From the Mediterranean basin to the Portuguese Atlantic shore: Papers in Honor of Anthony Marks Actas do IV Congresso de Arqueologia

a Peninsular

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The Role of the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt in the Modern Human Expansion

The Role of the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt in the Modern Human Expansion
Jeffrey I. Rose
Southern Methodist University Dallas, TX, USA

ABSTRACT Some new lithic assemblages from Northeast Africa and South Arabia appear Upper Pleistocene and related to sub-Saharan Africa based on techno-typological characteristics. These assemblages all contain thin bifacial foliates and exhibit a mix of faonnage , discoidal, and Levallois reduction. It is argued that these sites are intrusive from East Africa, showing affinities to Middle Stone Age industries there. If there was an East African MSA techno-complex extended northward and eastward into the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt, this may provide direct archaeological evidence for an early human expansion out of sub-Saharan Africa sometime during OIS 5 or OIS 3. KEYWORDS Arabian Peninsula; Northeast Africa; Lower Paleolithic; Modern Humans

INTRODUCTION J. Desmond Clark argued that palaeoenvironmental conditions in the Sahara oscillating between ameliorated savannas and desiccated deserts acted as a pump in disseminating populations to and from sub-Saharan Africa throughout the Pleistocene (Clark, 1989). This idea is particularly intriguing in light of recent MtDNA and Y-Chromosome genetic data that suggest all modern humans are derived from an ancestral population in sub-Saharan Africa dating to the Penultimate Glaciation (~200,000-128,000 BP). It is posited early human groups subsequently expanded out of sub-Saharan Africa in one or more bottleneck release(s) that occurred around 128,000 and 60,000 BP, durat the onset of OIs 5 and/ or OIS 3 (Ambrose, 2003). These expansions correlate with these wet-phases that transformed the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt into wooded and open savannas dotted by playa lakes and perennial streams, an environment that housed significantly increased biomass. In this sense, the Arid Belt served as a physical cork sealing early human populations within sub-Saharan Africa, a cork that blocked human movement through the Sahara and Arabia during hyperarid periods, and facilitated their expansion during pluvials. It is reasonable to assume that if any population expanded from East Africa into Northeast Africa and/or Arabia during a wet-phase, they would have brought with them lithic technology from whence they came. To date, however, there has not
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been any convincing archaeological evidence in northeast Africa to suggest inter-regional affinities during the Middle Stone Age (henceforth MSA) between East Africa and the contiguous Arid Belt. On the contrary, Middle Palaeolithic (henceforth MP) industries of the Sudan (e.g., Marks 1968a, 1968b) are technologically and typologically distinct from those found in East Africa (e.g., Breuil et al. , 1951; Wendorf and Schild, 1974; Merrick, 1975; Kurashina, 1978; Gresham, 1984). Furthermore, comparative analyses of Northeast African and Levantine MP assemblages along a possible route out of Africa termed The Levantine Corridor suggest there were no compelling technological connections between these two regions (e.g., Marks, 1990; Van Peer, 1998). Indeed, examination of lithic technological trajectories in the Levant demonstrates a continuous lineage from the late Lower Palaeolithic to the Upper Palaeolithic (Monigal, 2002), implying there was no significant influx of African technology (and presumably associated human population) into the Levant during the Upper Pleistocene. This is not surprising, since a recent mtDNA study demonstrates that haplogroup M appears in high frequencies among populations in East Africa, South Arabia, India, and Southeast Asia, and is notably absent among Levantine populations. Geneticists posit the initial branching of haplogroup M took place in East Africa some 60,000 years ago (Quintana-Murci et al. , 1999). So, archaeological and genetic data suggest modern hu-

