Still Bay and Howiesons Poort Foraging Strategies: Recent Research and Models of Culture Change |
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Authors: | Grant S McCall Jonathan T Thomas |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Anthropology, Tulane University, 101 Dinwiddie Hall, New Orleans, LA 70118, USA;(2) Department of Anthropology, University of Iowa, 114 Macbride Hall, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA |
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Abstract: | The Still Bay (SB) and Howiesons Poort (HP) industries, endemic to southern Africa and dating to approximately 72–59 ka, have
received a great deal of archaeological attention by virtue of their striking patterns of technology and their close association
with some of the earliest unambiguously symbolic objects found in southern Africa. This paper reviews recent literature concerning
SB and HP lithic assemblages, faunal remains, paleoenvironmental contexts, and chronological information. It argues that SB
biface-dominated technology was designed to be multifunctional and to economize lithic raw material, a strategy well-suited
to foragers moving frequently across a wide range of ecological zones in which access to resources and prey encounters were
unpredictable. In contrast, HP blade-based tools, using backed blades as modular components in compound weapons, were efficient
and reliable hunting weapons designed for specific tasks. More costly and difficult to maintain, HP technology resulted from
the targeting of known, localized, and seasonal resources through planned logistical forays. We argue that these complicated
patterns of innovation represent separate cultural responses to environmental instability during Marine Isotope Stage 4 and
demographic pressures in southern Africa at this time. Against the backdrop of environmental and demographic shifts, the emergence
of these innovative tools and associated symbolic objects reflects distinct but quintessentially modern cultural behaviors
ethnographically associated with risk reduction, reciprocity, and information sharing. |
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