People chose the coast during the big chill [View all]

25 November 2020/Cosmos

Evidence found of persistent occupation in South Africa.



Excavations at Waterfall Bluff on South Africa’s southeast coast. Credit: Erich Fisher

Excavations on South Africa’s southeast coast have uncovered evidence of persistent human occupations from the end of the last Ice Age 35,000 years ago.

Importantly, the scientists say, this includes the period of the Last Glacial Maximum, which lasted from 26,000 to 19,000 years ago, highlighting the complex transitions that were necessary to survive wide climate and environmental fluctuations.

Archaeological records from this globally cold and dry time are rare in southern Africa because of widespread movement as people abandoned increasingly inhospitable regions.

However, researchers involved with the Mpondoland Palaeoclimate, Palaeoenvironment, Palaeoecology, and Palaeoanthropology Project (P5) suspected that places with narrow continental shelves may preserve records of glacial coastal occupation and foraging.

Mpondoland (also known as Pondoland) includes a remote and largely unstudied section of South Africa’s “Wild Coast”. Here a part of the continental shelf is only 10 kilometres wide.

More:
https://cosmosmagazine.com/history/archaeology/people-chose-the-coast-during-the-big-chill/