Dorothy Garrod's Excavations in the Late Mousterian of Shukbah Cave in Palestine Reconsidered

Abstract

Professor Dorothy A.E. Garrod's 1928 excavation of the Mousterian Layer D at Shukbah Cave in the Wadi en-Natuf (Palestine) has been neglected by prehistorians in favour of the Epipalaeolithic Layer B with its Natufian culture, for which Shukbah is the typesite. The excavation of Layer D is now re-examined with the aid of Garrod's own unpublished documentation and photographs, and the lithic industry analysed in the light of her conclusion that it was the work of a late Middle Palaeolithic hominid population, probably of Neanderthal type. Application of current analytical methods to approximately one half of the recovered assemblage confirms Garrod's correlation of the Shukbah Mousterian with Tabun Layer B in the later model for the Mount Carmel Levantine Palaeolithic succession. Comparison is made, and consistency demonstrated, with the late Mousterian industry of Kebara Cave (Mount Carmel, excavation 1982–90) and the Shukbah D assemblage is further considered in the wider regional context of approximately contemporary sites ranging from southern Jordan to northern Syria. Suggestions are made regarding future excavation at Shukbah.

Nubian Levallois technology associated with southernmost Neanderthals

“…We analysed 707 lithic artefacts from Shukbah D, constituting 57% of the total collection selected and reported by Garrod 56 and 61% of the collection where its present location is currently known (SI7; SI Table 13), all of which are produced on varying cherts. The results of this analysis support the broad conclusion of Callander's analysis 33 that an emphasis on Levallois point production is evident, but our analysis reveals greater variability within the assemblage than previously acknowledged. Here, we highlight this diversity with respect to patterns of shaping flaking surfaces evident among both the core and flake populations.…”

“…Though attributed to Neanderthals, the key hominin fossils from the site were housed in Keith's private collection throughout most of the last century 32 , prohibiting comparative analysis to test the claimed Neanderthal affiliation. Stone artefacts from the excavation were collected selectively and subsequently dispersed to several global institutions that had supported the excavations, with an emphasis on complete Levallois flakes and points, retouched tools and, to a lesser extent, cores, whereas fine debitage, simple flakes and broken pieces appear to have been discarded 33 . The first detailed assessment of the known artefact collections suggested stone technologies that are comparable with other Middle Palaeolithic sites with Neanderthal remains 33 .…”

“…Stone artefacts from the excavation were collected selectively and subsequently dispersed to several global institutions that had supported the excavations, with an emphasis on complete Levallois flakes and points, retouched tools and, to a lesser extent, cores, whereas fine debitage, simple flakes and broken pieces appear to have been discarded 33 . The first detailed assessment of the known artefact collections suggested stone technologies that are comparable with other Middle Palaeolithic sites with Neanderthal remains 33 . In particular, emphasis is placed on the prominence of unidirectional convergent Levallois point reduction, but the illustration of a Levallois point core with a distinctive distal divergent scar pattern on the flaking surface creating a medial-distal ridge is consistent with Nubian Levallois technologies 34,35 (see SI3), hinting at evidence of greater diversity within the assemblage.…”

Sir Arthur Keith's Legacy: Re-discovering a lost collection of human fossils

“…Layer D was a hard layer consisting of breccia that appeared to have been eroded and later covered by Layer B and was therefore only present in some areas. It yielded Mousterian implements (Garrod, 1942 Mousterian was confirmed by Callander and Bar-Yosef (2004), suggesting a correlation of layer D with Tabun Layer B and the Neanderthals. Dorothy Garrod hoped to return to Shukbah Cave to continue the excavations but in 1929, after exploring a number of caves on Mount Carmel, she was asked by the Department of Antiquities and the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem to start excavations at el-Wad and later that year at Tabun and Skhul on Mount Carmel, and these took up all of her attention for the next few field seasons.…”

“…Keith did include a more detailed description of the material from the lower Mousterian levels, concluding that some is of Neanderthal ancestry, whereas some are most likely to be Natufian intrusions (Garrod, 1942;Keith, 1931) (Figure 5). Keith offered no further description of the burials or completeness of the skeletons in the RCS archives that can in any way be useful for identifying the material held at the NHM, but Callander and Bar-Yosef later did (Callander and Bar-Yosef, 2004). …”