Shellfishing and the Colonization of Sahul: A Multivariate Model Evaluating the Dynamic Effects of Prey Utility,Transport Considerations and Life-History on Foraging Patterns and Midden Composition

ABSTRACT

Archaeological evidence of shellfish exploitation along the coast of Sahul (Pleistocene Australia-New Guinea) points to an apparent paradox. While the continental record as a whole suggests that human populations were very low from initial colonization through early Holocene, coastal and peri-coastal sites dating to that time are dominated by small, low-ranked, littoral taxa to the near-complete exclusion of large, higher ranked, sub-littoral species, precisely the opposite of theory-based expectations, if human populations and predation rates were indeed as low as other data suggest. We present a model of shellfish exploitation combining information on species utility, transport considerations, and prey life-history that might account for this apparent mismatch, and then assess it with ethnographic and archaeological data. Findings suggest either that high-ranked taxa were uncommon along the Pleistocene coastlines of Sahul, or that abundant and commonly taken high-ranked prey are under-represented in middens relative to their role in human diets largely as a function of human processing and transport practices. If the latter reading is correct, archaeological evidence of early shellfishing may be mainly the product of subsistence activities by children and their mothers.     

Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analysis on the diet of Jomon populations from two coastal regions of Japan

We report on a stable isotope paleodietary reconstruction of Jomon populations in Japan during the Middle to Final Jomon period (ca. 5000–2300 years BP), focusing on dietary differences within and among populations and between regions. Carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis was performed on human and faunal bone collagen from six coastal sites along the Inland Sea in the Sanyo (Ota, Funamoto, and Tsukumo) region and along Mikawa Bay and the Pacific Ocean in the Tokai (Kawaji, Yoshigo, and Inariyama) region. We found that carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios were positively correlated, indicating that the Jomon people consumed a mixed diet of marine (shellfish and marine fish) and terrestrial (C₃ plants and terrestrial mammals) protein. In the Ota samples (n = 25, during the Middle Jomon period, 5000–4000 years BP), sex was one of the main reasons for the intra-population dietary variation. Ota males consumed greater amounts of marine food, while Ota females consumed greater amounts of terrestrial food; these dissimilar diets may have been related to the sexual division of labor. Significant inter-population dietary differences were found, which may have been related to differences in age or site location. Notably, the two coastal regions showed clear isotopic differences. Nitrogen isotope ratios of individuals from the Sanyo region were significantly higher than ratios of individuals from the Tokai region. The individuals in the Sanyo region might have consumed a diet high in aquatic foods, particularly high trophic level marine fish, whereas the individuals in the Tokai region might have consumed a lot of marine shellfish. Another possible reason for the regional isotopic difference might have been different baseline of nitrogen isotope ratios of the marine ecosystems.     

δ18O Analyses of the Humpbacked Conch (Gibberulus gibberulus): Evaluating a Proxy for Reconstructing Sea-Surface Temperature at Chelechol ra Orrak,Palau

ABSTRACT

In Palau, Micronesia, marine resources, particularly shellfish, played a vital role in human subsistence for millennia. Despite the vast array of molluscan species in archaeological assemblages, there is a dearth of data on nearshore palaeoecology or prehistoric shellfish foraging practices. In this study, we analysed stable oxygen isotopes (δ¹⁸O) values present in the calcium carbonate shell of Gibberulus gibberulus from the Chelechol ra Orrak archaeological site to reconstruct average nearshore sea-surface temperatures (SST) from approximately 1500–1100 cal BP. Modern shellfish samples and environmental data were collected from intertidal zones near the site and x-ray diffraction (XRD) was employed to identify the biomineralogical composition of G. gibberulus. These steps provide necessary information for the selection of the proper oxygen isotope-to-SST conversion formula. The selected formula was applied to δ¹⁸O samples from archaeological shells to reconstruct prehistoric SST averages. The results of this proxy validation study verify that G. gibberulus accurately records ambient SST and can be used to reconstruct ancient nearshore conditions. These findings also contribute to the establishment of an environmental baseline, which can be used to examine how environmental changes may have influenced the availability of molluscan taxa that in turn influenced human subsistence practices through time.     

