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The Study of the Fauresmith: A Review
Abstract
The Fauresmith is an enigmatic South African stone tool industry, or culture, which many believe to be transitional between the Earlier and Middle Stone Ages. However, there is no consensus on its content or in fact, universal agreement on its existence. Over the past few years, absolute dating has been undertaken on sediments containing material labelled as Fauresmith. This has challenged its transitional status, but also exacerbated its use as a chrono-temporal marker. This is further complicating an already confused issue. Attempts at clarifying the Fauresmith are still ongoing, and offered here is an historical overview of its study since its first discovery. Presented is a review of the original classification proposed by Goodwin and Van Riet Lowe, its changing interpretation during the development of archaeology within South Africa, and the eventual abandonment of the termdue to its misuse. Attention shall then turn to the more recent resurrection of the term and the added levels of confusion that have arisen since this time. This review of the study of the Fauresmith can offer explanations as to how we have arrived at the present state of confusion, allowing us to move towards a firmer understanding of the Fauresmith and its place within the archaeology of South Africa.
... Their original description characterizes the Fauresmith as having handaxes of fine workmanship that are generally smaller than those in the Acheulean (then called the Stellenbosch) but closely allied to it, with 'longitudinal flakes' used for handaxe blanks and with slightly trimmed points and other flake tools. This influential diagnosis was based on a large number of sites, but unfortunately, these features were described from selected samples rather than on excavated assemblages (Underhill, 2011). Van Riet Lowe (1945) later refined the definition by describing the Fauresmith as the end of the Great Hand Axe Culture, not remarkable in its continued presence of handaxes, but rather in the use of the Levallois technique (then well-known in Europe), which produced flakes with facetted platforms and more right-angled detachments (i.e., in line with the prepared surface of the core). ...
... It was then common to rely on 'fossiles directeurs' (or diagnostic types) to define stages of cultural evolution in relation to a purported stratigraphic sequence of climatic changes (Clark, 1959; see also Supplementary Online Material [SOM] S1). In a comprehensive review of how the Fauresmith as a cultural entity had been used and misused over the years but never properly defined, Underhill (2011) concluded that these problems have challenged its usefulness as a transitional industry and a temporal marker. Some have suggested that precocious elements such as facetted platforms and convergent prepared cores should be used to indicate the first appearance of the MSA (Beaumont and Vogel, 2006;Herries, 2011), but this practice has not been popular, and the term continues to be used (Chazan and Horwitz, 2009;Porat et al., 2010;Chazan, 2015a,b;McNabb and Beaumont, 2011a,b;Lotter et al., 2016). ...
The Fauresmith was a term first coined by archaeologists in the 1920s to describe a cultural development intermediate between the Earlier and Middle Stone Ages. From the late 1960s, many researchers abandoned the term in favor of sinking the Fauresmith within the Later Acheulean. More recently, however, some have supported the idea of the Fauresmith as the earliest Middle Stone Age, whereas other researchers continue to use the term to refer to a transitional technological development. In this article, we evaluate the status of the Fauresmith. We do this by describing a newly excavated assemblage from Canteen Kopje in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa and by comparing it with other assemblages published as Fauresmith. Although there is substantial variability across these assemblages, we present data to show that the relevant assemblages show the consistency of a regional technology that is indeed transitional between the Earlier and Middle Stone Ages. It includes prepared cores, blades, and very reduced numbers of large cutting tools compared with the Acheulean, and it often includes convergent flakes and retouched points. We argue that the Fauresmith, along with parallel developments both within and beyond Africa, is a term worth retaining to identify the slow process of decline of Acheulean technology in favor of a lighter toolkit, which includes varying degrees of more advanced core reduction strategies, larger numbers of formal tools, and hafting. Such developments are associated with populations linked to the development of Homo sapiens in Africa from ca. 600 to 160 ka.
... These may as well derive from site formation processes, such as river incision and erosion linked to the local seasonal climate regime or trampling (Schoville, 2019) . The ''Fauresmith'' is a long-debated term for the either late ESA or early MSA assemblages frequently observed in open-air sites of the interior drylands of southern Africa and recognized by finely retouched bifaces, scrapers, Levallois points, prepared cores and blades (Kuman et al., 2020;Tryon and McBrearty, 2002;Underhill, 2011). The oldest dated ''Fauresmith'' tools are from Kathu Pan 1, to ca. 511-435 ka in a sequence of LCTs and flake-blades (Porat et al., 2010;Wilkins and Chazan, 2012). ...
