Bone tool

Abstract: Three archaeological sites at Katanda on the Upper Semliki River in the Western Rift Valley of Zaire have provided evidence for a well-developed bone industry in a Middle Stone Age context. Artifacts include both barbed and unbarbed points as well as a daggerlike object. Dating by both direct and indirect means indicate an age of approximately 90,000 years or older. Together with abundant fish (primarily catfish) remains, the bone technology indicates that a complex subsistence specialization had developed in Africa by this time. The level of behavioral competence required is consistent with that of upper Paleolithic Homo sapiens sapiens. These data support an African origin of behaviorally as well as biologically modern humans.

Abstract: Previous studies have suggested that modified bones from the Lower Paleolithic sites of Swartkrans and Sterkfontein in South Africa represent the oldest known bone tools and that they were used by Australopithecus robustus to dig up tubers. Macroscopic and microscopic analysis of the wear patterns on the purported bone tools, pseudo bone tools produced naturally by known taphonomic processes, and experimentally used bone tools confirm the anthropic origin of the modifications. However, our analysis suggests that these tools were used to dig into termite mounds, rather than to dig for tubers. This result indicates that early hominids from southern Africa maintained a behavioral pattern involving a bone tool material culture that may have persisted for a long period and strongly supports the role of insectivory in the early hominid diet.