Subsistence variations and landscape use among maritime hunter-gatherers. A zooarchaeological analysis from the Beagle Channel (Tierra del Fuego,Argentina)

Changes in the exploitation of resources among prehistoric hunter-gatherer-fishers of the Beagle Channel (Southern South America) are examined in this paper. Archaeological investigations show the prevalence of maritime hunter-gatherer organization throughout the occupation of the region (ca. 6400 BP – 19th century). Notwithstanding, variations in the exploitation of different kind of animal resources have been detected, and a concomitant reorientation in the landscape use is then inferred. Zooarchaeological evidence from five shellmiddens is analyzed here: evenness measures and relative abundance prey types are used to evaluate such adjustments. Results indicate the major utilization of coastal and terrestrial ecozones and the predominance in the exploitation of mammals (pinnipeds and guanacos) in ancient occupations. While, during the Late Holocene an expansion in ranges of maritime mobility for subsistence is detected, which was associated with an increase in the representation of birds and fish in the zooarchaeological record.     

Pre-pottery farmers on the Pacific coast of southern Mexico

Large island-like shell mounds along the southern coast of Mexico are the earliest known archaeological sites on the Pacific margin of Mesoamerica. These aceramic deposits date to between 7500 and 3800 cal BP and have been interpreted as locations where foragers, living elsewhere seasonally on the coastal plain, harvested shellfish and other estuarine resources. Based on an accumulation of paleoecological data from elsewhere in the lowland Neotropics of Mesoamerica, southern Central America and South America we pose and provide a first test of an alternative subsistence model: that the Archaic Period populations in this area were slash and burn farmers. Burned maize phytoliths first appear in these sedimentary records at 6500 cal BP in association with macroscopic charcoal and forest disturbance plant taxa. Periodic burning and forest disturbance, consistent with farming activities, are also evident in the macroscopic charcoal record between 6500 and 4700 cal BP. Pollen, phytolith and charcoal records all point to sustained burning, forest disturbance and the cultivation of maize between 4700 and 3800 cal BP. These data suggest that people were slash and burn farming during the Archaic Period prior to the adoption of pottery and the proliferation of Early Formative Period villages and full-fledged agriculture based on near or total reliance on crop plants after ∼3800 cal BP.     

Human impacts on ancient shellfish: a 10,000 year record from San Miguel Island,California

We use measurements of more than 11,000 marine shells from 41 archaeological components to construct a 10,000 year record of human impacts on ancient mussel and abalone stocks on San Miguel Island, California. General reductions in the mean size of mussel and abalone shells gathered through time are attributed to growing human population and predation pressure. Based on comparison with historically documented changes in shellfish communities caused by the local extinction of sea otters in the 19th century, changes in mean shell size and the abundance of other shellfish species may have been facilitated by Native American predation on sea otters as early as 7500 years ago. Despite having measurable impacts on local ecosystems, Native Americans on San Miguel harvested huge quantities of shellfish throughout the Holocene. Such long-term harvests appear to have been sustained by an early emphasis on fishing at lower trophic levels, by periodically shifting village locations, and by intensifying the use of finfish and sea mammals through time. This pattern of “fishing up the food web” contrasts with many modern fisheries, suggesting that the study of ancient fisheries can help us better manage our own endangered coastal ecosystems.     

Molluscan foraging efficiency and patterns of mobility amongst foraging agriculturalists: a case study from northern New Zealand

A New Zealand example illustrates the potential of foraging efficiency (FE) measures to inform not only on human-prey dynamics, but also to help identify situations where mobility is constrained or stimulated. Marked declines in Māori molluscan FE, coupled with increased shellfish usage, are identified over a ca. 450-year period at the coastal locality of Harataonga Beach, New Zealand. The potential effects of climate change are considered using newly available southwest Pacific multi-proxy records and temperature sensitive species, but correlations are lacking. The molluscan results signal possible restrictions on logistic and/or residential mobility in late prehistory, while evidence from the broader cultural landscape points to increasing agricultural investments and marked social competition. The Ideal Free Distribution model (IFD) is used to consider regional-scale interactions between foraging efficiency, agricultural developments, and competition, and their effects on mobility. Geographic and temporal variation in the patterning and causes of population movements is highlighted through this model, particularly differences between large game foragers in the south and populations with mixed economies in the north. In late prehistory, many northern areas including Harataonga apparently experienced reductions in the geographic scale of population movements, coupled with intensified intra-territorial mobility. The latter was an outcome of labour being widely dispatched across tribal territories, quasi-specialisation in subsistence tasks, and pooling and exchange of resources through a variety of social mechanisms which often involved population movements.     

