Clive Gamble

University of Southampton · Faculty of Humanities

Palaeoanthropologists and evolutionary psychologists have successfully used the increasing size of the brain during human evolution to infer cognitive and social outcomes. Archaeologists have applied similar reasoning to the development of technology in deep history. This paper goes beyond these approaches by considering the house as a metaphor for...

The time revolution of 1859 changed forever the relationship between humans and time. In the space of a calendar year, and at a furious pace, the belief that all human history could be fitted into 6,000 years was shattered. The evidence for such a fundamental change was small, handheld stone tools found in the gravel quarries of the Somme among the...

Circular features made from mammoth bone are known from across Upper Palaeolithic Eastern Europe, and are widely identified as dwellings. The first systematic flotation programme of samples from a recently discovered feature at Kostenki 11 in Russia has yielded assemblages of charcoal, burnt bone and microlithic debitage. New radiocarbon dates prov...

When was the human threshold crossed? What is the evidence for evolving humans and their emerging humanity? This volume explores in a global overview the archaeology of the Middle Pleistocene, 800,000 to 130,000 years ago when evidence for innovative cultural behaviour appeared. The evidence shows that the threshold was crossed slowly, by a variety...

In der Menschheitsgeschichte gab es während der Laufzeit des Lucy-Projekts zwei Meilensteine. Im Jahr 2007 lebten zum ersten Mal mehr Menschen in Städten als auf dem Land, und 2011 wuchs die Weltbevölkerung auf mehr als 7 Mrd. Die Archäologie rückt diese Wendepunkte in den richtigen Zusammenhang. Vor 11.000 Jahren, am Ende der Eiszeit, bestand die...

Was macht uns eigentlich zu Menschen? Wenn man die Evolution des Menschen erforschen will, besteht eines der größten Probleme darin, dass wir uns selbst definieren. Vor rund 300 Jahren taufte uns Carl von Linné, der große schwedische Klassifikator der Tiere und Pflanzen, auf den Namen Homo sapiens, der kluge Mensch. Und er schrieb auch: „Homo. Nosc...

In der Familie der Primaten machte die Evolution eine großartige Erfindung: das Sozialleben. Aber das Leben in Gruppen hat seinen Preis. Je mehr Tiere die Gruppe umfasst, desto größere Strecken muss man jeden Tag zurücklegen, denn jedes Tier muss in einem ungefähr gleich großen Gebiet auf die Suche gehen, um die benötigte Nahrung zu finden. Das bed...

It has been proposed that a strong relationship exists between the population size and density of Pleistocene hominins and their competence in making stone tools. Here we focus on the first ‘Out of Africa’ dispersal, 1.8 Ma ago, and the idea that it might have featured lower population density and the fragmentation of hominin groups in areas furthe...

Stellen wir uns einmal Folgendes vor: Außerirdische besuchen, getrieben von langen Erinnerungen und der typischen Neugier intergalaktischer Touristen, alle 500.000 Jahre die Erde. Vor 1,5 und einer Million Jahren fanden sie bei ihren Visiten den Homo erectus und wunderten sich darüber, wie langsam der Wandel ablief. Bei ihrem nächsten Besuch vor 50...

Die Evolution des Menschen ist eine legendäre Geschichte, die uns immer wieder aufs Neue fasziniert und verzaubert. In unserer Vergangenheit verbirgt sich einer der Triumphe der Evolution: der Prozess, durch den sich sowohl die äußere Gestalt als auch die Lebensweise eines gewöhnlichen afrikanischen Menschenaffen so veränderten, dass er am Ende zur...

Der schwierigste Teil jedes Forschungsprojekts ist die Überprüfung von Ideen. Sie macht aber auch am meisten Spaß. Die Archäologen, die in diesem Kapitel die weitere Geschichte erzählen, überprüfen ihre Ideen mithilfe handfester Belege. Ausgrabungen haben nicht den Zweck, antike Gegenstände um ihrer selbst willen zu bergen, sondern wir wollen damit...

Mit der Vorstellung vom sozialen Gehirn verfügen wir über eine starke Hypothese: Danach war unser Sozialleben die Triebkraft für das Wachstum unseres Gehirns. Aber von welchem Zeitpunkt an wenden wir diese Hypothese auf die Evolution des Menschen an? Und wie überprüfen wir sie? Manche Hypothesen, beispielsweise dass Objekte mit unterschiedlicher Ma...

Die Entdeckung der Gemeinsamkeit Dieses bemerkenswerte Buch, das die Evolution und die Archäologie des menschlichen Sozialverhaltens zusammenführt, spannt den Bogen von den sozialen Gruppen der Steinzeit bis zu den modernen digitalen Netzwerken – und zeigt, dass wir heute in sozialen Welten leben, die sich tief in unserer evolutionären Vergangenhei...

