Middle Palaeolithic and Neolithic Occupations around Mundafan Palaeolake, Saudi Arabia: Implications for Climate Change and Human Dispersals

Abstract

The Arabian Peninsula is a key region for understanding climate change and human occupation history in a marginal environment. The Mundafan palaeolake is situated in southern Saudi Arabia, in the Rub’ al-Khali (the ‘Empty Quarter’), the world’s largest sand desert. Here we report the first discoveries of Middle Palaeolithic and Neolithic archaeological sites in association with the palaeolake. We associate the human occupations with new geochronological data, and suggest the archaeological sites date to the wet periods of Marine Isotope Stage 5 and the Early Holocene. The archaeological sites indicate that humans repeatedly penetrated the ameliorated environments of the Rub’ al-Khali. The sites probably represent short-term occupations, with the Neolithic sites focused on hunting, as indicated by points and weaponry. Middle Palaeolithic assemblages at Mundafan support a lacustrine adaptive focus in Arabia. Provenancing of obsidian artifacts indicates that Neolithic groups at Mundafan had a wide wandering range, with transport of artifacts from distant sources.

Remote sensing and GIS techniques for reconstructing Arabian palaeohydrology and identifying archaeological sites

“…Palaeohydrology is key to understanding the dispersal of hominins into the Arabian Peninsula during the Quaternary, and for exploring hypotheses relating to the expansion and contraction of Palaeolithic populations both within Arabia and between regional refugia (Petraglia and Alsharekh, 2003;Field and Lahr, 2006;Rose and Petraglia, 2009;Armitage et al, 2011;Petraglia et al, 2011Petraglia et al, , 2012Delagnes et al, 2012;Petraglia, 2012, 2014;Crassard et al, 2013aCrassard et al, , 2013bScerri et al, 2014b). Surface freshwater availability, mediated by periodic incursions of increased rainfall, is likely to have been a critical control on the timing and routeways of hominin migrations across the mid-latitude SaharoArabian desert belt.…”

“…During some of these periods large lakes formed in northwestern regions such as Mudawwara, Tayma and Jubbah, and in southern regions such as Mundafan and Khujaymah, and in eastern regions such as Saiwan (McClure, 1976(McClure, , 1984Garrard et al, 1981;Petit-Maire et al, 2002Rosenberg et al, 2011Rosenberg et al, , 2012Engel et al, 2011;Petraglia et al, 2011Petraglia et al, , 2012Crassard et al, 2013a). Numerous smaller interdunal and terminal alluvial fan lakes have been reported from the Rub' al-Khali, Nefud and Ramlat as-Sab'atayn (McClure, 1976(McClure, , 1984Schulz and Whitney, 1986;L ezine et al, 1998;Thomas et al, 1998;Rosenberg et al, 2011) and the western Hajar (Parton et al, 2013).…”

“…Both images reproduced with kind permission from Springer Science and Business Media. research undertaken by the Palaeodeserts Project has begun to address this problem by displaying peninsula-scale drainage data generated using the methods discussed in this paper Crassard et al, 2013aCrassard et al, , 2013b. A higher level of spatial resolution has also been achieved by a number of palaeodrainage mapping studies at local and regional scales (e.g Cleuziou et al, 1992;Dabbagh et al, 1997Dabbagh et al, , 1998Petraglia et al, 2012;Crassard et al, 2013aCrassard et al, , 2013b.…”

“…research undertaken by the Palaeodeserts Project has begun to address this problem by displaying peninsula-scale drainage data generated using the methods discussed in this paper Crassard et al, 2013aCrassard et al, , 2013b. A higher level of spatial resolution has also been achieved by a number of palaeodrainage mapping studies at local and regional scales (e.g Cleuziou et al, 1992;Dabbagh et al, 1997Dabbagh et al, , 1998Petraglia et al, 2012;Crassard et al, 2013aCrassard et al, , 2013b. However, the spatial coverage of palaeodrainage mapping of Arabia remains sparse, and there is a clear need to fill in the enormous gaps between these regions (and the scalar gaps between displaying local drainage and peninsula-scale drainage) in a consistent manner in order to enhance our understanding of the Quaternary evolution of palaeodrainage in the peninsula.…”

“…It has been suggested (Anton, 1984) that initial wadi incision and Wadi Batin fan deposition (Al-Sulaimi and Pitty, 1995), may have occurred during a PlioceneePleistocene boundary pluvial phase, and that fluvial reactivation of the major relict systems occurred during subsequent Pleistocene pluvial phases under semiarid to semi-humid conditions (Holm, 1960;Anton, 1984;Edgell, 2006). The precise extent of this activation is unclear, as some sections of those systems are currently bisected by dunes, suggesting that they have been inactive for some time, although they may have been connected during Pleistocene humid phases (Holm, 1960;Brown et al, 1989;Edgell, 2006;Crassard et al, 2013a), and in some cases during the Holocene (Cleuziou et al, 1992;Edgell, 2006). Radiometric dating of the evolution of these major systems however, remains limited.…”