SEMINAR: Archaeology Seminar: Dr Nick Taylor

Dr Nick Taylor Eureka Arcaheological Research and Consulting, UWA

“A riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma” Middle Stone Age technology, use-wear and the evolution of Homo sapiens in Equatorial Africa

The archaeological record of central Africa bears witness to a technological shift around 300000 years ago, with the replacement of hand-held implements by distinctive tools suitable for hafting. The new tools are associated with the regional Middle Stone Age (MSA) Lupemban industry, the appearance of which coincides with the first settlement of the equatorial rainforest belt by Middle Pleistocene hominins. The development of sophisticated composite technologies in this ecological context bears directly on current palaeoanthropological debates about the origins of cognitive and behavioural modernity prior to the emergence of Homo sapiens.

This talk provides an overview of the MSA Lupemban industry and highlights the problems inhibiting Stone Age research in central Africa. The technological characteristics of the Lupemban and theories pertaining to the uses of Lupemban tools are outlined before chronological, palaeoenvironmental and site integrity datasets are reviewed. Use-wear methodologies are discussed and the results of the experimental tool-use programme presented. Finally, the results of the use-wear analysis of Kalambo Falls Lupemban core-axes are provided, and the implications of this research for the understanding of late Middle Pleistocene hominin cognition and behaviour considered.