Tammy Hodgskiss

• PhD
• Curator at University of the Witwatersrand

Rose Cottage Cave is widely recognised as a key sequence for the Middle Stone Age and Later Stone Age in the southern African central interior, with its unique palaeoenvironmental and chrono-cultural archive spanning a semi-continuous record from the Late Pleistocene to the 19th century. Building on important previous research, new excavations will...

Book Review of Heidi Gustafson. 2023. Book of Earth: A Guide to Ochre, Pigment and Raw Color. New York: Abrams. ISBN 9781419764653

Ochre is a mineral pigment that has been used by humans for more than 300,000 years. It appears in archaeological, historical, and contemporary settings across vast distances of time and space, and increasing evidence shows ochre use by ancestral hominins as well as by certain animal species. Because of its unique behavioral, functional, contextual...

Ochre is a colourful thread that meanders through our human story. This iron-rich pigmentous rock became habitually used by Homo sapiens during the Late Pleistocene in Africa. It was later used in the creation of rock art paints, and is still used around the world in various ways. Ochre painting workshops are offered at Origins Centre museum in Joh...

Society for American Archaeology 2024

Recent excavations at Olieboomspoort (OBP) in the Waterberg Mountains of South Africa confirmed previous research at the site that highlighted an abundance of ochre in the Middle Stone Age (MSA) deposits. Here, we report on the results of an analysis of the ochre from the MSA deposits excavated in 2018–2019. Fossilised equid teeth from these deposi...

Mwulu’s Cave is located on the eastern escarpment of the Makapansberg Mountains in the district of Mokopane (Limpopo Province, South Africa, 24.17° S, 29.24° E), close to the Makapan Valley. The area hosts several well-known Plio-Pleistocene sites (Fig. 1). The cave is accessed directly from a mountain pass, informally and locally called the ‘Monke...

The regular use of ochre appears in the archaeological record during the Pleistocene – a time of significant behavioral and cognitive advances for Homo sapiens. The many potential uses of ochre complicates interpretations of how it was used and applied in the past. Understanding past ochre use has proven valuable in shedding light on technological...

Kaingo Sheep Rock Shelter was used by Later Stone Age (LSA) hunter-gatherers between 4370±180 and 170±30 BP. The site has rock art that includes a fine-line painting of a large, fat-tailed sheep, animal finger paintings, and geometric motifs. There are many microlithic end scrapers, a few backed tools, and more than 500 complete, incomplete and bro...

Book Review of Kros, C.,Wright, J., Buthelezi, M.&Ludlow,H. 2022. Archives of Times Past: Conversations about South Africa’s Deep History. Johannesburg: Wits University Press. 360 pp. ISBN 97817761 47274 (paperback). Price: ZAR395.00.

The Leswika Geodatabase: A rock and colouring materials ‘library’ in southern Africa Presentation at SAFA 26th August 2021. Oxford

Olieboomspoort is one of the few rock shelters in the vast interior of southern Africa documenting pulses of occupation from the Acheulean until the end of the Later Stone Age. Revil Mason excavated the site in 1954 and attributed the large Middle Stone Age (MSA) lithic assemblage to his middle phase of the so-called Pietersburg Industry. Recent wo...

Origins Centre museum in Johannesburg, South Africa, was opened in 2006. Origins Centre has always had a wide array of lectures, movie-screenings, and interactive displays in addition to the museum experience itself. The museum deals with living cultures as well as the archaeological record and traditional histories. We are aware that understanding...

Ostrich eggshell and gastropod shell beads provide important evidence for understanding how past peoples decorated and cultured their bodies and may also be used as proxy evidence for interpreting the nature and extent of past social networks. This study focuses on the ostrich eggshell and gastropod shell bead assemblages from the terminal Pleistoc...

The term “ochre” has many meanings: a colored stone, a pigment, sunscreen, a curiosity item, a mustard hue, or even an object used for ritual. Ochre found at archaeological sites is described as a range of earthy, ferruginous rocks with red–yellow–purple streaks. The use of ochre in the past has proven valuable for interpreting not only cognitive c...

In this paper, we present a revised stratigraphy and results of preliminary analyses of the archaeological material from Mwulu’s Cave. This arises from two excavation campaigns conducted in 2017, 71 years after the site was initially investigated by P.V. Tobias. This cave, located in Limpopo Province (South Africa), preserves one of the few known M...

A brief overview of my Hons research on MSA (MIS 5) ochre excavated from Klasies River Cave 1.

