Robert Vernet

The Tichitt culture of the Ceramic Late Stone Age is known for its large settlement sites, built from dry stone walls. It is centered on the cliffs of southeastern Mauritania, but its links to the Middle Niger and the later urban developments there have long been a topic of research. This article adds a further piece of evidence linking the two reg...

In the Sahara-Sahelian regions, water is a life obsession. Studying it in the past may provide informations of surprising topicality. The Water is unequally distributed in the area and plays a key role in human presence and way of life. Man adapted to paleo-environmental changes, which led to present desert and half desert conditions. It enables us...

The mid- to late Holocene aridification pattern of NW Africa remains a matter of controversial debate. While many marine climate reconstructions indicate a relatively abrupt aridification at ∼5.5 ka BP, terrestrial palaeoclimate records rather show a spatially and temporally heterogeneous transition towards the modern arid state. To bridge conflict...

Morphological investigations on the northwest coastal plain of Mauritania (Banc d'Arguin) lead to a revised post-6000 yrs. BP sea-level curve. The region is characterized by extensive sand flats occasionally surmounted by low sand barriers. These barriers pick out a set of paleoshorelines attributed to the six episodes defined by Dia (2013). Morpho...

The nature and timing of the mid- to late Holocene aridification of NW Africa continue to be subjects of considerable debate. A growing body of evidence suggests a rather gradual and spatially heterogeneous transition, in contrast to early marine sedimentary records indicating a relatively abrupt change to the modern hyper-arid climate at around 5....

The reconstruction of pre-depositional cooking treatments used by prehistoric coastal populations for processing aquatic faunal resources is often difficult in archaeological shell midden assemblages. Besides limiting our knowledge of various social, cultural, economic and technological aspects of shell midden formation, unknown pre-depositional co...

The Sahara experienced several humid episodes during the late Quaternary, associated with the development of vast fluvial networks and enhanced freshwater delivery to the surrounding ocean margins. In particular, marine sediment records off Western Sahara indicate deposition of river-borne material at those times, implying sustained fluvial dischar...

Climate and Human story in the Sahel during the last 4 kyrs. - At the end of the Neolithic Era, during the third millennium BCE, there were fewer humid periods, and the sub-Saharan and Sahelian zones from the Atlantic to Lake Chad assumed their current geographical form. Since then, the climate has continued undergoing major variations. The success...

Acknowledging the patchiness of palaeoclimatic data, as well as a new appreciation of how complex the forcing mechanisms of Africa’s climates are, it would be premature to propose a grand synthesis of the continent’s climatic backdrop to human history and prehistory. That said, this “state-of-the-art” sampler from several regions of Africa serves s...

The Holocene climate change of NW Africa was characterized by a transition from humid conditions during the Early Holocene to the present desert state. However, it is still not clear whether this climate change was either an abrupt or a gradual transition. Sclerochronological approaches can provide important information on climate and oceanographic...

Résumé La culture épipaléolithique de Foum Arguin s'étend de l'oued Draa, dans le sud marocain, au Banc d'Arguin, et de l'Atlantique aux plaines du nord-ouest saharien, en Mauritanie. Elle est mal délimitée chronologiquement, entre le VIIIe et le VIIe millénaire B.P. et précède de peu le Néolithique qui lui succède, après 5500 B.P., sur la quasi-to...

Sand, prehistoric man and the archaeologist in the Sahara. The Sahara conveys lots of generally accepted ideas. Hot desert, it has not always been arid in the past. While often considered as a sandy immensity, it is mostly (80 %) made of stones and rocks. Despite that, the sand occupies an important place, at least in certain regions — in Mauritani...

4) Sub-Regional Fishery Commission (CSRP), Dakar, Senegal __________________ *corresponding author: peter.mueller@zmt-bremen.de Over the last decades, analyses of incrementally banded calcium carbonate hard parts of marine organisms (e.g. bivalves or corals) have unveiled an important source of paleoclimate and paleoceanographical information (Schö...

In 2005 TOTAL E&P obtained from the government of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania two concessions to explore the hydrocarbon potential of the Taoudenni Basin. The unusually big size of these concessions was only comparable to the challenge of exploring this virtually unknown basin, in a harsh and remote desert environment without human settlemen...

In the littoral zone of the Banc d'Arguin both littoral sedimentary units and man-made deposits (shell-middens) abound. They were formed during the Late Holocene after the final onset of the post-glacial transgression. Here, a geo-archaeological approach is used to study them. The geomorphological and sedimentological characteristics of the coastal...

