Thinking strings: additional evidence for personal ornament use in the Middle Stone Age at Blombos Cave, South Africa.

Earliest evidence of personal ornaments associated with burial: the Conus shells from Border Cave

A comprehensive characterization of the neurobiological underpinnings of artistic activities and aesthetic experience will require understanding of their evolution. Evolutionary approaches to these phenomena have thus far lacked adequate conceptual, archaeological, and neurobiological grounding. Here, after the necessary conceptual clarifications, we review the basic archaeological and neurobiological evidence that should be accounted for by any hypothesis about the evolution of visual art and aesthetic appreciation. We end by arguing that, in order to overcome the limitations of prior interdisciplinary attempts, such scenarios should take the form of gradual and mosaic coevolutionary processes.

An evolutionary approach to art and aesthetic experience.

Colour plays an eminent role in beadwork. Colour modifications are reported on early shell beads from Middle Stone Age sites. However, identifying the colouring agent and demonstrating the intentional nature of the colouring process is not straightforward. Here, we provide analytical data on colour and structural modifications observed on Nassarius kraussianus (Nk) collected in modern thanatocoenoses and on shells of the same species experimentally heated in oxidizing and reductive atmospheres. Comparison with Nk shell beads from the 72 ka old Middle Stone Age levels of Blombos Cave, South Africa, and contextual analysis of other malacological remains from the same levels that were not used as ornaments identify the mechanisms responsible for the change of colour in modern Nk thanatocoenoses and heated shells, and show that although some Nk shell beads were heated, intentional heat treatment of shell beads is not demonstrated.

Assessing the Accidental Versus Deliberate Colour Modification of Shell Beads: a Case Study on Perforated Nassarius kraussianus from Blombos Cave Middle Stone Age levels

North Africa features some of the earliest manifestations of the Middle Stone Age (MSA) and fossils of our species, Homo sapiens, as well as early examples of complex culture and the long distance transfer of exotic raw materials. As they are elsewhere, lithics (i.e., stone tools) present by far the most abundant source of information on this cultural period. Given the importance of North Africa in human origins, understanding the character and distribution of MSA lithics is therefore crucial, as they shed light on early human behaviour and culture. However, the lithics of the North African MSA are poorly understood, and their technological variability is frequently obfuscated by regionally specific nomenclatures, often repeated without criticism, and diverse methods of analysis that are often incompatible. Characterising dynamic technological innovations as well as apparent technological stasis remains challenging, and many narratives have not been tested quantitatively. This significantly problematizes hypotheses of human evolution and dispersals invoking these data that extend beyond North Africa. This paper therefore presents a description of the lithics of the North African MSA, including their technological characteristics, chronology, spatial distribution and associated research traditions. A range of interpretations concerning early H. sapiens demography in North Africa are then re-evaluated in the light of this review, and the role and power of lithic data to contribute to such debates is critically assessed.

Lithics of the North African Middle Stone Age: assumptions, evidence and future directions.

ANTHROPOLOGY Correction for Additional evidence on the use of personal ornaments in the Middle Paleolithic of North Africa, by

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ANTHROPOLOGY Correction for Additional evidence on the use of personal ornaments in the Middle Paleolithic of North Africa, by