From the Mediterranean basin to the Portuguese Atlantic shore: Papers in Honor of Anthony Marks Actas do IV Congresso de Arqueologia Peninsular

mans expanding from East Africa did not enter the Levantine Corridor (in any archaeologically or genetically visible sense) during the Upper Pleistocene, as is often assumed. The mtDNA study of haplogroup M indicates that the Arabian Corridor, which bridges Africa and Asia via South Arabia, may have served as the primary route of dispersal out of Africa during the Penultimate Glaciation (Figure 1). Archaeological evidence will be presented in this paper from Station One in northern Sudan and Bir Khasfa and Jibal Ardif 3 in central Oman sites that demonstrate technological affinities with the East African MSA. It is proposed that hunter-gatherers moved into the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt during an early Upper Pleistocene pluvial event(s), expanding into this favorable, unoccupied niche. In most places, the Arid Belt offered vast ameliorated savannas that were extensions of the East African phytogeographic zone (Patzelt, personal communication). Thus, expansion into this niche did not require any major change in subsistence strategy. The assemblages analyzed in this paper may belong to a MSA techno-complex that spread from East Africa (Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Djibouti, and Eritrea) into contiguous portions of the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt to the north (Sudan) and east (Yemen and Oman). This expansion provides direct archaeological data in support of an early human migration out of sub-Saharan Africa.

THE CORE AREA: EAST AFRICAN MSA Prior to an examination of Station One, Bir Khasfa, and Jibal Ardif 3, it is necessary to review lithic technologies of the East African MSA the purported ancestral modern human population. These industries are characterized by a suite of reduction strategies that employ both core and faonnage technologies (these are not mutually exclusive). Faonnage represents a fundamentally different approach to producing tools from core reduction; the final tool is achieved via invasive flaking across one or both faces of a plaquette, blank, or preform. It is an important distinction to make, as there is not one example of faonnage reduction in the Near East from the late Lower Palaeolithic through the Upper Palaeolithic, seriously calling into question movement(s) from sub-Saharan Africa through the Levantine Corridor during this time frame. The production of diminutive bifacial foliates with flat, invasive retouch is a common thread throughout East Africa (Figure 2: d-g, j-k). These tools are considered by the author a fossile directeur of the region during the early Upper Pleistocene, and are best represented at the following sites: Midhishi 2 Cave in an escarpment along the northern coast of Somalia, with radiocarbon and thermoluminescence dates placing the basal layer sometime greater than 42,000 BP (Brandt and Brook, 1984; Gresham, 1984), the Gademotta
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and Kulkuletti crater complexes in the Central Rift of Ethiopia, yielding potassium-argon dates between 225,000 and 150,000 BP; Porc Epic Cave in the southern Afar Rift of Ethiopia, with the controversial obsidian hydration dating technique indicating 80,000-60,000 BP (Clark and Williamson, 1984); KOne 5, an undated findspot within the Garibaldi crater in the southern Afar Rift of Ethiopia (Kurashina, 1978); and Prospect Farm in the Nakuru Basin of northern Kenya, also with obsidian hydration dates ranging between 120,000 and 40,000 BP (Merrick, 1975; Anthony, 1978; Michels et al., 1983). There is a range of variability among core reduction strategies within East Africa, including single-platform, convergent, Levallois point cores as well as simple unidirectional blade cores. Kurashina (1978) classifies one core type at KOne 5 as Nubian Mousterian, Type I (though Nubian Mousterian assemblages in the Sudan and Egypt have no bifacial component). Kurashina ( ibid. ) and others find thee cores from KOne 5 as convincing evidence for north-south connections across the Sahara at the same point in the MSA. Centripetal core exploitation, falling within a continuum that includes discoidal and Levallois tortoise cores, are also an important element of MSA reduction strategies, particularly at Gademotta, Kulkuletti, and Prospect Farm. This disparity between single-platform and radial reduction within East African MSA core reduction strategies has been attributed to the nature of the locally available raw material (Merrick, 1975; Clark, 1980). Artifacts from Gademotta, Kulkuletti, and Prospect Farm are predominantly manufactured from obsidian cobbles, which are not particularly conducive to Levallois point production; thus, there is a greater emphasis on radial reduction (though point cores are present). The lithic assemblages from Midhishi 2 and Porc Epic are made on tabular chert, while KOne raw material consists primarily of large blocks quarried from a local obsidian flow. Because of the large, angular nature of the available raw material, these latter three sites exhibit a greater frequency of Levallois points, as well as simple unidirectional blades.

