics
- The history of a special relationship: prehistoric terminology and lithic technology between the French and South African research traditions
- Essential attributes of any technologically competent animal
- Significant tools and signifying monkeys: the question of body techniques and elementary actions on matter among apes and early hominids
- Tools and brains: which came first?
- Environmental changes and hominid evolution: what the vegetation tells us
- Implications of the presence of African ape-like teeth in the Miocene of Kenya
- Dawn of hominids: understanding the ape-hominid dichotomy
- The impact of new excavations from the Cradle of Humankind on our understanding of the evolution of hominins and their cultures
- Stone Age signatures in northernmost South Africa: early archaeology in the Mapungubwe National Park and vicinity
- Vertebral column, bipedalism and freedom of the hands
- Characterising early Homo: cladistic, morphological and metrical analyses of the original Plio-Pleistocene specimens
- Early Homo, ‘robust’ australopithecines and stone tools at Kromdraai, South Africa
- The origin of bone tool technology and the identification of early hominid cultural traditions
- Contribution of genetics to the study of human origins 276
- An overview of the patterns of behavioural change in Africa and Eurasia during the Middle and Late Pleistocene
- From the tropics to the colder climates: contrasting faunal exploitation adaptations of modern humans and Neanderthals
- New neighbours: interaction and image-making during the West European Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition
- Late Mousterian lithic technology: its implications for the pace of the emergence of behavioural modernity and the relationship between behavioural modernity and biological modernity
- Exploring and quantifying technological differences between the MSA I, MSA II and Howieson's Poort at Klasies River
- Stratigraphic integrity of the Middle Stone Age levels at Blombos Cave
- Testing and demonstrating the stratigraphic integrity of artefacts from MSA deposits at Blombos Cave, South Africa
- From tool to symbol: the behavioural context of intentionally marked ostrich eggshell from Diepkloof, Western Cape
- Chronology of the Howieson's Poort and Still Bay techno-complexes: assessment and new data from luminescence
- Subsistence strategies in the Middle Stone Age at Sibudu Cave: the microscopic evidence from stone tool residues
- Speaking with beads: the evolutionary significance of personal ornaments
- Personal names index
- Subject index
Summary
Abstract
The chronologies of the Still Bay and the Howieson's Poort techno-complexes have been hotly debated for the last three decades, because though these technologies belong to the South African Middle Stone Age (MSA) they show affinities with those of the Late Stone Age (LSA) and are found associated with remains that reflect modern human behaviour. The aim of this article is to sum up and discuss the various published chronological data. In the first part are summarised the hypotheses derived from multidisciplinary (geological, palaeontological, stable-isotopic…) studies at Border Cave and Klasies River Mouth which place the Howieson's Poort within the last glacial cycle. In the second part a summary and evaluation of the radiometric and biochemical dates obtained since 1990 for the remains associated with these two techno-complexes is followed by a presentation of the thermoluminescence ages recently calculated for the burnt stones from the Howieson's Poort levels of the Klasies River Mouth (56 ± 3 thousand years (Ka) and the [Still Bay] levels of the Blombos Cave (74 ± 5 Ka).
Résumé
La chronologie des techno-complexes Still Bay (SB) et Howieson's Poort a fait l'objet de nombreuses discussions depuis une trentaine d'années car, bien qu'attribués au Middle Stone Age (MSA) de l'Afrique australe, ces techno-complexes présentent des affinités avec ceux du Later Stone Age (LSA) et sont associés à des vestiges qui reflètent des comportements modernes. L'objectif de cet article est de faire le bilan des données chronologiques disponibles et de les discuter. La première partie résume le résultat d’études pluridisciplinaires (géologie, paléontologie, isotopes stables…) réalisées dans les sites de Border Cave et de Klasies River Mouth. Ces études situent l'Howieson's Poort au sein du dernier cycle glaciaire. La seconde partie dresse le bilan des datations radiométriques ou biochimiques réalisées depuis les années 90 sur des vestiges associés à ces deux techno-complexes. Puis elle présente les âges moyens obtenus récemment par la méthode de la thermoluminescence appliquée aux pierres chauffées du niveau Howieson's Poort de Klasies River Mouth (56 ± 3 Ka) et du niveau Still Bay de Blombos Cave (74 ± 5 Ka).
Introduction
The Howieson's Poort and Still Bay techno-complexes include certain characteristics usually attributed to Late Stone Age: the backed geometric tools of Howieson's Poort are reminiscent of Wilton and the bifacial foliate points of Still Bay have been compared to those of the Solutrean (Fig. 1).
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- From Tools to SymbolsFrom Early Hominids to Modern Humans, pp. 493 - 511Publisher: Wits University PressPrint publication year: 2005