Patterns of Violence in the Pre-Neolithic Nile Valley

Abstract

Burial assemblages inform us about the biology of past societies, social relations, and ritual and symbolic behavior. However, they also allow us to examine the circumstances of death and social violence. A high level of intergroup violence among prehistoric hunter-gatherers is well-documented in some times and places but is extremely rare in others. Here we present an analysis of the perimortem injury to skeleton PD8 at the site of Sphinx in Central Sudan. This burial, attributed to the Early Khartoum (Khartoum Mesolithic) culture, radiocarbon dated between 8637 and 8463 cal BP, bears evidence of a perimortem sharp force trauma caused by penetration of an unshaped, fractured non-human bone between the right scapula and the rib cage. Among more than 200 anthropologically assessed human burials from the early Holocene Nile Valley reviewed in this paper, PD8 provides the only documented evidence of violence resulting in death. This rare case of death differs from the numerous cases of intergroup conflict documented in terminal Pleistocene burial grounds in Lower Nubia. This suggests different patterns of violence and strategies of conflict resolution in the pre-Neolithic (terminal Pleistocene and early Holocene) Nile Valley. We attribute this difference in the prevalence of interpersonal trauma to climatic and environmental conditions, territorial boundary defense, and post-marital residence practices before and after the Younger Dryas’ arid millennium (~ 12,800–11,600 BP).

Janus faced: The co‐evolution of war and peace in the human species

“…60,104 The oldest documented instance of interpersonal violence in Africa is found among Homo sapiens around 23,500-19,300 years ago at Wadi Kubbaniya, in the Nile Valley, where a young adult male displays healed forearm parry fracture and embedded projectiles. 105 Additionally, the Qadan graveyard at Jebel Sahaba in Sudan, dating between 13,400 and 18,600 years old, reveals 23 out of 61 bodies with signs of violent deaths, although debates persist over whether these deaths resulted from large-scale raids or isolated instances of violence over time. 60,106 In Eastern Africa, the site of Nataruk, located west of Lake Turkana in Kenya and dating to approximately 9,500-10,500 years ago, provides compelling evidence of intergroup violence among hunter-gatherers, with the discovery of 12 partially preserved bodies, 10 of which exhibit clear signs of death due to sharp and blunt force trauma inflicted by arrows and clubs.…”