Christopher Ames

Archaeological ostrich eggshell (OES) bead assemblages often comprise a variety of colours. However, it is unclear if the range of colours seen in OES beads were caused deliberately by anthropogenic action, or accidentally by post-depositional taphonomic factors. In this study, OES fragments were heated to four different temperatures (200°C, 350°C, 550°C, and 700°C) to recreate colour variation observed in the OES bead assemblage from the Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 1 occupations at Grassridge Rockshelter, South Africa. Beads were manufactured from the four samples of heated OES fragments, as well as from an unheated sample of control fragments. Time to perforation, successful bead manufacture and/or breakage, as well as loss of mass and fra-gility, were all documented to examine if heated ostrich eggshell performed differently from unheated ostrich eggshell during bead manufacture. Our results show that three of the four heated samples resulted in detrimental changes to ostrich eggshell properties, specifically the loss of mass and an increase in fragility, which negatively affected bead manufacture indicated by increased incidence of breakage and longer average times to perforation and completion. We compare these findings with the worked OES assemblage from Grassridge Rockshelter, South Africa, and our results indicate that unintentional heat treatment may have substantially impacted the colouration of the worked OES assemblage at Grassridge, especially with regard to heat treated preforms. Moreover, we argue that the impact of unintentional heat treatment on the colouration of worked OES assemblages , and especially preforms, should be more broadly considered across the archaeological record.

Grassridge rock shelter is located in the high elevation grassland foothills of the Stormberg Mountains in the Eastern Cape of South Africa. This places Grassridge at an important biogeoclimatic intersection between the Drakensberg Mountains, the South African coastal zone, and the interior arid lands of southern Africa. First excavated in 1979, the approximately 1.5 m stratigraphic sequence was divided into two major occupational components: a 50-70 cm thick Later Stone Age component dating between 7-6 ka and an underlying 50-80 cm thick Middle Stone Age component dated to 36 ka at the base. Here we present a reanalysis of the Grassridge stratigraphic sequence that combines new optically stimulated luminescence and radiocarbon age estimates with sedimentological and microbotanical analyses to evaluate site formation processes and the palaeoenvironmental context of human occupations. Results indicate a complex history of geogenic, anthropogenic, and biogenic inputs to the depositional sequence that are interspersed with pulsed human occupation from 43-28 ka, 13.5-11.6 ka, and 7.3-6.8 ka. Microbotanical remains indicate a cooler, drier grassland environment in MIS 3 that transitions to a warmer, moister grassland environment dominated by summer rainfall in the middle of MIS 1. The pulsed occupational sequence identified at Grassridge is characteristic of the Pleistocene and Holocene record across the greater high elevation grassland region of South Africa, which, based on comparison with other currently available evidence, seems linked to a complex system of forager mobility entwined with rapidly fluctuating palaeoenvironments across the last glacial to interglacial transition.

Grassridge Rockshelter is a multicomponent Pleistocene and Holocene archaeological site located in the interior of the Eastern Cape of South Africa, and was originally studied during the late 1970s and early 1980s. The Grassridge Archaeological and Palaeoenvironmental Project (GAPP) initiated new research at Grassridge in 2014, and here we present an overview of our initial excavations and research, with a focus on the Holocene occupations. Preliminary results indicate a more complex occupational and depositional history than previously thought. In addition to relocating the known mid-Holocene occupation , we have identified a previously unrecorded early Holocene occupation , which dates to the end of the Younger Dryas, and a thin flowstone located at the contact between the Holocene and Pleistocene deposits. The Holocene lithic assemblages are characterised by flake-based lithic reduction, primarily on hornfels, with an increase in the frequency and diversity of retouched pieces from the early to mid-Holocene. Ostrich eggshell beads are ubiquitous during both Holocene occupations, and marine shells have also been discovered. The latter are reported from Grassridge for the first time, and indicate a connection with the coast.

Excavations at Shishan Marsh, a former desert oasis in Azraq, northeast Jordan, reveal a unique ecosystem and provide direct family-specific protein residue evidence of hominin adaptations in an increasingly arid environment approximately 250,000 years ago. Based on lithic, faunal, paleoenvironmental and protein residue data, we conclude that Late Pleistocene hominins were able to subsist in extreme arid environments through a reliance on surprisingly human-like adaptations including a broadened subsistence base, modified tool kit and strategies for predator avoidance and carcass protection.

Abstract. In this paper we review recent developments in the  debate over the emergence of modern human behaviour (MHB) to show that despite considerable diversity among competing models, the identification of given material traits still underpins almost all current perspectives. This approach, however, allows assumptions over the biological relationship between archaic and modern humans to permeate the definitions of MHB and, as a result, has effectively stultified archaeology’s potential contribution to the issue. We suggest that the concept of MHB
as currently defined is flawed. It must either be redefined in strictly behavioural terms before reincorporation into the debate over
modern human origins or, more productively, discarded all together to avoid the harsh and unrealistic dichotomy it creates between a modern and non-modern archaeological record.

