The Chronology and Significance of Ablation in the Later Stone Age Maghreb

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isabelle De Groote ◽  
Louise T. Humphrey
Keyword(s):  
North Africa ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Neolithic Period ◽  
Later Stone Age ◽  
Systematic Practice

This chapter described the earliest evidence of the systematic practice of ablation. Purposeful removal of the upper central incisors became a widespread practice with the Iberomaurusian of the Later Stone Age in the Maghreb region—the area of current-day northern Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. During the Capsian times, ablation became less prevalent, but in some cases all incisors and canines were removed. During the Neolithic period the practice became even less frequent and in some areas disappeared completely. Nevertheless, in some regions of North Africa ablation remained common and may have been a way of identifying certain tribes or individuals within society. This chapter also considers possible causes for the origin of the practice.

scholarly journals Our Neighbours in the Neolithic Period Presidential Address

1918 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 479-507 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reginald A. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Presidential Address ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Neolithic Period ◽  
Later Stone Age ◽  
Early Date ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
Shell Mounds ◽  
The North Sea

It may seem a paradox, but it is nevertheless true, that more is known of the remote Palæolithic period than of the later Stone Age that ended about 4000 years ago. This applies to the Continent as well as to Britain, but Scandinavia is exceptional, and for our present purpose the best subject of investigation. The accepted view is that the three Baltic kingdoms were uninhabited in Quaternary times, and could only be approached by man after the last, or Baltic, glaciation had come to an end. There are certain facts inexplicable on that hypothesis, but all will agree that the Neolithic period in that area can be divided into early and late divisions; and so rich are the prehistoric remains and so advanced is this study, that the Scandinavian system can be used as a touch-stone by which to test the facts and theories of our own later Stone Age. I propose, therefore, on the present occasion to deal in some detail with the latest results of Scandinavian research, and then to proceed in order with the districts that face us across the North Sea and the Channel—North-west Germany, Holland, Belgium, and Northern France. It is hoped that such a survey will enable a more rigid classification to be made of the large amount of British material referred to the Neolithic period. In this country one has to rely mainly on form, but in Scandinavia that element is combined with others, such as habitation-sites, shell-mounds, and megalithic remains that furnish proof of the succession of forms, and open up the question of relations with Britain at that early date. If the claims already made on that head be valid, then comparisons become possible, and certain stages at least of the period in question can be arranged on scientific lines.

The Middle to Later Stone Age transition at Panga ya Saidi, in the tropical coastal forest of eastern Africa

2021 ◽  
Vol 153 ◽  
pp. 102954
Author(s):  
Ceri Shipton ◽  
James Blinkhorn ◽  
Will Archer ◽  
Nikolaos Kourampas ◽  
Patrick Roberts ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Africa ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Coastal Forest ◽  
Later Stone Age

Changing Patterns in the Late Pleistocene/Early Holocene Prehistory of Southern Africa as Seen from the Nelson Bay Cave Stone Artifact Sequence

1978 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janette Deacon
Keyword(s):  
Southern Africa ◽  
Sensu Stricto ◽  
Middle Stone Age ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Faunal Remains ◽  
Later Stone Age ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
Changing Patterns ◽  
Selection Of ◽  
Stone Artifact

The dating of the Stone Age sequence in southern Africa has been considerably revised over the last decade, and one of the anomalies which has resulted is that the Middle Stone Age, now dated to beyond 30,000 B.P., does not immediately precede the Later Stone Agesensu stricto. The excavation and analysis of occupation horizons dating between the most recent Middle Stone Age assemblages and the Holocene is therefore of particular interest. Nelson Bay Cave, situated on the southern coast of South Africa, contains deposits which partly fill the “gap” between the Middle and Later Stone Ages, and the occupation horizons dating between about 18,000 and 5000 years ago are described in this paper. Changes in the habitat in the vicinity of the site caused by sea-level and vegetation changes coincident with the amelioration of temperatures at the end of the Pleistocene are clearly marked in the faunal remains at the site. Largely correlated with the faunal changes (which includes the introduction of marine resources to the cave at about 12,000 B.P.) are changes in the stone artifact assemblages. Three industries are recognized in the sequence: the Robberg, characterized by microbladelets produced from bladelet cores and a few small scrapers and backed tools; the Albany, characterized by large scrapers and an absence of backed tools; and the Wilton, characterized by a variety of Formal Tools including relatively large numbers of small scrapers and backed tools. These changes in artifact-manufacturing traditions are interpreted as signaling adjustments to changing environmental conditions. An explanation for these adjustments is not sought in a simple cause-and-effect relationship between the environment and the cultural response; artifact changes are seen instead as the result of a twofold process, with the environment acting as an external stimulus to change, and the direction of the artifact change governed by the selection of a range of possibilities offered by the technology of the Later Stone Agesensu latothat was widespread in subequatorial Africa during the last 20,000 years.

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