... Interestingly, descriptions of the composition of the Fauresmithdas is also the case with several other southern African Stone Age entitiesdhave tended to vary between researchers (Underhill, 2011;Wilkins, 2020) and the regional extent, geological determinants and chronology of the industry are still ambiguous (Humphreys, 1970). Similar challenges of compositional and geochronological consistency are shared by other supposedly ESA to MSA transitional industries such as the Sangoan and Lupemban. ...
... Le ré examen du site est donc né cessaire à la fois pour documenter les plus anciens vestiges daté s à ce jour en Namibie et discuter la cohé rence de l'assemblage. Il permettra é galement de questionner le lien entre technique et subsistance à travers l'exemple d'un site de la frange occidentale aride et semi-aride de l'Afrique australe occupé durant l'Acheulé en ré cent, pé riode charniè re dans les changements comportementaux et culturels en Afrique australe (Deacon, 1975 ;Cruz-Uribe et al., 2003 ;Kuman, 2007b ;Klein, 2009 ;Herries, 2011 ;Underhill, 2011 ;Wilkins et Chazan, 2012 ;Wilkins, 2013 ;Kuman, 2019 ;Wurz, 2019). ...
Résumé
En Namibie, malgré une riche documentation sur le Middle et Later Stone Age, les sites Earlier Stone Age sont principalement connus en surface du fait d’important processus d’érosion. Dans ce contexte, les comportements humains et les réponses aux environnements namibiens au cours du Pléistocène moyen restent obscurs. À la fin des années 1970, les prospections entreprises par Myra Shackley dans le désert de dunes du Namib central ont mis au jour des restes lithiques associés à des os fossilisés fragmentés d’antilopes, d’éléphants, de zèbres et de buffles sur les bords d’un paléo-lac à Namib IV. Le site a alors été interprété comme un site de boucherie acheuléen. Les datations radiométriques suggèrent un âge de ~347 ka alors que la biochronologie suggèrent une faune de la Mid-Pleistocene Transition (1–0,5 Ma) ; ce qui ferait de Namib IV la plus ancienne preuve de présence humaine dans l’actuel désert côtier du Namib. Malgré les données chronologiques et paléoenvironnementales existantes, le matériel lithique n’a pas été étudié. Nous avons donc appliqué une approche qualitative techno-morpho-structurelle aux outils en pierre et essayé de reconstruire les chaînes opératoires de production. Nos résultats plaident pour une économie importante de la matière première, la fragmentation spatiale de la production lithique et une homogénéité importante de l’assemblage malgré quelques éléments techno-typologiques potentiellement intrusifs. In fine, nous interrogeons la cohérence entre la nature de l’assemblage lithique et la fonction présumée d’aire de boucherie du site de Namib IV.
... For earlier sites, there is a real challenge in correlating the timing of the archaeological record with the stages of hominin evolution leading up to the emergence of modern humans. In southern Africa, the immediate challenge is to establish the chronology of the Fauresmith industry, which represents the local transition between the Earlier Stone Age and the Middle Stone Age (Chazan, 2015a, see Herries, 2011Underhill, 2011 for critical discussion of the Fauresmith). At Kathu Pan 1, the Fauresmith Stratum 4a is dated by OSL of quartz to 464 ± 47 ka and by U-series/ESR of tooth enamel to 542 + 140/-107 ka (Porat et al., 2010). ...
The transition from the Earlier Stone Age (ESA) to the Middle Stone Age (MSA) in the interior of southern Africa is associated with the Fauresmith Industry. Major cultural developments found in the Fauresmith include regular use of ochre and other coloured minerals, prepared core technology including blade and point production, and the use of hafted spears. Chronological control for the Fauresmith is weak so that critical questions regarding the relationship of this industry to the evolution of modern humans remain unresolved. Here we present ages for the Bestwood 1 site, an open-air locality in the Northern Cape Province (South Africa) where an extensive Fauresmith occupation is found underlying sand deposits.Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) was first applied to samples from the sands overlying the Bestwood 1 occupation horizon, and from the occupation horizon itself, in order to establish the chronology of the site. However, sediment mixing resulting from bioturbation processes has been observed, causing post-depositional bleaching of the majority of the grains, thus limiting the use of OSL. In addition, given the identification of the lithic assemblage to the Fauresmith, it seems likely that the sands were beyond the dating range of conventional OSL. Due to its hard-to-bleach properties, the thermally transferred-optically stimulated luminescence (TT-OSL) signal was deemed suitable for detecting the least-bleached grains.Single grain TT-OSL analyses combined with the finite mixture model (FMM) were conducted in order to isolate the oldest grains that could be contemporaneous with the time of deposition of the sediment associated with the ESA assemblage. High scattering of the equivalent doses is consistent with bioturbation processes that mixed sediment; the distribution of the equivalent dose values suggests that younger grains were incorporated into the ESA layers, thus supporting the use of the oldest component determined using the FMM to calculate the TT-OSL ages. This approach allowed us to establish the time for the Fauresmith occupation at 366 ± 32 ka, and the age of the overlying sand deposits, spanning from 350 ± 22 ka to 226 ± 13 ka.
