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What happened to the human mind after the Howiesons Poort?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 November 2011

Marlize Lombard  and
Isabelle Parsons
Marlize Lombard
Affiliation:
1Department of Anthropology and Development Studies, University of Johannesburg, P.O. Box 524, Auckland Park 2006, South Africa (Email: [email protected])
Isabelle Parsons
Affiliation:
2Department of Anthropology & Archaeology, University of South Africa, P.O. Box 329, UNISA 0003, South Africa
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Extract

The authors deliver a decisive blow to the idea of unidirectional behavioural and cognitive evolution in this tightly argued account of why the bow and arrow was invented and then possibly laid aside by Middle Stone Age communities in southern Africa. Finding that all are modern humans (Homo sapiens), they paint a picture of diverse strategies for survival and development from 75 000 years ago onwards. It is one in which material inventions can come and go, human societies negotiating their own paths through a rugged mental landscape of opportunity.

Keywords

southern AfricaStone AgeHowiesons Poortevolutionprojectileshuman mind
Type
Research article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 85 , Issue 330 , December 2011 , pp. 1433 - 1443
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 2011

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