Now in an updated third edition, Archaeology: The Basics provides a straightforward and engaging introduction to the world of Archaeology. This book answers key questions about how and why we practice archaeology and examines the theories and themes underpinning the subject. Fully updated, this new edition includes a wide range of examples and new...

Investigation of an in-filled lake basin in Schünsmoor, Ldkr. Rotenburg (Wümme), northern Germany, reveals the discovery of ‘cryptotephra’ (non-visible volcanic ash) in biogenic sediments dating to the Late-glacial and early Holocene periods (c.15.4 - 7.5 ka cal BP). Major element geochemistry of glass shards shows the tephra originates in Iceland...

Now in an updated third edition, Archaeology: The Basics provides a straightforward and engaging introduction to the world of Archaeology. This book answers key questions about how and why we practice archaeology and examines the theories and themes underpinning the subject. Fully updated, this new edition includes a wide range of examples and new...

The history of anthropology reveals a discipline driven by fission and fusion. In this article I use the framework of deep history as an example of what might be achieved if anthropology resolved to travel the road of fusion rather than continue with atomization. I will illustrate the pathway by examining the fusion of interdisciplinary endeavour t...

It is now generally recognised that the activity known as hunting is a complex but predictable adaptation of small social units to the variable structure of the environment. In the last decade we have passed from the model of the hunter as a ‘catch-as-catch-can’ opportunist to an appreciation of his ability to exploit resources in both a systematic...

Life is a compelling addition to the Darwin College Lecture Series, in which eight distinguished authors each present an essay from their area of expertise devoted to the theme of 'life'. The book forges connections between art, science and the humanities in a vibrant and thought-provoking collection that exposes both conventional and unconventiona...

My aim in this paper is to put the question, ‘Where was the centre of the Upper Palaeolithic world?’. I promise no answers and I will confine the discussion to Europe. The purpose behind raising such a seemingly irrelevant problem is that its investigation leads us directly into issues of palaeolithic society, the interpretation of art in such cont...

The site at Red Barns was excavated in 1975, but the large lithic collection remained unstudied following preliminary examination. This paper reports on further analysis of the lithic material from the site, together with a reappraisal of the faunal remains and original mineralogical analyses, and the results of processing sediment samples from the...

Sets out the detailed stratigraphy and chronology of the palaeolithic rockshelters of Asprochaliko and Kastritsa excavated in the 1960s, the methods used by the original investigators in excavation and classification of the finds, and the general characteristics of the stone industries and fauna. Methods of estimating the density of finds are discu...

It is now three decades since Waterbolk introduced evaluation criteria to 14C chronology. Despite this, and other subsequent attempts to introduce quality control in the use of 14C data, no systematic procedure has been adopted by the archaeological community. As a result, our databases may be significantly weakened by questionable dates and/or que...

The discovery of a cryptotephra (nonvisible volcanic horizon) in a windblown sand archaeological site in Poland highlights how luminescence and tephrostratigraphy may combine to better refine the chronology of such sites. In this study we identify a cryptotephra horizon which on the basis of major and minor element geochemistry and an OSL age of 2....

One hundred years after the publication of the great sociological treatise, The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, this new volume shows how aptly Durkheim¹s theories still resonate with the study of contemporary and historical religious societies. The volume applies the Durkheimian model to multiple cases, probing its resilience, wondering where...

The Palaeolithic is traditionally described as a static period when innovation and creativity were rare. Moreover, with the accent on accounting for modern behaviour this view has stressed the late appearance of novel artefacts in Africa and elsewhere. These beads, ochre and art-works fit well with a model of the mind that emphasises its rational c...

The picture of human evolution has been transformed by new evidence in recent years, but contributing disciplines seem to have difficulty in sharing knowledge on a common basis. The disciplines producing primary data in paleoanthropology scarcely reach out to a broader picture and are often bypassed by writers in other disciplines. Archaeology is e...

Buttercups are not the first flower that comes to mind when thinking about Neanderthals. But when a small group of these distinctive hominins walked into the Lynford locale on a mild, early summer's day 60,000 years ago, their first sight would have been a dazzling carpet of water crowsfoot (ranunculus cf aquatilis, a close relative of the terrestr...

Marked changes in human dispersal and development during the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition have been attributed to massive volcanic eruption and/or severe climatic deterioration. We test this concept using new records of volcanic ash layers of the Campanian Ignimbrite (CI) eruption, dated to c. 40,000 years ago (40 ka BP). The distribution...