La Prehistoire de la Mauritanie occidentale a un siecle, mais ses progres ont ete contrastes. D'abord oeuvre de pionniers, elle s'est heurtee aux difficultes d'un milieu saharien souvent hostile, avant que les importants moyens de l'Ifan, dans les annees 50, puis de l'IMRS, ne permettent de construire peu a peu un canevas coherent a la Prehistoire...

African Pottery Roulette Past and Present: Techniques, Identification and Distribution considers ethnographic, museological and archaeological approaches to pottery-decorating tools called roulettes, that is to say short lengths of fibre or wood that are rolled over the surface of a vessel for decoration. This book sets out, for the first time, a s...

The geomorphological, sedimentological and archaeological studies of coastal features in the Iwik-Aouatil area show two categories of coastal sedimentary units: very extensive sand flats and linear relief features covered by a thin veneer of anthropogenic Anadara senilis shell-middens. These units provide an opportunity to discuss the return to ari...

Dhar Nema, easternmost of the Tichitt escarpment chain, was neglected by archaeologists throughout the twentieth century. However, since 2000, two separate archaeological teams have conducted survey and test excavation work in the region. This article presents the final research results of one of these teams. Two sites in particular are closely exa...

In the Ras el Sass and Jerf el Oustani region (Banc d’Arguin coastal area of Mauritania), a study was carried out involving: (1) the identification, location and direct or indirect dating of shell middens; and (2) reconstruction of the infilling of the Oued ech Chibka palaeo-estuarine embayment, between 5500 years B.P. and the present. The shell mi...

The epipaleolithic culture of Foum Arguin stretched from the Oued Draa, in southern Morocco, to the Banc d'Arguin and from the Atlantic shore to the lowlands of northwestern Sahara in Mauritania. Its chronology is vague, located between the eighth and the seventh lenniums BP It preceded a little the Neolithic, which followed it after 5500 BP oil al...

Decorated ostrich egg shells discovered in southern Morocco and Mauritania

The sea-shells middens of the Mauritanian coast constitute an exceptional example of the use of coastal marine resources, under a dry tropical climate. During at least 6 millennia men lived on this shore, or visited it to fish or collect bivalves and gastropods. The study of molluscs remains, in their natural environment and other archaeological in...

La région de Nouakchott (Mauritanie) connaît au quatrième millénaire BP une recrudescence d'établissements néolithiques dont il ne reste que des gisements de surface. Ces sites présentent une céramique très variée et quelquefois hétérogène. En prenant en compte les types de dégraissant, les formes de vase et la composition des décors, nous avons pu...

In the area of Nouakchott (Mauritania) the number of neolithic settlements increases during the fourth millenium BP. Most sites consist of surface deposit where miscellaneous ceramics are found. With the analysis of the type of temper, the shapes of vase and the organisation of the decorative pattern, we try and precise the relations of the ceramic...

The onset of desert conditions in the Sahara began earlier in the north than in the south, where more favorable levels of precipitation led to the maintenance for a long time of northern Sahelian conditions. In order to understand the evolution of Neolithic and post-Neolithic cultures, however, we need to gain a more precise knowledge of the geogra...

A critical study of the literature on the Quaternary of Mauritania confirms the field evidence of a succession of arid and humid climatic phases, and emphasizes the lack of sufficient precise dating. Marine deposits show that transgressions begin during the end of dry phases and reach a maximum during and after the succeeding wet episodes. Taking i...

The study of 270 paleoenvironmental 14C dates and 175 dates regarding human settlements of the Atlantic coast and the Mauritanian western areas provides the first synthesis of the Holocene evolution in the region. The findings are based on: (1) See level changes since 7500 yr BP (the end of the Wurm transgression), (2) The variability of coastal en...

La prehistoire de la vallee de la Mekrou (parc de la Tapoa), au sud de la Republique du Niger, est d'une grande richesse. La riviere a installe un systeme de terrasses dans lesquelles on retouve parfois en stratigraphie les differentes periodes archeologiques. Le paleolithique inferieur et moyen est present. Le paleolithique recent est frequent. Il...

Res. d'A. Les gravures rupestres d'Akreijit sont integrees a une structure d'habitat en village. Elles se divisent en deux ensembles: l'un a patine ancienne, l'autre a patine plus recente, paleo-berbere. A ces differences de patine correspondent des differences de theme et de repartition dans le village, qui sembleraient en relation directe avec l'...

Multigr. Thèse Doctorat : Préhistoire : Paris Université de Paris I - Panthéon - Sorbonne : 1983.