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A Late Stone Age Site in the Erongo Mountains South West Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

J. Desmond Clark  and
James Walton
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Extract

The main object of this paper is to draw attention to the existence of Late Stone Age sites in South West Africa where perishable organic remains are preserved, and in particular to the ‘Big Elephant Cave’, discovered by Dr E. R. Scherz in the Erongo Mountains.

These lie some 10 to 15 miles north-north-east of Usakos, at approximately 21° 40′ S., 15° 40′ E., in a region of open grass steppe with stands of thornbush, mainly Acacia, with low sclerophytic scrub supported by an annual rainfall of between 150–200 millimetres. These mountains rest on Basement Complex rocks and consist of Karroo sediments through which have been introduced granites of post-Karroo Age. The western face of the Erongo forms the edge of the plateau escarpment, and looks out to the Namib Desert and the Atlantic Ocean.

The cave, to which we were conducted in May, 1959, by Dr Scherz, is situated in a commanding position on a kopje of rounded granite boulders near Ameib. It was first shown by its discoverer to the Abbé Henri Breuil when he was copying the Erongo rock paintings, but no study of the settlement was made and it was not revisited in the interim. Although the name ‘Big Elephant Cave’ has been adopted from Dr Scherz, it is, in fact, a deep rockshelter rather than a cave. It contains no paintings, but a line of male and female figures, in faded red paint, is drawn low down on a protected rock at the north side of the kopje. These have been published by the Abbé Breuil.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society , Volume 28 , December 1962 , pp. 1 - 16
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1962

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References

page 1 note 1 For general reference, see: Breuil, Henri, ‘The Whıte Lady of the Brandberg, South West Africa’, S. Afr. Archaeol. Bull., III (1948), pp. 2–11CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Mason, R. J., ‘Note on the Recent Archaeology of the Scherz Basin, Brandberg’, S. Afr. Archaeol. Bull., X (1955), pp. 30–1CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Viereck, A. and Rudner, J., ‘Twyfelfontein–a Centre of Prehistoric Art in South West Africa’, S. Afr. Archaeol. Bull., XII (1957), pp. 15–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Rudner, Jalmar, ‘The Brandberg and its archaeological remains’, Journ. S.W. Afr. Scient. Soc., XII (1957), pp. 7–44Google Scholar.

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page 15 note 3 W. Sydow, Letter to James Walton, dated 12th June, 1959.

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