Explaining Shellfish Variability in Middens on the Meriam Islands,Torres Strait,Australia

Archaeologists have traditionally assumed that proportional variability in the types of shellfish remains found in middens can directly inform arguments about prehistoric coastal and island diets. We explore this assumption by comparing an analysis of three shellmidden sites on the Meriam Islands (eastern Torres Strait, Australia) with data on contemporary Meriam shellfishing strategies. We present tests of hypotheses drawn from behavioral ecology about factors that influence prey choice and differential field processing and transport, and compare these results to variability displayed in the shell assemblages. We find that while prey choice is predictable ethnographically, it is not reflected in the midden remains. Variability in the middens only begins to make sense with reference to the tradeoffs that foragers face in attempts to maximize the rate at which they can deliver resources to a central locale. This result should be of interest to all researchers concerned with reconstructing and explaining variability in prehistoric subsistence practices, especially in coastal or island settings.     

Strandloping as a Resource-Gathering Strategy in the Cape,South African Holocene Later Stone Age: The Verloren Vlei Record

ABSTRACT

Elands Bay and adjacent coastline near the mouth of the Verloren vlei on the South African Atlantic coast offered Later Stone Age foragers a variety of marine, estuarine, and terrestrial food resources. We suggest that strandloping (beachwalking or beachcombing) by latest Holocene foragers as a regular practice constituted an important component in their repertoire of subsistence activities. Washed-up mussels, seals, birds, whales, and other recently dead animals would have been available to such strandlopers. We distinguish strandloping as a subsistence practice from the procurement of living prey, including shellfish, mammals, birds, and other animals. The Holocene archaeological record of the Elands Bay area suggests changes through time in resource use, and these changes appear to be recognizable in patterns of shellfish gathering. During the latest part of the Holocene, between about 1,500 and 300 years ago, subsistence practices display a distinctive character that perhaps conforms more strongly than previously to what we conceive of as strandloping.     

Integrating Human-Animal Relationships into New Data on Aterian Complexity: a Paradigm Shift for the North African Middle Stone Age

In the last decade, research conducted in North Africa, particularly in northwestern Africa, has shed light on the key role that the region has played in improving our understanding of human evolution. Specifically, (1) the increased number of direct dates obtained with new methods has pushed back the age of the Aterian (~ 150,000 to 40,000 BP); (2) analyses of Aterian lithic assemblages have placed them within the range of variation of the Middle Stone Age; (3) analyses of associated human remains suggest that the makers of the Aterian are within the range of variation common among early modern human and present affinities with contemporary remains from the Levant (Qafzeh, Skhul); (4) zones of settlement, such as those in the present-day Sahara and coastal areas, and even the composition and demography of populations could have been influenced by specific climatic changes of the Late Pleistocene; and (5) the presence of blocks of pigment showing use-wear facets on their surfaces, the presence of pigments on artifacts, as well as osseous industry and earliest ornaments suggest complex behaviors among these populations. In this renewed approach to the Aterian, data from faunal analyses provide information on human-carnivore competition and the subsistence practices of hunter-gatherer groups. Taphonomic and zooarchaeological analyses suggest that humans were not the only large predators occupying caves, and that the hunter-gatherers of the Middle Stone Age exploited a wide range of environments, consuming terrestrial and coastal resources alike. Interdisciplinary confrontations highlight the apparent complexity of socioeconomic organization and the strategies of high levels of mobility that characterized Aterian groups.     

Late Holocene Changes in Shellfishing Behaviors From the Gulf of Carpentaria,Northern Australia

ABSTRACT

Dramatic changes in shellfishing behaviors occur across northern Australia during the late Holocene, marked most conspicuously by the cessation of large shell mound construction in some areas, and the reorganization of shellfishing behaviors towards more intensive production in the last 1,000 years. Excavations reveal rapid and widespread changes within coastal sites, an increasing diversification in overall subsistence resources, and patterns of increase in site establishment and use. Some of these changes have been argued to be associated with increasing climate variability and a trend towards increasing aridity during the late Holocene, thought to have transformed coastal ecosystems and mollusc availability. However, when these hypotheses are tested at the local level, more nuanced patterns of human-environment interaction emerge, which call into question interpretations based on broad-scale climate records. We suggest that disjunctions in the timing of the cessation of shell mound construction noted between the west and east Gulf of Carpentaria may be related, at least in part, to the timing and intensity of external cultural contacts with Macassan seafarers, associated with reorganization of mobility and production strategies, rather than as yet undemonstrated environmental changes impacting on shellfish availability.     

