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The Oldowan Horizon in Wonderwerk Cave (South Africa): Archaeological, Geological, Paleontological and Paleoclimatic Evidence

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The Oldowan Horizon in Wonderwerk Cave (South Africa): Archaeological, Geological, Paleontological and Paleoclimatic Evidence See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/232932316 The Oldowan horizon in Wonderwerk Cave (South Africa): Archaeological, geological, paleontological and paleoclimatic evidence Article in Journal of Human Evolution · November 2012 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2012.08.008 · Source: PubMed CITATIONS READS 59 1,088 14 authors, including: Michael Chazan D. Margaret Avery University of Toronto Iziko South African Museum 107 PUBLICATIONS 2,841 CITATIONS 91 PUBLICATIONS 1,789 CITATIONS SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE Marion Bamford Francesco Berna University of the Witwatersrand Simon Fraser University 159 PUBLICATIONS 5,029 CITATIONS 96 PUBLICATIONS 4,364 CITATIONS SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects: Excavations at the Middle Paleolithic site of Tinshemet Cave, Israel View project Development of the pre-South Atlantic continental margin of Namibia View project All content following this page was uploaded by Naomi Porat on 09 October 2017. The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file. Journal of Human Evolution 63 (2012) 859e866 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Journal of Human Evolution journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jhevol News and views The Oldowan horizon in Wonderwerk Cave (South Africa): Archaeological, geological, paleontological and paleoclimatic evidence Michael Chazan a,*, D. Margaret Avery b, Marion K. Bamford c, Francesco Berna d,e, James Brink f,g, Yolanda Fernandez-Jalvo h, Paul Goldberg d,i, Sharon Holt f, Ari Matmon j, Naomi Porat k, Hagai Ron j,1, Lloyd Rossouw l,m, Louis Scott m, Liora Kolska Horwitz n a Dept. of Anthropology, University of Toronto, 19 Russell St., Toronto, ONT M5S 2S2, Canada b Cenozoic Studies, Iziko South African Museum, 25 Queen Victoria Street, Cape Town, P.O. Box 61, Cape Town 8000, South Africa c BPI Palaeontology, University of the Witwatersrand, P. Bag 3, WITS 2050, Johannesburg, South Africa d Dept. of Archaeology, Boston University, 675 Commonwealth Ave., Boston, MA 02215, USA e Research Group for Palaecological and Geoarchaeological Studies, Barcelona, Spain f Florisbad Quaternary Research Department, National Museum, P.O. Box 266, Bloemfontein 9300, South Africa g Centre for Environmental Management, University of the Free State, P.O. Box 339, Bloemfontein 9300, South Africa h Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales (CSIC), Dept. Paleobiologia, Jose Gutierrez Abascal, 2, 28006 Madrid, Spain i Heidelberg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, ROCEEH, Rümelinstr. 23, 72070 Tübingen, Germany j Institute of Earth Sciences, Faculty of Natural Sciences, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem 91904, Israel k Geological Survey of Israel, 30 Malkhe Yisrael Street, Jerusalem 95501, Israel l Dept. of Archaeology, National Museum, P.O. Box 266, Bloemfontein 9300, South Africa m Dept. of Plant Sciences, University of the Free State, P.O. Box 339, Bloemfontein 9300, South Africa n National Natural History Collections, Faculty of Life Sciences, Berman Building, Givat Ram, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem 91904, Israel article info a small number of localities in southern Africa, none of which is Article history: interpreted as representing primary contexts (Kuman, 1998; Schick Received 2 March 2012 and Toth, 2006). Here we provide the first comprehensive Accepted 18 August 2012 description of an in situ Oldowan deposit from basal Stratum 12 Available online 3 November 2012 inside Wonderwerk Cave, Northern Cape Province, South Africa. Keywords: Paleolithic The Wonderwerk Cave Earlier Stone Age sequence Oldowan Paleoecology Wonderwerk Cave is a w140m phreatic tube formed in the dolo- Wonderwerk Cave mites of the Kuruman Hills (Northern Cape Province, South Africa) South Africa (Fig. 1a). Beginning in the 1940s, archaeological excavations were carried out at the site by Malan and colleagues (Malan and Cooke, 1941; Malan and Wells, 1943) followed by further investigations by other researchers (Butzer,1984). The mostextensive excavations were undertaken by Peter Beaumont from the 1970s to the early 1990s Introduction Beaumontand Vogel, 2006). Since 2007,ourteamhas been engaged in fieldwork at the site, primarily in Excavation 1 located w30 m in from In marked contrast to East Africa, where the emergence of stone the cave mouth (Fig. 1bed). This work has focused on sampling for tool technology (w2.6 Ma) is well documented at a wide range of micromorphological analyses of sediments, pollen, phytoliths and for sites (Semaw, 2000; Schick and Toth, 2006; Hovers and Braun, cosmogenic burial and paleomagnetic dating. All samples were taken 2009), the earliest stages of tool production are known from only from the freshly cleaned Earlier Stone Age (ESA) sections left by Beaumont (maximum ESA section height 2 m). In addition, limited * Corresponding author. test excavations aimed at in situ sampling of the lowest ESA horizon, E-mail addresses: [email protected] (M. Chazan), [email protected] Stratum 12, were carried out. Analyses of archaeological finds (lithics, (D.M. Avery), [email protected] (M.K. Bamford), [email protected] fauna and macro-botanical remains) deriving from Beaumont’s (F. Berna), [email protected] (J. Brink), [email protected] (Y. Fernandez-Jalvo), excavations of the ESA levels have also been undertaken. [email protected] (P. Goldberg), [email protected] (S. Holt), arimatmon@ During fieldwork, we subdivided the ESA sedimentary sequence cc.huji.ac.il (A. Matmon), [email protected] (N. Porat), [email protected] (L. Rossouw), [email protected] (L. Scott), [email protected] (L.K. Horwitz). into nine lithostratigraphic Units (Fig. 2). Overall, the sediments 1 Author deceased. consist of reddish, powdery, bedded quartz silt and sand with 0047-2484/$ e see front matter Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jhevol.2012.08.008 860 M. Chazan et al. / Journal of Human Evolution 63 (2012) 859e866 Figure 1. a. Map of the present day biomes of southern Africa showing the location of Wonderwerk Cave and other sites discussed in the text. b. Plan view of Wonderwerk Cave generated by 3-D scans showing precise location of Excavation 1 (courtesy of H. Rüther, ZAMANI project, University of Cape Town). c. Plan of units excavated by Peter Beaumont in Excavation 1. Grey indicates units that produced lithic remains; black indicates unit excavated by our team; Red line indicates main profile sampled by us for dating as shown in Fig. 2. d. Photo showing large stalagmite located just in front of Excavation 1 and the form of the dolomite cave roof. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.) M. Chazan et al. / Journal of Human Evolution 63 (2012) 859e866 861 Figure 2. Excavation 1, north and east sections showing location of samples for dating, and the limits of archaeological strata and lithostratigraphic units. localized accumulations of roof fall. Units vary in thickness, verti- of channel-shaped unconformities is documented, although obvious cally and laterally, and contacts between them range from diffuse to water-depositional features (i.e., cross-bedding) are only seen in sharp, the latter generally a result of erosion. Excavation 1 in the basal Stratum 12. Presumably channeling was Micromorphological analyses show that the basal archaeological produced by water coming from outside the cave (as suggested by Stratum 12 is composed of sediments containing alternating clays Butzer, 1984), and/or from the cave roof or features associated with and reworked Kalahari sands interspersed with bedded angular stalagmite formation or the runoff derived from it. However, to date, mm-size lag of ironstone fragments (Fig. S1). Specifically, it the current sediment exposures reveal only a partial view so that it is comprises two lithostratigraphic horizons, Units 8 and 9 (Fig. 2). The not clear how many sources of sediment and water were active during basal Unit 9 (Fig. 2)isw 50 cm thick, differs from the overlying the entire infilling of the cave. In addition to physical erosion, there is sediments in that it exhibits very soft, finely bedded to laminated clear evidence for chemical transformations in the form of decalcifi- (with graded bedding), extremely fine red to brown sand, with a cm- cation and phosphate precipitation. The agent/s responsible for these thick layer of ironstone micro-gravels at the base (Figs. S1-S3). The features is still being investigated. Most importantly, Units 8 and 9 upper part of Unit 9 is composed of finely bedded, fine-sand con- show no evidence for high-energy water action that could account for taining iron-manganese nodules and secondary phosphates the transport of artifacts or bones from outside the cave, currently (Fig. S1). On top of Unit 9 is a pale yellow centimeter-thick layer that adistanceofw30 m, to their place of deposition in Stratum 12. is isotropic in cross-polarized light (Fig. S4). Fourier Transform Likewise, noneof the bones or lithics exhibits abrasion consistent with Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and Microspectroscopy (mFTIR) analysis water transport (e.g., Fernández-Jalvo and Andrews, 2003; Hosfield, (see SOM) show that this layer is composed of carbonate hydroxyl 2011). The fine bedding visible in micromorphological samples from apatite containing crystalline nodules of montgomeryite, a magne- Unit 9 (Figs. S2-S3) provides the strongest evidence for low energy sium phosphate mineral that is probably related to the reaction of water activity (sheetflow) in this context. phosphate with the dolomitic pore solution (Karkanas et al., 2000). Bioturbation is evident only as small, mm- and cm-wide passage The pale yellow layer most likely represents an altered flowstone. features (Fig. S1) e corroborated by observations during excavation The base of the overlying Unit 8 is pinker, impregnated with whitish in 2004, and the intact lamination and bedding that is clearly seen phosphate material and contains diagenetically altered pieces of throughout the ESA profile (Fig. 2, S1c, S2; Berna et al., 2012:Fig.
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