Marked changes in human dispersal and development during the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition have been attributed to massive volcanic eruption and/or severe climatic deterioration. We test this concept using records of volcanic ash layers of the Campanian Ignimbrite eruption dated to ca. 40,000 y ago (40 ka B.P.). The distribution of the Cam...

Human populations, along with those of many other species, are thought to have contracted into a number of refuge areas at the height of the last Ice Age. European populations are believed to be, to a large extent, the descendants of the inhabitants of these refugia, and some extant mtDNA lineages can be traced to refugia in Franco-Cantabria (haplo...

Cryptotephra of Icelandic origin from the open-air archaeological site of Ahrenshöft LA 58 D (Kr. Nordfriesland, Schleswig-Holstein), northern Germany overlies a Late-glacial Havelte lithic assemblage, hitherto dated by 14C and biostratigraphy to the earliest part of the Late-glacial interstadial (GI-1e to GI-1c 3). Peaks in ash shards are observed...

Archaeological accounts of cognitive evolution have traditionally favoured an internal model of the mind and a search for symbolic proxies. This chapter argues for an external model of cognition and uses this perspective to develop the understanding of Palaeolithic material culture as based on sensory experience. It explores ways of investigating t...

Human nature is the product of a long history that has brought us, over the course of some 6-8 million years, from our common ancestor with the chimpanzee lineage to modern humans. The aim of this particular volume has been to bring together two powerful approaches that deal, respectively, with explanations of the evolution of human brains and unde...

In this worldwide survey, Clive Gamble explores the evolution of the human imagination, without which we would not have become a global species. He sets out to determine the cognitive and social basis for our imaginative capacity and traces the evidence back into deep human history. He argues that it was the imaginative ability to "go beyond" and t...

The Palaeolithic is traditionally described as a static period when innovation and creativity were rare. Moreover, with the accent on accounting for modern behaviour this view has stressed the late appearance of novel artefacts in Africa and elsewhere. These beads, ochre and art-works fit well with a model of the mind that emphasises its rational c...

Clive Gamble relishes the inside story on the cognitive abilities of our fossil relatives.

Social Archeology: Beyond Subsistence and Dating. By RedmanC. L.et al. 23·5 × 15·5 cm. Pp. xiv + 471. New York: Academic Press, 1978. £16·75. Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory. Vol. I. Edited by SchifferM. B.. 23·5 × 15·5 cm. Pp. xv + 426. New York: Academic Press, 1978. £15·90. - Volume 60 Issue 2 - Clive Gamble

Archaeologists regard the demonstration of human antiquity in 1859 as a major breakthrough in the development of prehistoric studies. However, the significance of this event, although acknowledged by other disciplines, is largely passed over. We investigate why this is so by examining the procedures that the antiquary John Evans and the geologist J...

The spread of anatomically modern humans (AMH) into Europe occurred when shifts in the North Atlantic meridional overturning circulation triggered a series of large and abrupt climate changes during the last glacial. However, the role of climate forcing in this process has remained unclear. Here we present a last glacial record that provides insigh...

It is often the case in interdisciplinary accounts of human evolution that archaeological data are either ignored or treated superficially. This article sets out to redress this position by using archaeological evidence from the last 2.5 million years to test the social brain hypothesis (SBH) – that our social lives drove encephalization. To do thi...

While it is a commonplace to state that every age gets the Neanderthals it either deserves, or wants, there has recently been a sea-change in these just-desserts and needs. It has taken 150 years for Neanderthals to emerge as humans with a difference and this difference depends not on the shape of the skulls or tools but rather in their competence...

To understand who we are and why we are, we need to understand both modern humans and the ancestral stages that brought us to this point. The core to that story has been the role of evolving cognition - the social brain - in mediating the changes in behaviour that we see in the archaeological record. This volume brings together two powerful approac...

In this paper we argue for a relational perspective based on metaphorical rather than semiotic understandings of human and hominin1 material culture. The corporeality of material culture and thus its role as solid metaphors for a shared experience of embodiment precedes language in the archaeological record. While arguments continue as to both the...

We know that there are fundamental differences between humans and living apes, and also between living humans and their extinct relatives. It is also probably the case that the most significant and divergent of these differences relate to our social behaviour and its underlying cognition, as much as to fundamental differences in physiology, biochem...

Hominin dispersal and human colonization have been hallmark concepts in the last two decades of palaeanthropological research,1–7 even though the terminology in these approaches is loosely defined (Box 1). The number, frequency, and routes of dispersal have been analyzed on a global scale,8 beginning with the earliest movement of hominins between A...