The area of the escarpment of Angola between Namib and Huíla Province, about 150 km from the Atlantic coast, yields abundant evidence for human activity throughout the Stone Age. There is a high concentration of open-air sites with stone tools classified as Early (ESA) and Middle Stone Age (MSA) by past explorers. At the top of the plateau, the Chela group rocks and particularly the Leba dolomites yield a series of caves and fissures infilled with deposits ranging from the Early Pleistocene to recent times. Considering, the background information, a new project was developed to establish new proxies, we set out to revise this cultural landscape and set the stage for archaeological testing of Stone Age sites. In 2018–2019, our survey documented 45 sites including caves, rock shelters, and open-air locations with evidence of fossil and cultural deposits, including Middle and Later Stone Age (LSA) stone artifacts, faunal remains, pottery, and human burials. A complete map of distribution of caves and their underground topography is presented. Active and fossil speleothems, important for paleoclimatic reconstructions and absolute dating, were found at the caves of Malola and Tchivinguiro. Fossil occurrences were relocated at Tchíua and Cangalongue. Our study shows there is intense recent activity, historical remains, and the use of at least of three caves as burial sites of past herding populations living at the Humpata plateau. Our field assessment shows there is potential to pursue several lines of evidence to reconstruct past human lifeways and environments in this region.
Renewed research at Amanzi Springs has increased resolution on the timing and technology of the Acheulian industry in South Africa. The archeology from the Area 1 spring eye has recently been dated to MIS 11 (~404-390 ka), and analyses revealed significant technological variability when compared to other southern African Acheulian assemblages. We expand on these results in presenting new lumi-nescence dating and technological analyses of Acheulian stone tools from three artifact-bearing surfaces exposed within the White Sands unit of the Deep Sounding excavation in the Area 2 spring eye. The two lowest surfaces (Surfaces 3 and 2) are sealed within the White Sands and dated between~534 to 496 ka and~496 to 481 ka (MIS 13), respectively. Surface 1 represents materials deflated onto an erosional surface that cut the upper part of the White Sands (~481 ka; late MIS 13), which occurred before the deposition of younger Cutting 5 sediments (<408e<290 ka; MIS 11e8). Archaeological comparisons reveal that the older Surface 3 and 2 assemblages are predominated by unifacial and bifacial core reduction and relatively thick, cobble-reduced large cutting tools. In contrast, the younger Surface 1 assemblage is characterized by discoidal core reduction and thinner large cutting tools, mostly made from flake blanks. Typological similarities between the older Area 2 White Sands and younger Area 1 (404-390 ka; MIS 11) assemblages further suggest long-term continuity in site function. We hypothesize Amanzi Springs represent a workshop locality that Acheulian hominins repeatedly visited to access unique floral, faunal, and raw material resources from at least~534 to 390 ka.
Amanzi Springs is a series of inactive thermal springs located near Kariega in the Eastern Cape of South Africa. Excavations in the 1960s exposed rare, stratified Acheulian-bearing deposits that were not further investigated over the next 50 years. Reanalysis of the site and its legacy collection has led to a redefined stratigraphic context for the archaeology, a confirmed direct association between Acheulian artefacts and wood, as well as the first reliable age estimates for the site. Thermally transferred optically stimulated luminescence and post-infrared infrared stimulated luminescence dating indicates that the Acheulian deposits from the Amanzi Springs Area 1 spring eye formed during Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 11 at ~ 404–390 ka. At this time, higher sea levels of ~13-14m would have placed Amanzi Springs around 7 km from a ria that would have formed along what is today the Swartkops River, and which likely led to spring reactivation. This makes the Amanzi Springs Area 1 assemblage an unusual occurrence of a verified late occurring, seaward, open-air Acheulian occupation. The Acheulian levels do not contain any Middle Stone Age (MSA) elements such as blades and points that have been documented in the interior of South Africa at this time. However, a small number of stone tools from the upper layers of the artefact zone, and originally thought of as intrusive, have been dated to ~190 ka, at the transition between MIS 7 to 6, and represent the first potential MSA identified at the site.
