Re: Eritrean stone tools push back dates of earliest use of marine resources
- From: Lee Olsen <paleocity@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 12 Aug 2007 20:41:06 -0700
On Aug 12, 1:58 pm, nickname <alas_my_lo...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Aug 11, 5:01 pm, nickname <alas_my_lo...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:> On Aug 11, 4:39 pm, Lee Olsen <paleoc...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Aug 8, 9:52 pm, nickname <alas_my_lo...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Aug 8, 11:15 am, arclein <arcl...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Jul 11, 2:14 pm, Lee Olsen <paleoc...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
http://www.utexas.edu/opa/pubs/oncampus/00oc_issues/oc000626/oc_eritr...
An international research team, including two geologists from UT
Austin, has unearthed ancient stone tools from an unusual geological
setting in Africa that may contribute to solving the mystery of the
geographic origins and adaptations of modern humans. The findings push
back by 10,000 years the date for earliest evidence of human
consumption of shellfish, marking the onset of a new type of feeding
strategy in human evolution.
The tools were found within a fossil reef terrace on the Red Sea coast
of Eritrea. They suggest that early humans were adapted to coastal
marine environments and ate seafood, including clams, crabs, scallops
and oysters, as early as 125,000 years ago. Eritrea is located north
of Ethiopia and southeast of the Sudan. The findings were published in
the May 4 issue of the journal Nature.
Dr. Richard T. Buffler, a professor of geological sciences and senior
research scientist at the UT Austin Institute for Geophysics, and
Berhane Negassi Ghebretensae, a UT Austin graduate student from
Eritrea, participated in the project. The project was headed by Dr.
Robert C. Walter, a geologist and geochronologist with Mexico's Centro
de Investigacion Cientifica y Educacion Superior de Ensenada in Baja
California. The research team includes scientists from Eritrea, the
U.S., Mexico, the Netherlands, France and Canada.
The Paleolithic hand axes and obsidian flakes and blades were
discovered in a fossil reef terrace near the Eritrean village of Abdur
on the Gulf of Zula. The reef terrace is about ten kilometers long and
about six to fourteen meters above current sea level.
"This is the oldest documentation in the world of the utilization of
marine resources - clams, crabs and oysters - which are found in this
reef along with the stone tools," Buffler said. "The use of marine
seafoods as a food source indicates a new behavior for early humans."
"We would like to call this the 'first oyster bar,'" said Walter.
"Abdur is an important site, not just because it is the earliest
evidence for coastal marine occupation to date, but because it opens
up the entire coast of Africa as a whole new realm of exploration for
early human archaeology and paleontology."
Buffler said the discovery "adds credence to the idea that early Homo
sapiens originated in Africa, and migrated from there to Europe and
Asia."
The geographic origin of modern humans is a subject of intense debate.
One school of thought contends that modern humans evolved semi-
independently in Europe, Asia and Africa between 100,000 and 40,000
years ago. Another holds that modern humans evolved in Africa between
200,000 and 100,000 years ago, migrating to Eurasia at a later period.
Direct paleontological, archaeological and biological evidence is
required to resolve the conflict. The importance of finding ancient
tools in Eritrea is that it favors an "out of Africa" migration.
"It is right on the potential migration route of modern humans out of
Africa into Europe, Central Asia and over into Far Eastern Asia,"
Buffler said.
The age of the stone tools found embedded in the rock was based on
dating the fossil corals close to the tools by uranium-thorium mass
spectrometric techniques to 125,000 years ago. The oldest previously
known coastal site, the Klasies River mouth in South Africa, is
estimated to be 115,000 years old, some 10,000 years later than the
Abdur site. Rare occurrences of bifacial handaxes have been found on
the surface of Pleistocene marine terraces from the Danakil Rift
Valley of Eritrea and the Egyptian coast of the Red Sea. But they were
not found in geological context, meaning direct estimates of their age
were not possible.
"Nowhere else have stone tools been reported to be in a reef rock
itself. So we know that the ancient people at Abdur were there on the
reef and dropped these tools where they harvested their food. And the
tools then became part of the geological record," Buffler said.