INTO THE SAHARA: STATION ONE Station One was discovered by A. Marks during the 1964 season of the Combined Prehistoric Expedition to Nubia. The site is an open-air occurrence of chipped stone material approximately 30 km east of the Second Cataract, in the Eastern Desert of Sudan (Figure 1). The lithic artifacts, primarily manufactured from quartz pebbles, are scattered atop an inselberg that is capped by a bed of workable ferrocrete sandstone. The inselberg stands about 20 m above the pre-Nilotic peneplain; it is the only relief on the immediate landscape. Because the assemblage was outside the reservoir floodplain and had no obvious relationship with materials found within

The Role of the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt in the Modern Human Expansion

the floodplain it was not included in the final report, and only recently published (Rose, in press). The site is named for its proximity to the first stop on the Sudanese railway traveling south from Wadi Halfa. Station One was initially recognized by the sharp contrast of white quartz debris littering the deflated ferrocrete sandstone surface. The assemblage consists of 1,939 pieces systemically collected from two distinct loci atop the inselberg. A 10 m 2 unit was established in both loci; all material within these arbitrary units, including tools, cores, debitage, and debris, was collected. Lithic analysis indicates there are no technological or typological differences between the two scatters. The Lithic Assemblage The material from Station One is in relatively good condition (considering the brittle nature of quartz), although edges and artes are slightly rounded from wind abrasion. Half the artifacts are complete, and among the broken pieces there is a high frequency of false burins (c.f. Brzillon, 1971), likely due to the numerous internal fractures within the available quartz pebbles. The assemblage was sorted into four categories: debitage (n = 1102), debris (n = 551), cores (n = 76), and tools (n = 210). All tools and cores were examined, and a random sample of 25 per cent of the debitage was selected for attribute analysis (n = 280). Quartz comprises nearly the entire assemblage (91.45%), followed, in low percentages, by silicified wood (2.74%), ferrocrete sandstone (2.56%), Nile pebble (2.22%), metamorphic rock (0.68%), and quartz crystal (0.34%). The Station One inselberg is capped by a bed of flakeable ferrocrete sandstone, ranging between 10 and 50 cm in thickness. Despite its quality and proximity, ferrocrete sandstone represents a small portion of the total assemblage. This patterning is anomalous when compared with most other MP/MSA sites in Nubia, which are dominated by tools manufactured almost exclusively on ferrocrete sandstone (Solecki et al. , 1963; Guichard and Guichard, 1965; Marks, 1968a; Marks 1968b; Guichard and Guichard, 1968; Irwin et al. , 1968). Rather than exploiting the immediately available (and perfectly suitable) raw material, inhabitants of Station One chose to procure small quartz pebbles (between 23 and 63 mm in maximum dimension) that are riddled with fracture planes. Quartz gravels and found at the base of the inselberg. With the exception of Sai Island (Van Peer et al. , 2003), MSA quartz industries are unprecedented in Nubia; though analogies can be drawn with sub-Saharan MSA sites in Central and East Africa. The use of quartz at Station One represents a deliberate choice not to exploit the most immediate raw material flakeable ferrocrete sandstone occurring in large slabs but rather to procure small, rounded quartz peb59