Human Adaptive Responses to Catastrophic Landscape Disruptions During the Holocene at Numundo,PNG

Prehistoric land use and social activity in West New Britain, PNG, are well documented, although the landscapes – largely shaped by catastrophic volcanic eruptions – in which these took place, and the relationships people had with these landscapes, are poorly understood. We define the evolving landscape at Numundo, from prior to the Witori-Kimbe 2 eruption (W-K2, ca. 3600 BP) to after the Witori-Kimbe 4 eruption (W-K4, ca. 1400 BP), using fossil phytolith and coral evidence at eight archaeological sites to provide environmental evidence of the human responses to periodic catastrophic events. From ca. 5900 to 3600 BP, all the sites were coastal and disturbed. Early disturbance reflected natural forest recovery after W-K1 (ca. 5900 BP), whereas the later landscape was largely shaped by human activity. In contrast, forest regrowth was limited after W-K2 and open environments typical of human activity with a mosaic of regenerating, disturbed and managed vegetation, persisted until W-K3. Environmental recovery from W-K3 and W-K4 (ca. 1700 BP and ca. 1400 BP) differed completely, reflecting severity of the volcanism and the short time between eruptions. The landscape after W-K3 was largely a naturally recovering landscape, in contrast to effective vegetation recovery and significant human exploitation of the landscape – again a mosaic of regenerating, disturbed and managed vegetation – after W-K4. The social history is one in which people evolved increasingly flexible land-use practices, enabling them to re-settle this periodically disrupted landscape, and to take advantage of an increasingly broad range of habitats suitable for cultivation. The human response to this highly dynamic landscape represents a close relationship between social and natural processes, as people became increasingly better at re-settling an unpredictably disrupted landscape; both the social and environmental processes within this landscape become equally influential and instrumental in shaping the effects of the other.     

Early Maritime Desert Dwellers in Namaqualand,South Africa: A Holocene Perspective on Pleistocene Peopling

ABSTRACT

South Africa's northern Namaqualand coastal desert is the southern extension of the Namib. Today, this region is semi-desert with patchy subsistence resources and scarce, unpredictable rainfall. Yet this ancient desert landscape possesses residues of human activity stretching back into the Middle Pleistocene, evidenced by heavily weathered surface finds, including handaxes and Victoria West cores. Such old finds in so harsh an environment raise important questions: how do human movements into this area relate to local palaeoenvironmental changes, and how has this relationship changed through time? While no dated Middle Pleistocene sites presently exist to reconstruct the earliest hominin dispersals, several late Pleistocene sites now have chronostratigraphic sequences that can be brought to bear on these questions. This article presents chronological and subsistence-settlement data for one such site, Spitzkloof A Rockshelter in northern Namaqualand's rugged Richtersveld. Humans are shown to have visited the site very sporadically between ～50,000 and 17,000 cal BP. Unlike most of the subcontinent, the most intensive occupations occur during early Marine Isotope Stage 2, when multiple proxies suggest enhanced humidity associated with intensified winter rainfall. We examine these data using the region's better-developed Holocene archaeological record to create predictions about the earliest coastal desert dwellers.     

Lapita subsistence strategies and food consumption patterns in the community of Teouma (Efate,Vanuatu)

The subsistence strategies of the Lapita populations (3100–2800 BP), the first colonisers of the pristine environments of the islands of Eastern Melanesia and Western Polynesia, have been a matter of ongoing debate for decades. Opinions have ranged between the two extremes of Lapita colonisers being either characterised as highly mobile foragers to fully horticultural communities. To further address the question, this paper presents stable carbon and nitrogen isotopic data obtained from analyses of human and animal collagen samples from the site of Teouma (Efate, Vanuatu) dated to between c. 3000–2500 BP. The isotopic signatures obtained from 28 samples (23 human and 5 animal), interpreted in combination with isotopic information from several coastal and insular environments, suggest a diet primarily made up of terrestrially derived animal protein with lesser contributions from vegetable produce and inshore marine species. Comparisons linking the isotopic data gleaned from the Teouma individuals and Lapita subsistence patterns reconstructed through archaeozoological and archaeobotanical remains support the hypothesis of a mixed economy, that included terrestrial foraging, inshore marine exploitation and a low level of food production for at least some of the earliest Lapita colonists in Vanuatu.     

