Ages-at-death distribution of the early Pleistocene hominin fossil assemblage from Drimolen (South Africa)

2019 ◽  
Vol 168 (3) ◽  
pp. 632-636 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alessandro Riga ◽  
Tommaso Mori ◽  
Travis Rayne Pickering ◽  
Jacopo Moggi-Cecchi ◽  
Colin G. Menter
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Fossil Assemblage

scholarly journals The Equidae from Cooper’s D, an early Pleistocene fossil locality in Gauteng, South Africa

PeerJ ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. e6909
Author(s):  
Shaw Badenhorst ◽  
Christine M. Steininger
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
The Other ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Fossil Assemblage ◽  
Plains Zebra

Cooper’s D is a fossil locality in the Bloubank Valley close to other important sites such as Sterkfontein and Kromdraai in Gauteng, South Africa. The fossil deposits of Cooper’s D date to 1.38 ± 0.11 Ma. Hominins like Paranthropus robustus and early Homo have been recovered from Cooper’s Cave. We report here on the Equidae remains. Our sample contains specimens from the extinct Equus capensis, and a specimen which represents an extinct hipparion Eurygnathohippus cf. cornelianus. This particular specimen was previously identified as plains zebra (Equus quagga). The contribution of Equidae to the total fossil assemblage of Cooper’s D is relatively low, and these remains were likely accumulated by various predators such as spotted and brown hyenas and leopards. The Equidae, as well as the other fauna from Cooper’s D supports the existence of grassland, wooded and water components in the vicinity of the site.

Lithostratigraphy of the Kweekvlei Formation (Witteberg Group), Cape Supergroup

2017 ◽  
Vol 120 (3) ◽  
pp. 421-432 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Browning ◽  
M. Reid
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Transition Zone ◽  
Distal Part ◽  
Vascular Plant ◽  
Trace Fossil ◽  
Plant Debris ◽  
Lower Carboniferous ◽  
Fossil Assemblage ◽  
Low Diversity ◽  
Storm Wave

AbstractThe Lower Carboniferous, probably Tournaisian, Kweekvlei Formation is part of the Witteberg Group (Cape Supergroup) of South Africa. Together with the overlying Floriskraal Formation, it forms an upward-coarsening succession within the Lake Mentz Subgroup. Sedimentary features of the Kweekvlei Formation suggest deposition in a storm-wave dominated marine setting, within the storm-influenced, distal part of an offshore transition zone environment. This predominantly argillaceous formation preserves a low diversity trace fossil assemblage. Reworked vascular plant debris (including the problematic genus Praeramunculus sp.) and a shark spine have been reported for the Kweekvlei Formation. There are no known stratigraphic equivalents in South Africa.

Ground‐penetrating radar analysis of the Drimolen early Pleistocene fossil‐bearing palaeocave, South Africa

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian J. Armstrong ◽  
Stephanie Edwards‐Baker ◽  
Paul Penzo‐Kajewski ◽  
Andy I. R. Herries
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Ground Penetrating Radar ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Ground Penetrating

Termites and necrophagous insects associated with early Pleistocene (Gelasian) Australopithecus sediba at Malapa, South Africa

2020 ◽  
Vol 560 ◽  
pp. 109989
Author(s):  
Lucinda Backwell ◽  
Jean-Bernard Huchet ◽  
Tea Jashashvili ◽  
Paul H.G.M. Dirks ◽  
Lee R. Berger
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Early Pleistocene

scholarly journals New early Pleistocene hominin teeth from the Swartkrans Formation, South Africa

2016 ◽  
Vol 100 ◽  
pp. 1-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Travis Rayne Pickering ◽  
Jason L. Heaton ◽  
Morris B. Sutton ◽  
Ron J. Clarke ◽  
Kathleen Kuman ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Early Pleistocene

Cetopirus complanatus (Cirripedia: Coronulidae) from the late Middle Pleistocene human settlement of Pinnacle Point 13B (Mossel Bay, South Africa)

Zootaxa ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 4237 (2) ◽  
pp. 393 ◽  
Author(s):  
ALBERTO COLLARETA ◽  
CURTIS W. MAREAN ◽  
ANTONIETA JERARDINO ◽  
MARK BOSSELAERS
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Marine Invertebrates ◽  
Indirect Evidence ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Middle Pleistocene ◽  
Human Consumption ◽  
Right Whale ◽  
Pinnacle Point ◽  
History Of ◽  
Late Middle Pleistocene

