Centre for Archaeological Science, School of Earth, Atmospheric and Life Sciences, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia.
Department of Archaeology, University of Cape Town, Upper Campus, Rondebosch, Western Cape, South Africa.
Nat Ecol Evol. 2022 Apr;6(4):361-369. doi: 10.1038/s41559-022-01667-5. Epub 2022 Feb 28.
Africa's Middle Stone Age preserves sporadic evidence for novel behaviours among early modern humans, prompting a range of questions about the influence of social and environmental factors on patterns of human behavioural evolution. Here we document a suite of novel adaptations dating approximately 92-80 thousand years before the present at the archaeological site Varsche Rivier 003 (VR003), located in southern Africa's arid Succulent Karoo biome. Distinctive innovations include the production of ostrich eggshell artefacts, long-distance transportation of marine molluscs and systematic use of heat shatter in stone tool production, none of which occur in coeval assemblages at sites in more humid, well-studied regions immediately to the south. The appearance of these novelties at VR003 corresponds with a period of reduced regional wind strength and enhanced summer rainfall, and all of them disappear with increasing winter rainfall dominance after 80 thousand years before the present, following which a pattern of technological similarity emerges at sites throughout the broader region. The results indicate complex and environmentally contingent processes of innovation and cultural transmission in southern Africa during the Middle Stone Age.
非洲中石器时代保存了早期现代人一些零星的新行为证据，引发了一系列关于社会和环境因素对人类行为进化模式影响的问题。在这里，我们记录了一套大约在现在 92-80 千年前在位于南部非洲干旱的肉质灌木丛生物群的考古遗址 Varsche Rivier 003（VR003）的新适应。独特的创新包括鸵鸟蛋壳制品的生产、远距离运输海洋软体动物以及系统地在石器生产中使用热破碎，这些都没有出现在南部更潮湿、研究更充分的地点的同期组合中。这些新奇事物在 VR003 的出现与区域风力减弱和夏季降雨量增加的时期相对应，并且所有这些新奇事物都在现在 80 千年前随着冬季降雨量主导地位的增加而消失，此后整个更广泛地区的遗址出现了技术相似的模式。结果表明，在中石器时代，南部非洲的创新和文化传播存在复杂和依赖环境的过程。
