Early humans in the Kalahari were as innovative as their coastal neighbours
Picture: The archaeological website at a rock shelter in South Africa’s Kalahari Desert: Much more than 100,000 decades in the past, folks applied the so-identified as Ga-Mohana Hill North Rockshelter for religious functions….
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Credit: Jayne Wilkins
“Our conclusions from this rockshelter clearly show that overly simplified versions for the origins of our species are no longer acceptable. Proof implies many regions across the African continent were involved, the Kalahari becoming just one particular,” Dr Wilkins claimed.
“Archaeological evidence for early Homo sapiens has been mainly found at coastal web pages in South Africa, supporting the strategy that our origins ended up joined to coastal environments. There have been really several nicely-preserved, datable archaeological web-sites in the inside of southern Africa that can inform us about Homo sapiens’ origins away from the coastline.
“A rockshelter on Ga-Mohana Hill that stands earlier mentioned an expansive savannah in the Kalahari is just one such website.”
Used as a place of religious actions currently by some of the local local community, archaeological analysis in the rockshelter has revealed a very long heritage as a put of religious importance.
The scientists excavated 22 white calcite crystals and fragments of ostrich eggshell, believed be applied as h2o containers, from deposits dated to 105,000 years back at Ga-Mohana Hill North Rockshelter when the ecosystem was much wetter than currently. The scientists ended up delighted to find that the assemblage of human-gathered crystals and ostrich eggshell fragments at Ga-Mohana Hill ended up considerably more mature than that reported in interior environments elsewhere.
“Our evaluation indicates that the crystals ended up not released into the deposits by means of natural procedures, but have been deliberately gathered objects likely joined to spiritual beliefs and ritual,” Dr Wilkins stated.
“The crystals issue in the direction of religious or cultural use of the shelter 105,000 a long time back,” mentioned Dr Sechaba Maape from the University of the Witwatersrand. “This is outstanding thinking of that web-site proceeds to be applied to follow ritual functions today.”
The age of the archaeological layers was constrained by way of Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) dating in the OSL laboratory at the Department of Geology at the College Innsbruck, Austria.
“This technique measures normal gentle alerts that accumulate above time in sedimentary quartz and feldspar grains,” said Dr Michael Meyer, head of the OSL Laboratory. “You can imagine about every grain as a miniaturised clock, from which we can examine out this pure light-weight or luminescence sign, supplying us the age of the archaeological sediment layers.”
The name Kalahari is derived from the Tswana word Kgala, indicating ‘great thirst’. And today the climate at Ga-Mohana is semi-arid, with minimal, incredibly seasonal rainfall. Even so, historic evidence of plentiful h2o on the landscape is evident from the considerable tufa formations all over the shelter. These ended up aged using the uranium-thorium relationship technique to concerning 110,000 and 100,000 many years ago – precisely the similar time period as the people were being living there.
“This is a story of h2o in what we know now as a dry landscape, and of adaptable people today who exploited the landscape to not only endure but to prosper,” claims Dr Robyn Pickering, who is director of the Human Evolution Investigation Institute (HERI) at the College of Cape City.
Due to the ongoing non secular significance of Ga-Mohana Hill, the researchers are acutely aware to minimise their impression on the area communities’ use of the rockshelter after each time.
“Leaving no visible trace and working with the nearby group is significant for the sustainability of the project,” Dr Wilkins stated. “So that Ga-Mohana Hill can continue on to provide new insights about the origins and evolution of Homo sapiens in the Kalahari.”
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Inbound links:
Dr Jayne Wilkins: https:/
Griffith University’s Australian Study Centre for Human Evolution: https:/
OSL Laboratory at the Division of Geology, College of Innsbruck, Austria: https:/
Human Evolution Research Institute (HERI) at the College of Cape Town: https:/
Speak to: 
Jayne Wilkins
Griffith University 
Australian Study Centre for Human Evolution
[email protected]
+61 07 3735 4072
Robyn Pickering
College of Cape Town
Human Evolution Analysis Institute (HERI)
[email protected]
Michael Meyer
College of Innsbruck
Division of Geology
+43 512 507 54340
+43 680 2470679
E-Mail: [email protected]
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