Prehistory of Native Americans on the Central American Land Bridge: Colonization,Dispersal, and Divergence

The Central American land bridge has served as a passageway for animals and humans moving between North and South America. Nevertheless, after the first waves of human immigration at the end of the Pleistocene, contact between the native peoples who remained on this isthmus and other peoples living in continental areas where civilization ultimately developed, is characterized, according to the field record, by the transfer of crops, technologies, and goods, until ca.1400 BP when speakers of Mesoamerican languages occupied the northwestern edge (Gran Nicoya). The ancestors of modern-day speakers of Chibchan and Chocoan languages underwent social and cultural diversification mostly within the confines of the land bridge. Some Precolumbian residents altered vegetation immediately after first arrival at least 11,000 years ago, and began to add domesticated crops to their subsistence inventory between 9000 and 7000 BP. Maize and manioc (or cassava), domesticated outside the land bridge, were introduced in Preceramic times, early in the period between 7000 and 4500 BP, and gradually dominated regional agriculture as they became more productive, and as human populations increased and spread into virgin areas. Diversity in material culture is visible ca. 6000 BP, and becomes more apparent after the introduction of pottery ca. 4500 BP. By 2000 BP culture areas with distinctive artifact inventories are discernible. Between 2500 and 1300 BP hierarchies among regions, sites, social groups, and individuals point to the establishment of chiefdoms whose elite members came to demand large numbers of costume and sumptuary goods. A few special centers with stone sculptures and low-scale architecture served a social universe larger than the chiefdom, such as clusters of recently fissioned social groups with memories of a common heritage. Social interactions on the land bridge, endowed with productive bottomlands, highland valleys, and coastal habitats, appear always to have been strongest among neighboring groups.     

Geographical Influences on Settlement-Location Choices by Initial Colonizers: a Case Study of the Fiji Islands

From 3200 to 2850 cal BP (1250–900 BCE), the Lapita people of the Bismarck Archipelago (Papua New Guinea) undertook voyages eastward that led to their colonization of the eastern outer Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa. The earliest (Lapita) settlements in Fiji were along the Rove Peninsula in southwest Viti Levu Island. At the time of colonization, sea level was 1.5 m higher than today. The Rove Peninsula was then a smaller island off the coast of larger Viti Levu, with a broad, fringing reef along its windward coasts, which was probably the main attraction for Lapita colonizers. As elsewhere during Lapita times in the western tropical Pacific Islands, settlement choice for the initial colonizers of the Fiji Islands was at one level driven by site access, at another by the presence of broad, fringing coral reefs suitable for marine foraging. The earliest settlement along the Rove Peninsula was at Bourewa, occupied first in 3050 cal BP (1100 BCE), where people lived in houses on stilt platforms built along the axis of a subtidal sand barrier; on one side was a broad coral reef, on the other a partly-enclosed tidal inlet. There is no evidence that the Bourewa settlers practised horticulture or agriculture at this time, their subsistence being predominantly marine foraging. After some 300 years of following this subsistence strategy, the inhabitants of Bourewa responded to sea-level fall and the arrival of cultivars (of taro and yam) by including horticulture. As sea level fell further, a total of 550 mm during the Lapita era, the tidal inlet dried up and marine-food resources diminished to a point where the natural environment of the Rove Peninsula could no longer sustain its Lapita inhabitants. All Lapita sites in the area were abandoned about 2500 cal BP (550 BCE), at the same time as the Lapita culture, marked by the end of dentate-pottery manufacture, came to an end in Fiji.     

Auditory Exostoses in Pre‐Hispanic Populations of the Lower Paraná Wetlands,Argentina

Auditory exostosis (AE) has been characterised from the medical and anthropological perspectives as an adaptive biological response to repeated immersion in cold water as well as exposure to cold environmental temperatures and wind chill. At the archaeological level, the highest prevalence has been found in societies living in coastal environments in areas located at 30–45° north or south latitude with a subsistence pattern based on fishing and mollusc gathering. The region of the lower Paraná River wetlands in Argentina is an area dissected by multiple rivers, streams, and lakes, especially in the Paraná delta near Buenos Aires where these features create a landscape composed of many islands. A variety of archaeological analyses performed on faunal remains, stone tools, bone, and ceramic artefacts are consistent with the interpretation that towards the end of the late Holocene (2000–700 BP), this region was inhabited by hunter–gatherer populations with a subsistence pattern based mainly on fishing and hunting along with the gathering of molluscs. In this work, we present an analysis of 176 crania of individuals recovered from 21 archaeological sites in the region. Results indicate the presence of AE in 6.25% of the cases, with all of these corresponding to adult male individuals. This moderate prevalence coincides with the expected levels for populations where contact with water is frequent in regions located at 30–45° latitude. The absence of female individuals showing evidence of AE allows us to suggest a possible sex‐based division of labour. We hope that this work can contribute to ongoing discussion of the economic and social aspects that characterised pre‐Hispanic life in the study area, while also expanding the available information on AE at the worldwide level. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Megafaunal extinction in the late Quaternary and the global overkill hypothesis

