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Mercader J, Belev G, Bushozi P, Clarke S, Favreau J, Itambu M, Jianfeng Z, Koromo S, Larter F, Lee P, Maley J, Fernández-Marchena JL, Mohamed A, Mwambwiga A, Ngisaruni B, Kingi M, Olesilau L, Patalano R, Pedergnana A, Sammynaiken R, Siljedal J, Soto M, Tucker L, Walde D, Ollé A. Microbotanical residues for the study of early hominin tools. Sci Rep 2022; 12:2951. [PMID: 35194092 PMCID: PMC8863820 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-06959-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/08/2021] [Accepted: 02/08/2022] [Indexed: 12/02/2022] Open
Abstract
More than 2 million years ago in East Africa, the earliest hominin stone tools evolved amidst changes in resource base, with pounding technology playing a key role in this adaptive process. Olduvai Gorge (now Oldupai) is a famed locality that remains paramount for the study of human evolution, also yielding some of the oldest battering tools in the world. However, direct evidence of the resources processed with these technologies is lacking entirely. One way to obtain this evidence is through the analysis of surviving residues. Yet, linking residues with past processing activities is not simple. In the case of plant exploitation, this link can only be established by assessing site-based reference collections inclusive of both anthropogenic and natural residues as a necessary first step and comparative starting point. In this paper, we assess microbotanical remains from rock clasts sourced at the same quarry utilized by Oldowan hominins at Oldupai Gorge. We mapped this signal and analysed it quantitatively to classify its spatial distribution objectively, extracting proxies for taxonomic identification and further comparison with freestanding soils. In addition, we used blanks to manufacture pounding tools for blind, controlled replication of plant processing. We discovered that stone blanks are in fact environmental reservoirs in which plant remains are trapped by lithobionts, preserved as hardened accretions. Tool use, on the other hand, creates residue clusters; however, their spatial distribution can be discriminated from purely natural assemblages by the georeferencing of residues and statistical analysis of resulting patterns. To conclude, we provide a protocol for best practice and a workflow that has the advantage of overcoming environmental noise, reducing the risk of false positive, delivering a firm understanding of residues as polygenic mixtures, a reliable use of controls, and most importantly, a stronger link between microbotanical remains and stone tool use.
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Affiliation(s)
- Julio Mercader
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4, Canada. .,Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social (IPHES-CERCA), Zona Educacional 4, Campus Sescelades URV (Edifici W3), 43007, Tarragona, Spain. .,Department of Geoscience, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4, Canada. .,Department of Archaeology, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745, Jena, Germany.
| | - George Belev
- Saskatchewan Structural Sciences Centre, Rm. G81 Thorvaldson Building 110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
| | - Pastory Bushozi
- Department of Archaeology and Heritage Studies, University of Dar Es Salaam, PO Box 35091, Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania
| | - Siobhán Clarke
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4, Canada
| | - Julien Favreau
- Department of Anthropology, McMaster University, 100 Main St W, Hamilton, ON, L8P 1H6, Canada
| | - Makarius Itambu
- Department of Archaeology, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745, Jena, Germany.,Department of Archaeology and Heritage Studies, University of Dar Es Salaam, PO Box 35091, Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania
| | - Zhu Jianfeng
- Saskatchewan Structural Sciences Centre, Rm. G81 Thorvaldson Building 110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
| | - Samson Koromo
- Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Iringa, P.O Box 200, Iringa, Tanzania
| | - Fergus Larter
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4, Canada
| | - Patrick Lee
- Department of Anthropology, University of Toronto, 27 King's College Circle, Toronto, ON, M5S 1A1, Canada
| | - Jason Maley
- Saskatchewan Structural Sciences Centre, Rm. G81 Thorvaldson Building 110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
| | - Juan Luis Fernández-Marchena
- Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social (IPHES-CERCA), Zona Educacional 4, Campus Sescelades URV (Edifici W3), 43007, Tarragona, Spain.,Seminari d'Estudis i Recerques Prehistòriques, Secció de Prehistòria i Arqueologia, Departament d'Història i Arqueologia, Facultat de Geografia i Història, Universitat de Barcelona, c/Montalegre 6-8, 08001, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Abdallah Mohamed
- Department of Archaeology and Heritage Studies, University of Dar Es Salaam, PO Box 35091, Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania
| | - Aloyce Mwambwiga
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4, Canada.,Natural History Museum, PO Box 2160, Arusha, Tanzania
| | - Benja Ngisaruni
- Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority, Ngorongoro, P.O. Box 1, Arusha, Tanzania
| | - Meshack Kingi
- Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority, Ngorongoro, P.O. Box 1, Arusha, Tanzania
| | - Lucas Olesilau
- Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Iringa, P.O Box 200, Iringa, Tanzania
| | - Robert Patalano
- Department of Archaeology, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745, Jena, Germany
| | - Antonella Pedergnana
- Institute of Evolutionary Medicine, University of Zurich, Winterthurerstrasse 190, 8057, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Ramaswami Sammynaiken
- Saskatchewan Structural Sciences Centre, Rm. G81 Thorvaldson Building 110 Science Place, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 5C9, Canada
| | - Joakim Siljedal
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4, Canada
| | - María Soto
- Madrid Institute for Advanced Study (MIAS), Casa de Velázquez, Calle de Paul Guinard, 3, 28040, Madrid, Spain. .,Departamento de Prehistoria y Arqueología, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaria de Cantoblanco, 28049, Madrid, Spain.