BOOK-REVIEW in South African Archaeological Bulletin

From c.100 000 years ago, ochre pieces were habitually collected and used at Middle Stone Age sites in southern Africa. This earthy iron-rich rock has been continually used since then and still has many applications today, such as pigment, sunscreen or body paint for ritual purposes. Although a range of colours were collected in the past, bright re...

The Late Pleistocene is a time of significant behavioural developments, with important cognitive implications for Homo sapiens. Rose Cottage Cave is an inland archaeological site that contains Middle Stone Age (MSA) and later Stone Age material covering the Late Pleistocene and Holocene periods. The long MSA sequence, dated from ~96 000 to ~30 000...

Many Middle Stone Age (MSA) sites such as Rose Cottage and Sibudu Caves yield large quantities of ochre pieces (9000 pieces from Sibudu alone). Physico-chemical characterisation is required to add value to the prior studies of ochre use traces. This project involves a non-destructive and multi-analytical approach (including Raman spectroscopy, Four...

Palaeoenvironments possibly had a significant effect on social behaviour in the Late Pleistocene, influencing subsistence strategies and population density, and could have allowed or restricted access to raw materials. This study explores ochre collection and use at Blombos and Klipdrift in relation to environmental fluctuations. The two sites are...

We describe colour, hardness, grain size, geological type and surface modifications of ochre pieces excavated, first by Malan and later by Harper, from the Middle Stone Age (MSA) of Rose Cottage Cave, 96, 000 to 30, 000 years ago. Soft, bright-red shales are abundant, and most ochre has clayey or silty grain sizes. The post-Howiesons Poort layers c...

Ochre pieces found at Middle Stone Age (MSA) and Middle Palaeolithic sites show a range of colours, use-traces and applications. Ochre assemblages provide a way to explore some of the behavioural and cognitive changes that took place during the Late Pleistocene – a time of significant behavioural developments, and important cognitive implications f...

Rose Cottage and Sibudu Caves yielded a large quantity of ochre pieces and traces. Some attributes of the ochre have already been studied purely from a visual point of view. Visual comparisons have been made between sites to understand use of ochre during Middle Stone Age occupation in South Africa, but physico-chemical evidences are needed to comp...

Rose Cottage Cave has a long and significant Middle Stone Age (MSA) sequence that was excavated by numerous archaeologists. The ochre collections have been studied in varying detail and there are some discrepancies in reports, making comparisons with other MSA sites problematic. Here I report on the ochre assemblages excavated by Berry Malan and Ph...

Ochre pieces are a common find at Middle Stone Age (MSA) sites. The collection and use of ochre is often attributed to enhanced mental abilities and symbolism. This is due to the preferential use of bright red, shiny ochre, engraved designs found on ochre pieces and the range of use-traces and applications. Rose Cottage Cave and Sibudu contain two...

Ochre is found at many Middle Stone Age sites and its use is often associated with enhanced mental abilities and symbolism, but the links between the visible uses of ochre and cognition have not been clearly defined. By establishing the technology and processes involved in using ochre, one can determine the skill, knowledge and cognitive abilities...

Many Middle Stone Age (MSA) sites have evidence of the regular collection and use of ochre. Sibudu (KwaZulu- Natal, South Africa) has a large MSA ochre assemblage of over 9000 pieces from layers dating between ~77 ka and ~38 ka. There are 682 pieces with signs of use. All usetraces were examined and activity categories were defined based on publish...

Many Middle Stone Age (MSA) sites have evidence of the regular collection and use of ochre. Sibudu (KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa) has a large MSA ochre assemblage of over 9000 pieces from layers dating between ~77 ka and ~38 ka. There are 682 pieces with signs of use. All usetraces were examined and activity categories were defined based on publishe...

The properties of ochre from the Middle Stone Age (MSA) layers of Sibudu, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, are described here. The assemblage comprises 5449 pieces (>8 mm), including 682 pieces with markings from use. Shale is the most common geological form. Ochre of medium hardness is common and the grain sizes are generally silty or clayey. Some cha...

Ochre pieces were used experimentally for a variety of grinding, scoring and rubbing activities to record and compare the use-wear markings that each activity creates on the ochre piece. Ochre that is ground on coarse or fine-grained slabs develops parallel striations that cover the surface of the piece. The striations have unfrayed ends. Grinding...

Compound adhesives made from red ochre mixed with plant gum were used in the Middle Stone Age (MSA), South Africa. Replications reported here suggest that early artisans did not merely color their glues red; they deliberately effected physical transformations involving chemical changes from acidic to less acidic pH, dehydration of the adhesive near...