Ecology and demography of earlyHomo sapiens
A synthesis of archaeological and climatic data from eastern Africa
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6041607 |
|---|---|
| Authors | L Timbrell (0000-0003-1229-554X, University of Liverpool, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 59 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 76-110 |
| Publication date | 2024-01-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Azania Archaeological Research in Africa (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0067-270X • E-ISSN: 1945-5534 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/0067270x.2024.2307790 |
| OpenAlex | W4392985170 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 8 |
| References cited | 142 |
Eastern Africa maintains a key position in debates surrounding the emergence of Homo sapiens across Africa. Extensive research in the region has revealed a rich fossil record in association with a 'generic' but variable Middle Stone Age (MSA) material culture, providing an important laboratory for testing hypotheses about the behavioural evolution of our species. For example, multiple archaeological studies of the eastern African MSA note a link between the distribution and density of sites, archaeological diversity and environmental conditions, with ecology and demography often cited as key drivers of cultural evolution. This article formulates new hypotheses using theoretical models of complex fitness landscapes of evolution and reviews the archaeological and climatic records of Middle-late Pleistocene eastern Africa in the light of these ideas. It proposes that evidence from eastern Africa implicates much of the region as a refugial zone within Pleistocene Africa, providing consistently suitable conditions for survival that were characterised by high and changing biodiversity, facilitating population growth and interconnectivity as well as material culture diversification. Interactions between different evolutionary processes likely resulted in the complex cultural mosaic observed across Africa, including the appearance of 'specific' innovations against a backdrop of more 'generic' MSA elements
Archaeology · Biology · Geography · Homo sapiens · Sociology · Anthropology · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Ecology · Forensic Anthropology and Bioarchaeology Studies · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology
Recent progress in studies of the last million years of human physical and behavioural evolution
The Southern African Stone Age Site Index (Sassi)
Late Quaternary human occupation of the Kilwa coast (Tanzania)
Excavations at the Stone Age Site of Nyabusora in the western Lake Victoria-Nyanza Basin, Tanzania
When to generalise and when to specialise? Climate change and hominin biocultural adaptability in the African early and middle stone age
Edge Sharpness Does Not Vary Between Palaeolithic Flake Technologies, With the Possible Exception of Levallois Débitage
The generic Middle Stone Age
A generic MSA
Politics and history in band societies
The cultures of the Middle Palaeolithic/Middle Stone Age
Dating and Context of Three Middle Stone Age Sites with Bone Points in the Upper Semliki Valley, Zaire
Year-old record of Middle and Later Stone Age innovation in an East African tropical forest
Experimental evidence for the influence of group size on cultural complexity
Development of Middle Stone Age innovation linked to rapid climate change
Human Evolution Out of Africa
Direct dating of Florisbad hominid
Middle Stone Age (MSA) site distributions in eastern Africa and their relationship to Quaternary environmental change, refugia and the evolution of Homo sapiens
Environmental dynamics during the onset of the Middle Stone Age in eastern Africa
Earliest evidence for the structure of Homo sapiens populations in Africa
Prospect Farm and the Middle and Later Stone Age Occupation of Mt. Eburru (Central Rift, Kenya) in an East African Context
From Acheulean to Middle Stone Age in the Kapthurin Formation, Kenya
Trajectories of Change in the Middle Paleolithic of Italy
Across Rainforests and Woodlands
Culture and Convergence
Human Evolution in Late Quaternary Eastern Africa
Social networks and information
Hunter–gatherer movement patterns
The Middle/Later Stone Age transition and cultural dynamics of late Pleistocene East Africa