Buffler said the team of researchers was traveling to another field
area in the winter of 1997 when the group stopped near the reef. "We
camped overnight and in the morning we started looking around and
discovered the paleolithic tools in the reef," Buffler said. The team,
led by Walter and partly funded with a National Science Foundation
grant, returned to study the area in more detail in January and
February of 1999.
I find this interpretation rather difficult. Firstly, the material is
essentially at sea level. The current level is only around 10,000
years of age and relates to the disappearance of the northern Ice age
11,000 years ago.
Secondly, exposure to natural weathering means that there has been
persuasive remobilization of the calcium carbonate.
And conforming geological movement is a low probability event.
In short I am a little skeptical.
Arclein
http://globalwarming-arclein.blogspot.com
As I understand it, the hand tools were within a fossil coral reef
matrix
"the stone tools found embedded in the rock"
Yes, that is what the article said. Do you think we need you, a person
who has a problem with reading, to paraphrase for us?
which was tectonically uplifted at some time in the past.
"about six to fourteen meters above current sea level."
I can't comment on the technology used to determine the dates.
I would not be surprised with dates from any period, from 3+ million
years ago to 50 years ago.
If you can't comment on their dating tech., why did you make the
comment on dates?
People still use stone tools for various
purposes.
Specifically the article said:
"Paleolithic hand axes and obsidian flakes and blades..."
Why do you feel you need to water-down specifically named tools and
replace them with a generalised statement "stone tools" in its place?
Is it because you want to drag science down to your level of
expertise, ie, imagination?
It's certainly nice to see those clearly crafted tools in
the reef, no doubt others will be found when people start looking.
They already have been looking:
"Rare occurrences of bifacial handaxes have been found on
the surface of Pleistocene marine terraces from the Danakil Rift
Valley of Eritrea and the Egyptian coast of the Red Sea."
It will certainly be nice when you and Marc start looking for an
English class.
Must be a slow day...
Yes:
DD, how can a smart person like you say such a stupid thing like
this:
Association of extant arboreal Pan, tree hollow, spear thrusting prey
Association of early Homo, hollow log dugout, spear thrusting prey
Some chimps use thrusting spears to hunt bushbabies in hollow trees.
This is arboreal, not savanna (bushbabies don't live in trees
surrounded by grass), they sharpen the spears with their teeth. Some
Suaq swamp orangs use very small spears to get the neesia oilseeds
from the spiny neesia fruit, they manipulate the spear with their
mouth, not their hands. This is done arboreally, not on the ground,
not on savanna. Some Ndoki swamp gorillas have been seen crossing
water with wading sticks. I think savanna baboons never use sticks as
weapons or tools.
Great apes & most likely extinct hominids & humans manufacture/d
thrusting spears/push-poles/wading sticks of some form. unlike other
known anthropoids.
Mario: Actually, the presence of sharp sticks is very common in
nature, and you don't have to invent anything. A lot of animals have
sharp antlers on their heads. Baboons have two sharp spears in their
mouth. -- Mario Petrinovich
DD: Sharp fangs and horns require close contact, spears allow further
distance.
horn->thrust-spear->throw-spear->atlatl-spear->arrow->bullet->rocket
each one allows safer distance while retaining accuracy.
A dugout canoe vehicle has a wood hull that partly conceals and
provides a spearing/throwing platform, made of solid cellulose fibers
nearly impenetrable to teeth of hippos, cats, crocs.
Spearing fish or animals from a dug out canoe is relatively safe, so I
think that push-pole spears were used very effectively, one person
(wife) push-poling the boat, the other stabbing the prey/predator
(husband) and also steering & push-poling at times. Piles of pebbles
in the bottom (heavy ballast to prevent tipping over) allowed fast
throwing with reasonable accuracy, so there was no need for large
groups of Homo for protection at all times (which had been necessary
during the previous swimming-diving-wading-beachcombing period), this
allowed expansion inland and thus slowly began inland shore trade for
sea nutrients (salt, sun-shore-dried fish & shellfish).
Seems that the swimming-diving and dugout development co-occurred for
a lengthy period.
Dugongs are arrowed by Andaman people from dugouts.
Whales trapped during their birthing time in bays/lagoons could have
been targets for dugout users, as they were for whaling vessels in
Baja Calif.
Please review your posts before submitting them. It's painful to your
interested readers otherwise, since it negates your other irrelevant
info.
DD
.
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