It all began in a railway carriage. Two businessmen, travelling to the Kingston Assizes in Surrey, nodded to each other as strangers do, but did not strike up a conversation. They were expert witnesses appearing for different sides in the Croydon Water Question; a legal test case that boiled down to who owned the undergroundwaters of London (Mather...

Biological Kinship Is Not KinshipTwo Revolutions But No KinshipA Diasporic Species and Social ExtensionThe Social Brain, Language and Kinship CategoriesMaterial KinshipConclusion: Did Neanderthals Marry?

The turn of the twenty-first century has seen a new era in the cognitive and brain sciences that allows us to address the age-old question of what it means to be human from a whole new range of different perspectives. Our knowledge of the workings of the human brain increases day by day and so does our understanding of the extended, distributed, em...

Sir John Evans 1823–1908: antiquity, commerce and natural science in the age of Darwin. Edited by MacgregorArthur. 250mm. Pp xiv + 326, 59 b&w and col ills. Oxford: The Ashmolean Museum. ISBN 9781854442376. £45 (hbk). - Volume 88 - Clive Gamble

IntroductionOur Deep-Time Social Background Social Archaeology and the Paleolithic: The Origins of Group ClosureThe Primate Alternative and the “Release from Proximity”The Standard View of the PaleolithicOrigins and LogocentrismA Role for the Individual in the PaleolithicConclusions: The Future Social PaleolithicAcknowledgmentsReferences

John Wymer devoted his professional life to the study of the Palaeolithic, and his importance to the subject extended far beyond a brick pit in Suffolk. He was the greatest field naturalist of the Palaeolithic. Wymer had acute gifts of observation and an attention to detail for both artefacts and geology that was unsurpassed. He provided a typology...

New developments in neuroimaging have demonstrated that the basic capacities underpinning human social skills are shared by our closest extant primate relatives. The challenge for archaeologists is to explain how complex human societies evolved from this shared pattern of face-to-face social interaction. We argue that a key process was the gradual...

There can be no doubt that Peter Bellwood's First Farmers is a major new statement which presents a robustly expressed solution to one of those classic problems which provides a benchmark for theorization and justifies archaeology as a field. But agreement stops there. Few academic books published recently have evoked such highly charged reactions....

Who are the ``amphibious ill-born mob'' who gave rise to the British nation?

In this innovative study Clive Gamble presents and questions two of the most famous descriptions of change in prehistory. The first is the 'human revolution', when evidence for art, music, religion and language first appears. The second is the economic and social revolution of the Neolithic period. Gamble identifies the historical agendas behind 'o...

Chronometric attention in the Late Glacial of Western Europe is turning from the dating of archaeological cultures to studying how the continent was re-populated at the end of the last ice age. We present results from a survey of all available radiocarbon determinations (the S2AGES database) which show that when calibrated, and compared to the GRIP...

Why are humans musical? Why do people in all cultures sing or play instruments? Why do we appear to have specialized neurological apparatus for hearing and interpreting music as distinct from other sounds? And how does our musicality relate to language and to our evolutionary history? Anthropologists and archaeologists have paid little attention to...

This article presents the initial results from the S2AGES data base of calibrated radiocarbon estimates from western Europe in the period 25,000–10,000 years ago. Our aim is to present a population history of this sub-continental region by providing a chronologically-secure framework for the interpretation of data from genetics and archaeology. In...

Nature is the international weekly journal of science: a magazine style journal that publishes full-length research papers in all disciplines of science, as well as News and Views, reviews, news, features, commentaries, web focuses and more, covering all branches of science and how science impacts upon all aspects of society and life.

A link between climate change and human evolution during the Pleistocene has often been assumed but rarely tested. At the macro-evolutionary level Foley showed for hominids that extinction, rather than speciation, correlates with environmental change as recorded in the deep sea record. Our aim is to examine this finding at a smaller scale and with...

A link between climate change and human evolution during the Pleistocene has often been assumed but rarely tested. At the macro-evolutionary level Foley showed for hominids that extinction, rather than speciation, correlates with environmental change as recorded in the deep sea record. Our aim is to examine this finding at a smaller scale and with...

It is now three decades since Waterbolk introduced evaluation criteria to 14C chronology. Despite this, and other subsequent attempts to introduce quality control in the use of 14C data, no systematic procedure has been adopted by the archaeological community. As a result, our databases may be significantly weakened by questionable dates and/or que...

Our understanding of the first peopling of Britain has recently undergone a transformation. On the one hand there have been fundamental advances in the investigation of Pleistocene environments and chronology, while on the other exceptionally well preserved archaeological sites of the period have now been investigated. These data are allowing us to...