Hunter‐gatherers
Variability selection in hominid evolution
Hunter-gatherers adjust mobility to maintain contact under climatic variation
Population density, mobility, and cultural transmission
First Chrono-Cultural Reference Framework for the West African Paleolithic
Garba III (Melka Kunture, Ethiopia)
Lithic variability and raw material exploitation at the Middle Stone Age (MSA) site of Gotera, southern Ethiopia
Excavations at Site C North, Kalambo Falls, Zambia
The origins of hunting & gathering in the Congo basin
Between continuity and discontinuity
Late Pleistocene and Holocene Lithic Variability at Goda Buticha (Southeastern Ethiopia)
How marginal are forager habitats
Still Bay and Howiesons Poort Foraging Strategies
The Middle Stone Age occupations of Tiémassas, coastal West Africa, between 62 and 25 thousand years ago
Stone tool assemblages and models for the dispersal of Homo sapiens out of Africa
Cultural change or continuity in the late MSA/Early LSA of southeastern Ethiopia? The site of Goda Buticha, Dire Dawa area
Is it Time to Retire Nasties in Southern Africa? Moving Beyond the Culture-Historical Framework for Middle Stone Age Lithic Assemblage Variability
Chronology of the Later Stone Age and Food Production in East Africa
Social and Ecological Models for the Middle Stone Age in Southern Africa
Handbook of Paleoanthropology
West African Palaeolithic history
Early MIS 3 occupation of Mochena Borago Rockshelter, Southwest Ethiopian Highlands
Chronological and behavioral contexts of the earliest Middle Stone Age in the Gademotta Formation, Main Ethiopian Rift
The Still Bay points of Blombos Cave (South Africa)
Persistence of Middle Stone Age technology to the Pleistocene/Holocene transition supports a complex hominin evolutionary scenario in West Africa
What is Still Bay? Human biogeography and bifacial point variability
The environmental context for the origins of modern human diversity
Variability in the Middle Stone Age of Eastern Africa
Stone point variability reveals spatial, chronological and environmental structuring of eastern African Middle Stone Age populations
Explanations of variability in Middle Stone Age stone tool assemblage composition and raw material use in Eastern Africa
The Middle Stone Age of East Africa and the beginnings of regional identity
Those marvellous millennia
Late Pleistocene artefacts and fauna from Rusinga and Mfangano islands, Lake Victoria, Kenya
Tephrostratigraphy and the Acheulian to Middle Stone Age transition in the Kapthurin Formation, Kenya
The revolution that wasn't
High- and low-latitude forcing of Plio-Pleistocene East African climate and human evolution
A new archaic Homo sapiens fossil from Lake Eyasi, Tanzania
The revolution that still isn't
Trajectories of cultural innovation from the Middle to Later Stone Age in Eastern Africa
The Pleistocene archaeology and environments of the Wasiriya Beds, Rusinga Island, Kenya
The pattern of emergence of a Middle Stone Age tradition at Gademotta and Kulkuletti (Ethiopia) through convergent tool and point technologies
Landscapes of human evolution
New ages for Middle and Later Stone Age deposits at Mumba rockshelter, Tanzania
Late Acheulean occupations at Montagu Cave and the pattern of Middle Pleistocene behavioral change in Western Cape, southern Africa
Radiometrically dated ostrich eggshell beads from the Middle and Later Stone Age of Magubike Rockshelter, southern Tanzania
A West African Middle Stone Age site dated to the beginning of MIS 5
Coalescence and fragmentation in the late Pleistocene archaeology of southernmost Africa
Revisiting Mwulu's Cave
Defining the 'generalist specialist' niche for Pleistocene Homo sapiens
The Sangoan-Lupemban and middle stone age sequence at the Muguruk site, western Kenya
Tectonics and human evolution
What happened to the human mind after the Howiesons Poort
Style and Social Information in Kalahari San Projectile Points
Interaction and Alliance in Palaeolithic Society
Technological Trends in the Middle Stone Age of South Africa between MIS 7 and MIS 3
Symbolic Use of Terrestrial Gastropod Opercula during the Middle Stone Age at Porc-Epic Cave, Ethiopia
Explaining Global Patterns of Language Diversity
| Unique citing works | 8 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 4 |
| Citation span | 2024 - 2026 (3) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 8 |