The late Middle Pleistocene cave site of Pinnacle Point 13B (PP13B, South Africa) has provided the archaeologically oldest evidences yet known of human consumption of marine resources. Among the marine invertebrates recognised at PP13B, an isolated whale barnacle compartment was tentatively determined as Coronula diadema and regarded as indirect evidence of human consumption of a baleen whale (likely Megaptera novaeangliae). In this paper we redetermine this coronulid specimen as Cetopirus complanatus. This record significantly extends the fossil history of C. complanatus back by about 150 ky, thus partially bridging the occurrence of Cetopirus fragilis in the early Pleistocene to the latest Quaternary record of C. complanatus. Since C. complanatus is currently known as a highly specific phoront of right whales (Eubalaena spp.), we propose that the late Middle Pleistocene human groups that inhabited PP13B fed on a stranded southern right whale. Therefore, the whale barnacle from PP13B suggests the persistence of a southern right whale population off South Africa during the predominantly glacial MIS 6, thus evoking the continuity of cetacean migrations and antitropical distribution during that global cold phase. Interestingly, the most ancient evidence of humans feeding on a whale involves Eubalaena, historically the most exploited cetacean genus, and currently still seriously threatened with extinction due to human impact. 

scholarly journals Orbital precession modulates interannual rainfall variability, as recorded in an Early Pleistocene speleothem

Geology ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (8) ◽  
pp. 731-734 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip J. Hopley ◽  
Graham P. Weedon ◽  
Chris M. Brierley ◽  
Christopher Thrasivoulou ◽  
Andy I.R. Herries ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Interannual Variability ◽  
Climate Model ◽  
Rainfall Variability ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Stone Tool ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
African Rainfall ◽  
Interannual Rainfall Variability ◽  
Instrumental Records

Abstract Interannual variability of African rainfall impacts local and global communities, but its past behavior and response in future climate projections are poorly understood. This is primarily due to short instrumental records and a lack of long high-resolution palaeoclimate proxy records. Here we present an annually resolved 91,000 year Early Pleistocene record of hydroclimate from the early hominin-bearing Makapansgat Valley, South Africa. Changes in speleothem annual band thickness are dominated by precession over four consecutive orbital cycles with strong millennial-scale periodicity. The frequency of interannual variability (2.0–6.5 yr oscillations) does not change systematically, yet its amplitude is modulated by the orbital forcing. These long-term characteristics of interannual variability are reproduced with transient climate model simulations of water balance for South Africa from the Late Pleistocene to Recent. Based on these results, we suggest that the frequency of interannual variations in southern African rainfall is likely to be stable under anthropogenic warming, but that the size of year-to-year variations may increase. We see an orbitally forced increase in the amplitude of interannual climate variability between 1.8 Ma and 1.7 Ma coincident with the first evidence for the Acheulean stone tool technology.

scholarly journals New evidence of bone tool use by Early Pleistocene hominins from Cooper’s D, Bloubank Valley, South Africa

2021 ◽  
Vol 39 ◽  
pp. 103129
Author(s):  
Raphaël Hanon ◽  
Francesco d'Errico ◽  
Lucinda Backwell ◽  
Sandrine Prat ◽  
Stéphane Péan ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Tool Use ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
New Evidence ◽  
Bone Tool

Late Cenozoic Paleoclimates of the Gaap Escarpment, Kalahari margin, South Africa

1978 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 310-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
K.W. Butzer ◽  
R. Stuckenrath ◽  
A.J. Bruzewicz ◽  
D.M. Helgren
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
East Africa ◽  
Atmospheric Circulation ◽  
Late Holocene ◽  
Summer Rainfall ◽  
Climatic Variation ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Late Cenozoic ◽  
Australopithecus Africanus ◽  
Middle Holocene

The Gaap Escarpment is a dolomite cuesta demarcating the southeast margin of the Kalahari. Since Miocene-Pliocene times, thick masses of lime tufa have repeatedly accumulated at several points along this escarpment, and four regional sequences are described. These allow discrimination of six major depositional complexes, commonly characterized by basal cryoclastic breccias or coarse conglomerates that reflect frost shattering and torrential runoff, followed by sheets and lobes of tufa generated in an environment substantially wetter than today. A chronostratigraphy for the last 30,000 yr is provided by 14C dating, with direct or indirect correlations to the Vaal River sequence. The regional stratigraphy as well as faunal dating indicate an early Pleistocene age for Australopithecus africanus at Taung. Repeated episodes of protracted cold or wetter climate or both begin in terminal Miocene times, and the last Pleistocene cold-moist interval began after 35,000 yr B.P. and ended 14,000 yr B.P. Early and late Holocene times were mainly wetter, whereas the middle Holocene was drier than today. The paleoclimatic sequence differs from that of the southern and southwestern Cape or that of East Africa, but close parallels are evident throughout the lower Vaal Basin and the southern Kalahari. The tufa cycles provide a unique, 5,000,000-yr record of climatic variation in the Kalahari summer-rainfall belt that can be related to complex anomalies of the general atmospheric circulation.

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