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The Origins of Ground-Edge Axes: New Findings from Nawarla Gabarnmang, Arnhem Land

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The Origins of Ground-Edge Axes: New Findings from Nawarla Gabarnmang, Arnhem Land The Origins of Ground-edge Axes: New Findings from Nawarla Gabarnmang, Arnhem Land The Origins of Ground-edge Axes: New Findings from Nawarla Gabarnmang, Arnhem Land (Australia) and Global Implications for the Evolution of Fully Modern Humans Jean-Michel Geneste, Bruno David, Hugues Plisson, Jean-Jacques Delannoy & Fiona Petchey The grinding of stone to make sharp cutting edges did not evolve with the emergence of biologically modern humans in Africa, but late in the Pleistocene at the completion or near- completion of the Out-of-Africa 2 migration. Here we discuss the earliest securely-dated fragment of ground-edge axe from Australia, dated at 35,500 cal. bp, an age slightly older or comparable to the earliest ages for edge-grinding from the Pacific Ocean’s western seaboard. In this region ground-edge axes did not evolve with the emergence of agriculture, nor for the clearance of forests, but, rather, as socially mediated technology, part of the development of symbolic storage that is the hallmark of the evolution of cognitively modern humans at the geographical end, during, or following, Out-of-Africa 2. The world’s earliest stone tools date to 2.52–2.60 mil- manipulations (de Beaune 2000; 2003), long-distance lion years ago and predate the earliest known Homo trade (Bon 2009, 241–63; Hovers & Braun 2009) and species along the Gona River of the Afar region of fully linguistically mediated group behaviour (Bicker- Ethiopia, eastern Africa (Semaw et al. 1997). Even ton 2003; d’Errico et al. 2003; Gamble & Coward 2009; older knapped stone tools are posited to exist, with Vanhaeren & d’Errico 2006). Each of these components the recent discovery of cut marks on 3.4 million-year- of social life, from complex multi-component tools old bones from Dikika attributed to Australopithecus to environmental manipulations, is permeated with afarensis, also in Ethiopia (McPherron et al. 2010). Such symbolic storage because it incorporates very particu- early core and flake tools were all manufactured by lar ways of doing things subject to human cognisance. freehand percussion, although bipolar debitage is These ‘ways of doing’ result in particular material also found in Oldowan times (Braun et al. 2009; Clark signatures to all kinds of products, from objects to & Kleindienst 2001; de la Torre et al. 2003; de la Torre lived landscapes. While such products may be seen & Mora 2009). as ‘economic production’, they also involve a socio- With the evolution of Homo sapiens between economy of symbolic meaning and reproduction. 200,000 and 100,000 years ago emerged a broad range However, such technological and cognitive innova- of technological and cognitive innovations (e.g. Dea- tions did not suddenly come in a single package with con & Deacon 1999) that over time came to incorporate the evolution of biologically fully modern humans new forms of symbolic behaviour including rock art (for a review of the evidence, see Habgood & Franklin (Henshilwood et al. 2002; Conard & Bolus 2003; 2008; 2008). Rather, over the tens of thousands of years Conard et al. 2003; d’Errico et al. 2010; Parkington et following the first emergence of biologically modern al. 2005), complex multi-component tools (Mellars humans during the Middle Stone Age by 100,000 et al. 2007; Zilhão & d’Errico 2003), environmental years ago in Africa (Anton & Swisher 2004; Field et Cambridge Archaeological Journal 22:1, 1–17 © 2012 McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research doi:10.1017/S0959774312000017 Received 13 Apr 2011; Revised 10 Aug 2011;1 Accepted 2 Sep 2011 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. Open University Library, on 18 Jan 2020 at 01:12:01, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0959774312000017 Jean-Michel Geneste et al. al. 2007), new technologies and symbolic behaviours grinding with an abrading tool, such as ground-edge were gradually and cumulatively added out of Africa. axes and ground flakes, from the abrading tools used Sahul, that region on the extreme eastern edge of the to manufacture various materials such as objects of Out-of-Africa 2 migration route, has a crucial part to adornment, plant produce, stone tools, and miner- play in understanding those behavioural traits that als for the production of pigments, such as files emerged following, versus prior to, the out of Africa and grinding stones. Globally, and concerning raw migration, for innovations identified in Sahul will materials other than stone, the oldest-known cases indicate post-migration inventions that emerged sub- of grinding are found on bone tools from Swartkrans sequent to Homo sapiens’ early behavioural develop- and Drimolen (Backwell & d’Errico in press; d’Errico ments. Identifying such post-migration developments & Backwell 2009). enables a better understanding of the extent to which In Europe, fine, intentionally abraded shallow biologically modern humans became behaviourally bowls in sedimentary rocks and calcite have been modern in a process of ongoing developments. found in residential sites attributed to the Mousterian. One of these traits of modernity concerns ‘sym- The discovery of stone receptacles for the preparation bolic storage’, which many authors have identified as of ochre at Cioarei Cave is testimony to the intentional originating in Africa but continuing to unfold during transformation of blocks of stone by pounding and and subsequent to the Out-of-Africa 2 migration (e.g. abrasion (Carciumaru et al. 2010). Habgood & Franklin 2008; Wadley 2001). Symbolic Generally, scraped and abraded pigments are storage cannot in itself be reduced to short-term ergo- most notably found at habitation sites dating from nomic efficiency, although this does not mean that it the end of the Middle Palaeolithic. In the southwest works counter to adaptive principles. Rather, symbolic of France, more than 500 fragments of red (iron storage in material culture concerns the way in which oxides, haematite, goethite) and black (manganese objects store information about meaning, meanings dioxide) pigments were ground for decoration and that relate to one’s physical and socio-cultural loca- thus symbolic expression by Homo neanderthalensis tion. Symbolic storage imbues things, physical and during the Mousterian. There are now more than 70 non-physical, with a presence enhanced by social sites that have yielded such pigments; at Pech de l’Azé value. By adding social meaning, symbolic storage rockshelter these go as far back as 50–60,000 bp (Sor- also socially structures use-value, for meaning comes essi & d’Errico 2007; d’Errico et al. 2009). In the cave into being in social and cultural codes, in culturally of Blombos in South Africa, red-ochre crayons were engaged social interaction. striated by abrasion during use in the Middle Stone Here we report on the discovery of the oldest Age, 70,000 years ago and presumably by Homo sapiens fragment of ground-edge axe in the world, and the (Henshilwood et al. 2002; Henshilwood & d’Errico origins of ground-edge axes, as one such innovation 2005; d’Errico et al. 2010). Grinding tools and abraded indicative of symbolic storage that took place follow- objects appear sporadically during the European ing Out-of-Africa 2 along the Southern Arc dispersal Upper Palaeolithic after 30,000 bp and include pestles, route as humans crossed from Africa to southern Asia handstones, cupules and shallow stone bowls (de into northeast Asia and Australia between 70,000 Beaune 2000; 2004). The earliest grinding tools used for and 50,000 years ago (cf. Balme et al. 2009). We argue plant-food processing in Europe come from Bilancino that this innovation cannot be understood simply in II in Italy (dated to 28,298±301 cal. bc), Kostenki 16 in abstract technological terms, but must also consider Russia (31,904±698 cal. bc) and Pavlov VI in the Czech the evolution of symbolic behaviour as socially medi- Republic (29,482±288 cal. bc) (Revedin et al. 2010). At ated technology. the Upper Palaeolithic occupation site of Kostenki IV (Aleksandrovskaya) on the Russian plains, mortars The origins of grinding and pestles have also been reported from levels dated to 23,000–21,000 bp (Semenov 1964 [1957], 137, fig. 67). Despite the manufacture and use of flaked stone tools In Europe there is also firm evidence for the by hominins in Ethiopia more than two million years grinding of stone in the manufacture of portable and ago (McPherron et al. 2010; Semaw et al. 1997), the fixed rock art during the Upper Palaeolithic. In France shaping of stone tools by grinding does not appear shallow bowls ground in stone used for mixing pig- in human evolution until about 35,500 years ago ments and lamps for the burning of animal fat are anywhere in the world, coincident in time with the symmetrically shaped and decorated, such as those emergence of naturalistic rock imagery (Clottes 2007; of Lascaux and of Solvieux (Sackett 1999, figs. 4.7, 4.8; Parkington et al. 2005; Valladas et al. 2001). Here we de Beaune 2000; 2004). Further to the east at Denisova distinguish between tools intentionally shaped by Cave in Siberia a finely polished bracelet dated to 2 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. Open University Library, on 18 Jan 2020 at 01:12:01, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0959774312000017 The Origins of Ground-edge Axes: New Findings from Nawarla Gabarnmang, Arnhem Land 30,000 bp is made of semi-precious ground chloritolite but not in others. In Western Europe, ground axes first (Derevianko et al. 2008), although the indirect dat- appear during the Mesolithic in the United Kingdom, ing, in a complex stratigraphy with superior Bronze Ireland, Scandinavia and Russia and increase signifi- age levels, is questionable.
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