| | - Laura Tucker
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4, Canada
| | - Dale Walde
- Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4, Canada
| | - Andreu Ollé
- Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social (IPHES-CERCA), Zona Educacional 4, Campus Sescelades URV (Edifici W3), 43007, Tarragona, Spain. .,Departament d'Història i Història de l'Art, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Avinguda de Catalunya 35, 43002, Tarragona, Spain.
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Mercader J, Akuku P, Boivin N, Bugumba R, Bushozi P, Camacho A, Carter T, Clarke S, Cueva-Temprana A, Durkin P, Favreau J, Fella K, Haberle S, Hubbard S, Inwood J, Itambu M, Koromo S, Lee P, Mohammed A, Mwambwiga A, Olesilau L, Patalano R, Roberts P, Rule S, Saladie P, Siljedal G, Soto M, Umbsaar J, Petraglia M. Earliest Olduvai hominins exploited unstable environments ~ 2 million years ago. Nat Commun 2021; 12:3. [PMID: 33414467 PMCID: PMC7791053 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-20176-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/27/2020] [Accepted: 11/12/2020] [Indexed: 01/29/2023] Open
Abstract
Rapid environmental change is a catalyst for human evolution, driving dietary innovations, habitat diversification, and dispersal. However, there is a dearth of information to assess hominin adaptions to changing physiography during key evolutionary stages such as the early Pleistocene. Here we report a multiproxy dataset from Ewass Oldupa, in the Western Plio-Pleistocene rift basin of Olduvai Gorge (now Oldupai), Tanzania, to address this lacuna and offer an ecological perspective on human adaptability two million years ago. Oldupai's earliest hominins sequentially inhabited the floodplains of sinuous channels, then river-influenced contexts, which now comprises the oldest palaeolake setting documented regionally. Early Oldowan tools reveal a homogenous technology to utilise diverse, rapidly changing environments that ranged from fern meadows to woodland mosaics, naturally burned landscapes, to lakeside woodland/palm groves as well as hyper-xeric steppes. Hominins periodically used emerging landscapes and disturbance biomes multiple times over 235,000 years, thus predating by more than 180,000 years the earliest known hominins and Oldowan industries from the Eastern side of the basin.
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Affiliation(s)
- Julio Mercader
- University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany.
| | - Pam Akuku
- Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social (IPHES), Tarragona, Spain
- Àrea de Prehistòria, Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV), Tarragona, Spain
| | - Nicole Boivin
- University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
- School of Social Science, University of Queensland, Saint Lucia, QLD, Australia
- National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | - Paul Durkin
- University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
| | | | - Kelvin Fella
- University of Dar es Salaam, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
| | - Simon Haberle
- Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
| | | | | | | | | | - Patrick Lee
- University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
| | | | - Aloyce Mwambwiga
- University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada
- National Natural History Museum, Arusha, Tanzania
| | | | - Robert Patalano
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
| | - Patrick Roberts
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
- School of Social Science, University of Queensland, Saint Lucia, QLD, Australia
| | - Susan Rule
- Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia
| | - Palmira Saladie
- Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social (IPHES), Tarragona, Spain
- Àrea de Prehistòria, Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV), Tarragona, Spain
| | | | - María Soto
- Madrid Institute for Advanced Study, Madrid, Spain.
- Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain.
| | | | - Michael Petraglia
- Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
- School of Social Science, University of Queensland, Saint Lucia, QLD, Australia
- National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA
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