Résumé. Cette étude présente une synthèse des avancées récentes dans la recherche sur l’origine du comportement moderne afin de démontrer que, malgré une diversité superficiellement substantielle entre les divers modèles, l’approche fondamentale qui les sous-tend presque tous reste ancrée dans l’identification de certains traits dans la culture matérielle des populations paléolithiques. Nous soulignons que cette caractéristique peut être problématique puisqu’elle permet à des présuppositions au sujet de la nature des relations biologiques entre humains modernes et archaïques de s’insinuer dans la définition du comportement moderne, ce qui réduit la contribution potentielle que l’archéologie pourrait apporter à la question. Il semble donc raisonnable de conclure qu’en l’état présent des choses, le concept-même de ‘comportement moderne’ est insatisfaisant. Nous suggérons ici que le concept de comportement moderne doit être soit redéfini sur des bases strictement comportementales ou, mieux, complètement abandonné afin d’amenuiser l’impact conceptuel de la dichotomie rigide qu’il impose entre les données archéologiques considérées ‘modernes’ et celles considérées non-modernes.

Large open-air archaeological sites provide a unique contribution to our understanding of the range of environments exploited by hominins and how their mobility patterns were affected by local, regional, and global environmental fluctuations. The challenge, however, is that in open-air contexts the distribution of buried and surface archaeological remains is greatly affected by geomorphic processes that acted on the landscape throughout the Pleistocene and Holocene. Deciphering the behavioural patterns of large open-air sites necessitates an approach that incorporates landscape evolution as a critical component contributing to the spatial distribution and variability in the archaeological record. We suggest that it is more appropriate to speak of open-air archaeological landscapes rather than sites in the traditional sense.

Within this framework, we present our ongoing research at Druze Marsh, a Paleolithic locale in the northwest corner of the Azraq Basin (Jordan), and an oasis that may have functioned as a desert refugium at different points during the Pleistocene. Surveys and excavations in the Azraq Basin have recovered material from the Lower Paleolithic to historical periods. Recent research by our team has identified a stratified sequence of artifacts that typologically correspond to the Late Lower, Middle, Upper, and Epipaleolithic industries. Both the surface and stratified material are the remains of prehistoric behaviour, and a full understanding of the prehistoric settlement system and land-use surrounding the Druze Marsh requires amalgamating these different contexts with the environmental history of the area, particularly accounting for the contribution of geomorphic processes on the spatial distribution of the archaeological record.

Over the past 8,000 years on the southwest coast of British Columbia there is a transition from assemblages dominated by chipped stone to assemblages that include more ground and polished stone, bone, and antler. In this study, we combine the plentiful data being produced by archaeological consultants and archived in provincial reports with that of more traditional academic sources to assess the nature of the documented transition and specifically determine if there is a major transition ca. 4850 cal B.P. as suggested by Moss et al. (2007). Our results show that not only is there a major transition between 5000 and 4500 cal B.P. but the long-standing conception of a gradual replacement of assemblages dominated by chipped stone to ones dominated by ground stone and faunal tools is inaccurate.

The Shishan Marsh was a spring-fed wetland in northern Jordan that has been completely dry since the late 1980s. The site of SM-1, first excavated in 2013, is located at the southern edge of the former Sawda spring pool, and contains a Middle Pleistocene occupation horizon characterized by bifaces and flakes. From a section at SM-1 we present new sedimentological and detailed ostracod and gastropod data from a succession of Quaternary limnic sediments.
These sediments contain particularly high amounts of ostracods and gastropods, increasing in number from the middle to the top of the section. Cyprideis torosa is the most common ostracod species, and Ilyocypris sp., Heterocypris salina, Limnocythere inopinata, Darwinula stevensoni, Fabaeoformiscandona cf. holzkampfi and Pseudocandona sp. were also observed. The gastropod fauna is characterized by Melanoides cf. tuberculata, Melanopsis buccinoides, Melanopsis costata, Theodoxus jordani and Hydrobia sp., and in the lower parts of the section Pseudoamnicola sp. occurs. These fauna from SM-1 allow us to reconstruct a brackish water environment for the upper section, which can also be assumed for some of the lower strata. The timing of regional increases in water availability and their environmental influence on local wetland and spring systems during the Quaternary is still poorly understood in Azraq.
Studies such as this on Quaternary ostracod and gastropod faunas are invaluable for reconstructing past environmental settings, but are scarce at present. Of particular importance are the post-depositional taphonomic processes of the wetlands, which are crucial for preservation of calcareous fossils.