90,000 year-old specialised bone technology in the Aterian Middle Stone Age of North Africa

Bouzouggar, Abdeljalil; Humphrey, Louise; Barton, Nick; Parfitt, Simon A.; Balzan, Laine Clark; Schwenninger, Jean‐Luc; Hajraoui, Mohamed Abdeljalil El; Nespoulet, Roland; Bello, Silvia M.

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0202021

Cited by 36 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…Recently available chronologies at El Mnasra estimate the age of bone tool-bearing Aterian layers to be $107 ka (Jacobs et al, 2012). Together, the Contrebandiers Cave, El Mnasra (El Hajraoui, 1993, 1994El Hajraoui and Debé nath, 2012) and Dar es-Soltan I (Bouzouggar et al, 2018) bone tool assemblages show that there is an archaeological tradition (El Hajraoui, 2019) of bone tool technology in the MSA of North Africa from 120 to 90 ka. Bone tools appear to be a pan-African phenomenon in the MSA well before they appear at similar levels of abundance in Europe.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There are also 21 formal bone tools at Sibudu that are dated to ∼64–57 ka ago ( d'Errico et al., 2012a ). Finally, in North Africa, a formal “bone knife” tool from Dar es-Soltan I cave was identified in Aterian deposits dated to ∼90 ka ago ( Bouzouggar et al., 2018 ) and “spatule” bone tools from Aterian deposits have been identified at El Mnasra ( El Hajraoui, 1993 , 1994 ; El Hajraoui and Debénath, 2012 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A worked bone assemblage from 120,000–90,000 year old deposits at Contrebandiers Cave, Atlantic Coast, Morocco

et al. 2021

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Summary The emergence of Homo sapiens in Pleistocene Africa is associated with a profound reconfiguration of technology. Symbolic expression and personal ornamentation, new tool forms, and regional technological traditions are widely recognized as the earliest indicators of complex culture and cognition in humans. Here we describe a bone tool tradition from Contrebandiers Cave on the Atlantic coast of Morocco, dated between 120,000–90,000 years ago. The bone tools were produced for different activities, including likely leather and fur working, and were found in association with carnivore remains that were possibly skinned for fur. A cetacean tooth tip bears what is likely a combination of anthropogenic and non-anthropogenic modification and shows the use of a marine mammal tooth by early humans. The evidence from Contrebandiers Cave demonstrates that the pan-African emergence of complex culture included the use of multiple and diverse materials for specialized tool manufacture.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A worked bone assemblage from 120,000–90,000 year old deposits at Contrebandiers Cave, Atlantic Coast, Morocco

et al. 2021

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“…For North Africa the record is equally sparse. Despite the recovery of shaped bone tools (knives) from MSA Aterian layers at Dar es-Soltan 1 and El Mnasra [19,20], no examples of bone retouchers are known at these sites. Three bone retouchers have been reported at El Harhoura 2 from MSA layers (4A, 5 and 8) [21: Fig 147 , Table 123].…”

Section: Plos Onementioning

confidence: 99%

Bone retouchers and technological continuity in the Middle Stone Age of North Africa

Turner¹,

Humphrey²,

Bouzouggar³

et al. 2020

PLoS ONE

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Evidence for specialised bone tools has recently been reported for the Middle Stone Age of North Africa [one], which complements similar finds of slightly younger age in South Africa [two, three]. However, until now scant reference has been made to lesser known tools also made of bone ('bone retouchers') that were employed specifically as intermediaries for working or refining stone artefacts, that are sometimes present in these assemblages. In this paper we describe 20 bone retouchers from the cave of Grotte des Pigeons at Taforalt in northeast Morocco. This is the largest stratified assemblage of bone retouchers from a North African MSA site, and the biggest single collection so far from the African Continent. A total of 18 bone retouchers was recovered in securely dated archaeological levels spanning a period from~84.5 ka to 24 ka cal BP. A further two bone retouchers were found in a layer at the base of the deposits in association with Aterian artefacts dating to around 85,000 BP and so far represent the earliest evidence of this type of tool at Taforalt. In this paper we present a first, detailed description of the finds and trace the stages of their production, use and discard (chaîne opé ratoire). At the same time, we assess if there were diachronic changes in their form and function and, finally, explore their presence in relation to stone tools from the same occupation layers of the cave.

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“…Yet, the origins and significance of bone technology remains important in understanding the development of human culture. More recently, the advent of formal bone tools-i.e., shaped with techniques specifically conceived for bone material such as scraping, grinding, and grooving (Klein, 1983(Klein, , 1999McBrearty and Brooks, 2000)-has become associated with behavioral modernity that began in the Middle Stone Age of Africa and became increasingly sophisticated through the Upper Paleolithic of Europe (McBrearty and Brooks, 2000;Henshilwood et al, 2001;d'Errico et al, 2012;Bouzouggar et al, 2018). However, evidence indicates that bone technology has much greater antiquity, extending into the Early Pleistocene at sites in South Africa (Brain and Shipman, 1993;d'Errico, 2001, 2008;d'Errico et al, 2001;d'Errico andBackwell, d2003, 2009;Stammers et al, 2018) and East Africa (Leakey, 1971;Shipman, 1989;Backwell and d'Errico, 2004).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bone tools from Beds II–IV, Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, and implications for the origins and evolution of bone technology

Pante

Torre

d’Errico

et al. 2020

Journal of Human Evolution

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The advent of bone technology in Africa is often associated with behavioral modernity that began sometime in the Middle Stone Age. Yet, small numbers of bone tools are known from Early Pleistocene sites in East and South Africa, complicating our understanding of the evolutionary significance of osseous technologies. These early bone tools vary geographically, with those in South Africa indicating use in foraging activities such as termite extraction and those in East Africa intentionally shaped in a manner similar to lithic tool manufacture, leading some to infer multiple hominin species were responsible for bone technology in these regions, with Paranthropus robustus assumed to be the maker of South African bone tools and Homo erectus responsible for those in East Africa. Here, we present on an assemblage of 52 supposed bone tools primarily from beds III and IV, Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, that was excavated by Mary Leakey in the late 1960s and early 1970s, but was only partially published and was never studied in detail from a taphonomic perspective. The majority of the sites from which the tools were recovered were deposited when only H. erectus is known to have existed in the region, potentially allowing a direct link between this fossil hominin and bone technology. Our analysis confirms at least six bone tools in the assemblage, the majority of which are intentionally flaked large mammal bones. However, one of the tools is a preform of the oldest barbed bone point known to exist anywhere in the world and pushes back the initial appearance of this technology by 700 kyr.

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90,000 year-old specialised bone technology in the Aterian Middle Stone Age of North Africa

Cited by 36 publications

References 39 publications

A worked bone assemblage from 120,000–90,000 year old deposits at Contrebandiers Cave, Atlantic Coast, Morocco

A worked bone assemblage from 120,000–90,000 year old deposits at Contrebandiers Cave, Atlantic Coast, Morocco

Bone retouchers and technological continuity in the Middle Stone Age of North Africa

Bone tools from Beds II–IV, Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, and implications for the origins and evolution of bone technology

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