Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Anthropology Theses Department of Anthropology 5-10-2019 Analysis of experimental bone tools from Swartkrans Cave, South Africa Sara Gardner Georgia State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/anthro_theses Recommended Citation Gardner, Sara, "Analysis of experimental bone tools from Swartkrans Cave, South Africa." Thesis, Georgia State University, 2019. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/anthro_theses/144 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Anthropology at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Anthropology Theses by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ANALYSIS OF EXPERIMENTAL BONE TOOLS FROM SWARTKRANS CAVE, SOUTH AFRICA by SARA GARDNER Under the Direction of Frank L’Engle Williams, PhD ABSTRACT Early Pleistocene deposits from Swartkrans Cave, South Africa, yield the remains of Paranthropus robustus and ungulate bone fragments that were manipulated through short-term use. An experimental tool set (n=30) modeled after those from Swartkrans Cave was created using fresh ungulate long bones to demonstrate wear caused by extracting termites, tubers, or both resources, and molded after 30, 60, 90 and 120 minutes of use. Scratch length, breadth, and angle were recorded for all scratches < 80 µm in breadth. The highest standard deviation of scratch angle is seen in the tools used to dig both termites and tubers, whereas the lowest standard deviation is seen in the tools used for digging only termites. Statistical comparison of these results with original bone tool data from Swartkrans suggests that P. robustus, utilized the bone tools for termite harvesting. These results have implications for reconstructing the diet of early hominins in southern Africa. INDEX WORDS: Bone, Tool, Australopithecus, Evolution, Diet, Paleoanthropology, Tuber, Termite, Swartkrans, Hominin, Paranthropus, South Africa ANALYSIS OF EXPERIMENTAL BONE TOOLS FROM SWARTKRANS CAVE, SOUTH AFRICA by SARA GARDNER A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in the College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University 2019 Copyright by SARA GARDNER 2019 ANALYSIS OF EXPERIMENTAL BONE TOOLS FROM SWARTKRANS CAVE, SOUTH AFRICA by SARA GARDNER Committee Chair: Frank L’Engle Williams Committee: Jeffrey Glover Bethany Turner-Livermore Electronic Version Approved: Office of Graduate Studies College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University May 2019 vi DEDICATION This thesis is dedicated to everyone who supported me at any capacity through this journey; to my partner, JG, who has been the best confidant and most reliable bird-person in my life; and to my best friends, Sadie and Erin, who kept me grounded with weekly long-distance phone calls for two years. And most of all, I wish to dedicate this thesis to my late Aunt Sue who wrapped me in her unconditional love and support from the moment I was born. I hope to continue making you proud, Aunt Sue, and finding happiness in the moments we had together. “Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, but love leaves a memory no one can steal.” vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thank you, Dr. Frank L’Engle Williams, for chairing my committee and introducing me to these bone tools which allowed me to move forward with this thesis; to Jeffrey Glover and Bethany Turner-Livermore, for guiding me through this elaborate process and helping me to become a better academic; to Jason Heaton and Travis Pickering, for creating the bone tool replicas on which I conducted hours and hours of analysis; and to Dr. Kathryn Kozaitis, who has been a shining light to the Anthropology Department at Georgia State. And thank you to my colleagues Alex Kim and Macie Orrand. Thank you for knowing where to guide me when I feel lost. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................................................................... VII LIST OF TABLES .......................................................................................................... XI LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................................... XII LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ..................................................................................... XIII 1 INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Searching in South Africa................................................................................... 2 1.1.1 Swartkrans Cave ............................................................................................. 4 1.1.2 Dating of members .......................................................................................... 5 1.1.3 Discoveries at Swartkrans Cave ..................................................................... 2 1.2 A robust, human-like hominin ........................................................................... 2 1.3 Bone tools ............................................................................................................. 5 1.3.1 Osteodontokeratic culture ............................................................................... 5 1.4 Diet ........................................................................................................................ 9 1.4.1 Masticatory morphology ................................................................................. 9 1.4.2 Isotopic analysis ............................................................................................ 16 1.5 Expected results ................................................................................................. 19 2 EXPERIMENT ......................................................................................................... 21 2.1 Bob Brain’s hypothesis ..................................................................................... 22 ix 2.1.1 Hypothesis development ................................................................................ 22 2.1.2 Experiment .................................................................................................... 23 2.2 Lucinda Backwell’s experiment ....................................................................... 24 2.2.1 Backwell’s methods ....................................................................................... 26 2.2.2 Statistical analysis ......................................................................................... 28 2.3 Methods .............................................................................................................. 29 2.3.1 Replicas at Georgia State University ............................................................ 30 2.4 Null hypothesis .................................................................................................. 31 2.4.1 Initial observations ........................................................................................ 32 2.4.2 Microwear analysis ....................................................................................... 36 3 RESULTS .................................................................................................................. 38 3.1 Scratch angle data ............................................................................................. 39 3.1.1 Tuber tools ..................................................................................................... 40 3.1.2 Termite tools .................................................................................................. 42 3.1.3 Tuber and termite tools ................................................................................. 44 3.2 Analysis of scratch data .................................................................................... 45 3.3 Inclusion of original bone tool data ................................................................. 48 3.4 Discussion ........................................................................................................... 50 4 CONCLUSIONS ....................................................................................................... 52 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................ 55 x APPENDICES ................................................................................................................ 59 Appendix A: Tool data by time .................................................................................. 59 Appendix A.1 : 5 minutes ......................................................................................... 59 Appendix A.2 : 30 minutes ....................................................................................... 59 Appendix A.3 : 60 minutes ....................................................................................... 60 Appendix A.4 : 90 minutes ....................................................................................... 60 Appendix A.5 : 120 minutes ..................................................................................... 61 xi LIST OF TABLES Table 1 Key for Figure 2 ................................................................................................................. 1 Table 2 Experimental bone tool replicas .....................................................................................