The global blitzkrieg hypothesis explains differential rates of megafaunal extinction between the world's landmasses in the late Quaternary based on a proposed leap in predation efficiency enjoyed by colonising societies. It is characterised by appealing simplicity. Selective over hunting, facilitated by naiveté to human predation, produced rapid mass extinctions of large animals wherever subsistence societies colonised new landmasses. Taken at face value the circumstantial case for blitzkrieg is compelling and despite a paucity of direct evidence it has gained considerable support. Our review of the model suggests that it overlooks much contradictory data and rests on simplistic interpretations of complex biogeographicat and anthropological phenomena. These interpretations and assumptions do not account for major differences between the biotas, ecologies and human cultures of the landmasses involved. The assertion that responses of remote island species to human predation provide realistic models for those of continental taxa is poorly founded, exaggerating the likely predation efficiency of humans colonising continents. An absence of terrestrial predators over evolutionarily significant periods, together with restricted ranges and small populations, renders island faunas uniquely vulnerable to invaders. The argument, that climate cannot explain these phenomena because previous Glacial Maxima did not cause comparable extinctions, presupposes that their local effects were at least as severe as those of the Last Glacial Maximum. This has yet to be demonstrated and at most it would indirectly support a role for anthropogenic influence, not overkill per se. Overlooked or underplayed are the influences of translocated and other invading species. Similarly, differences in the origins, technologies and traditions of colonising human societies are rarely considered. These factors strongly impact on the predation efficiency, density and range of human populations, critically affecting the outcomes of predator-prey modeling. When a fuller constellation of influences and constraints is considered it is reasonable to posit that rapid mass extinction through selective human predation may largely describe megafaunal extinctions on remote islands, but the argument is not convincing for continents. This is especially so regarding Australia. Because even the largest Australian species were prey to endemic carnivores, their responses to human predation would not have been comparable to those of oceanic island species. No kill-sites or specialized big-game hunting/butchering tools are known and, on the basis of ethnographic and archaeological data, it is probable that predation efficiency, population density and range of the first Australians were insufficient to effect rapid mass extinction. Chronologies of human arrival and the disappearance of megafauna remain poor, but the most recent estimates for human-megafaunal coexistence in Australia range from 10,000 to 43,000 years. Although human predation may have been a contributing factor in megafaunal extinctions, rapid overkill is unlikely to describe the actual mechanism in most instances. The role of human predation and its significance relative to competing factors, human and otherwise, varied considerably between landmasses, as did the speeds with which extinctions occurred. Blitzkrieg and other mono-factorial models are heuristically valuable devices, but a growing body of evidence suggests that extinction can rarely, if ever, be attributed to a single cause.     

The Pleistocene of Rabat (Morocco): Mollusks,Coastal Environments and Human Behavior

The Rabat-Témara region of the Moroccan Atlantic coast reveals a succession of Quaternary palaeobeaches. This coastal area is dotted with numerous prehistoric caves. The study of the Upper Pleistocene coastal landscape associated with these caves is of paramount importance in the knowledge of human population subsistence. During the Upper Pleistocene, the ocean level changes drastically influenced the coastal geomorphology as well as the fauna assemblages. The chrono-lithostratographical analysis of the coastal sedimentary formations allows the distinction of three sequences rich in marine fauna. These sequences date from MIS 11 to MIS 5. The identification of malacofauna species from these deposits revealed 39 species, along with Bryozoans, Crustaceans, and Echinoids. These assemblages show a constant fauna cortege highlighted by the dominance of the amphi-Atlantic species Stramonita haemastoma. This species shows an increase in the number of specimens in the uppermost part of marine deposits, probably in relation with a climate warming in the MIS 5. This fauna of both intertidal rocky substrates and sandy substratum indicates environmental conditions close to the present-day Rabat-Témara coastline. As in other coastal locations of Africa from MIS 5, the Middle Stone Age Homo sapiens population benefitted from a littoral environment rich in coastal resources. Comparison between thanatocenoses and archaeological records allows us to identify both species available for Middle Stone Age population and those preferred for human use.