The Middle Stone Age (MSA) of southern Africa provides crucial insight on early Homo sapiens behavioral evolution. Archaeologists have traditionally presented lithic assemblage variability as a sequence of discrete Named Stone Tool Industries (“NASTIES”, Shea, 2014, Quaternary International) or techno-complexes. Many have highlighted the issues associated with the archaeological systematics of this time period in southern Africa and beyond, yet the original framework continues to persist. This paper presents two case studies from the Late Pleistocene that further problematize the usefulness of NASTIES. First, the Pinnacle Point complex of sites show that significant landscape-scale variability between coeval lithic assemblages defies the traditional classification system. Second, investigating the relationship between technological and environmental change has led to conflicting results that cannot be resolved when NASTIES are the units of analysis. While lithic data are key for understanding early Homo sapiens behavioral evolution, NASTIES are not the best tools for doing so.
Artifact occurrences that can be integrated within the Acheulian Industrial Complex were recognized and described from Southern Africa towards the end of the last century. It was appreciated on geomorphological grounds even at that time that these Acheulian occurrences are of high antiquity despite the fact that they are frequently exposed at or near the present day surface. The earliest relatively dated artifact occurrences are known from the Australopithecine breccia sites of Sterkfontein and Swartkrans although there is the strong possibility that artifact occurrences of like or greater age exist elsewhere, as for example in the Vaal River basin. The Sterkfontein and Swartkrans occurrences have been variously described as Developed Oldowan and as Acheulian, but indicate an age in excess of 1 million years for the appearance of a stone tool manufacturing tradition in Southern Africa. At the other end of the time scale, the Acheulian is defined in terms of the consistent manufacture of bifaces. It persisted until some 100,000 years ago when replaced by a complex of the flake industries, some occurrences of which can be related to marine deposits of last interglacial age. The primary focus of initial Acheulian studies was on discerning evolutionary time trends in biface manufacture. Many of the sites studied were occurrences in geological context which perforce have proved limited in allowing discussion of content and inter-assemblage variability. Recently, more occurrences have been excavated in a primary or semiprimary context and make it possible to begin to discuss some aspects of the demography, subsistence, and behavior of the Acheulian populations through the Middle Pleistocene in Southern Africa. A limiting factor, however, is still the paucity of occurrences with preserved faunas or floras in association with artifactual materials. The Pleistocene faunas of southern Africa are known in general terms only and primarily indicate long-term environmental stability. Indeed as a stable, large geographical area presenting a mosaic of suitable habitats for Acheulian populations, southern Africa may have been an important population center in the Middle Pleistocene.
This volume represents a report of excavation conducted at the site of Canteen Koppie, Barkly West, Northern Cape, South Africa. It is a straight site report describing how the work was conducted and an analysis of the lithic assemblages recovered. This report describes the lithic assemblages associated with the sedimentological column for the Canteen Koppie site. The assemblages represent the first controlled excavations in this world famous locality
Africa has the longest record - some 2.5 million years - of human occupation of any continent. For nearly all of this time, its inhabitants have made tools from stone and have acquired their food from its rich wild plant and animal resources. Archaeological research in Africa is crucial for understanding the origins of humans and the diversity of hunter-gatherer ways of life. This book provides an up-to-date, comprehensive synthesis of the record left by Africa’s earliest hominin inhabitants and hunter-gatherers. It combines the insights of archaeology with those of other disciplines, such as genetics and palaeoenvironmental science. African evidence is critical to important debates, such as the origins of stone toolmaking, the emergence of recognisably modern forms of cognition and behaviour, and the expansion of successive hominins from Africa to other parts of the world. Africa’s enormous ecological diversity and exceptionally long history also provide an unparalleled opportunity to examine the impact of environment change on human populations. African foragers have also long been viewed as archetypes of the hunter-gatherer way of life, a view that is debated in this volume. Also examined is their relevance for understanding the development and spread of food production and the social and ideological significance of the rock art that many of them have produced.