bles, the dimensions and quality of which are less conducive to the manufacture of bifacial tools. Possible explanations for this trend are that the toolmakers were not familiar with the high-quality chert ubiquitous within the Nile floodplain, did not have access to resources within the Nile Valley, and/or were simply more comfortable utilizing quartz. The well-made bifacial foliates made from these pebbles are a testament to the skill of the knappers and/or familiarity with this challenging raw material. The closest source of Nile pebble would have been 30 km to the west, within the Nile Valley. This fine-grained chert is relatively free of inclusions and excellent for knapping. The nodules are heavily rolled and of similar size to the quartz pebbles, with the maximum dimension ranging between 29 and 60 mm. Known sources of silicified wood include the Eastern Desert just behind Dibeira East, the Western Desert behind Buhen (Marks, 1968a: 199), and in the Batn al-Hajar (Solecki et al., 1963). De Heinzelin and Paepe (1965) describe silicified wood as ubiquitous throughout the Cambrian sandstone formations outside the Nile Valley. This would imply a plethora of sources in proximity to Station One. There are four cores of this variety from the site, ranging between 46 and 67 mm in length. Technology About half the cores are informal, which includes the following types: single-platform (29.7%), multiple-platform (5.5%), and 90-degree cores (14.3%). Bidirectional cores are present, though low in frequency (7.7%). The Levallois cores (23.1%) all have centripetal preparation on the working face, while an additional number are radial (19.9%). It is most likely that these last two core types are part of the same continuum of parametal exploitation of the raw material. Unifacial blanks include flakes (70.5%), primary flakes (10.9%), Levallois blanks (8.1%), clats de taille (7.6%), blade/bladelets (2.5%), and primary blades (0.2%). clats de taille are defined by a combination of attributes such as longitudinal curvature; bidirectional, three-directional, or radial scar patterns; a modified striking platform; and/or thin dimensions of the piece. In general, the blanks from Station One are trapezoidal and ovoid in shape, only 11% are pointed and less than 3% are elongated. These traits are not surprising given the tendency toward centripetal core reduction. About 55% of the platforms are unfaceted, 35% display some degree of platform manipulation, and the remaining 10% are missing due to breakage and the tendency of quartz platforms to crush upon impact. Among the debitage, 63% of the dorsal scar patterns are unidirectional/unidirectional-crossed, 19.6% are radial, 9.1% converging, and 8.3% bidirectional. The technology observed at Station One differs from other

From the Mediterranean basin to the Portuguese Atlantic shore: Papers in Honor of Anthony Marks Actas do IV Congresso de Arqueologia Peninsular

MP industries in Northeast Africa; Type 1 and Type 2 Nubian Mousterian cores are predominantly unidirectional and/or bidirectional with converging Levallois point preparation (Marks, 1968). Khormusan Levallois technologies, with new U/Th measurements on ostrich eggshell and wood redating the industry to OIS 4 (Marks et al., in preparation), have a core reduction strategy similar to Station One, with radial exploitation to maintain convexity on the working face of classic Levallois cores (Sellet, 1995). In contrast, there is no bifacial element in the Khormusan, the Station One assemblage lacks the numerous burins that are prevalent within Khormusan toolkits, and lacks the variability in raw material exploitation that is characteristic of the Khormusan. Typology The tool assemblage is comprised primarily of typical, non-diagnostic MSA artifacts: retouched pieces (23.6%), scrapers (20.9%), notches (16.8%), and denticulates (15.5%). In addition to these ubiquitous types, bifacial (2.27%) and unifacial (1.4%) foliates/ovates with flat, invasive retouch are present (Figure 2: h-i), strongly suggesting affinities with the aforementioned MSA sites in East Africa. Retouched pieces make up the largest tool category within the assemblage, with continuous irregular or marginal secondary retouch. Almost all are on regular flakes. Within retouched pieces is a sub-category referred to as naturally-backed pieces. This type is noteworthy because it has been noted as a legitimate category at Prospect Farm. Anthony (1972: 81) describes these pieces as: a crescentic tool, not a true crescent, that often bears on its curved back a small amount of marginal retouch. More often, the retouch is replaced by a false backing resulting from the vertical trimming of the parent core. The flake, struck close to the trimmed edge of a small core hardly larger than the resultant flake, picks up, so to speak, the edge and its trimming scars . The four naturally-backed pieces at Station One are crescent to sub-crescent in shape, and possess invasive retouch on the working edge. The backing is not necessarily cortical; rather it is typically a fracture plane or remnant of previous removals from the core perpendicular to the dorsal surface. It is possible these blanks are a byproduct from the reduction of rounded quartz pebbles rather than a deliberate tool form. Scrapers and denticulates are nearly as frequent as retouched pieces, making up over a quarter of the overall toolkit. There is a low percentage of endscrapers, including nosed, ogival, and simple forms. Four specimens are bilateral converging scrapers, grading into retouched unifacial points. Retouch on these tools is predominantly observe and semisteep. The burins are simple and made from quartz flakes. In one case, the burin edge is created by a single blow coming
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from a truncated platform. Another burin is formed by a single blow on a natural fracture plane. The third, a dihedral burin, has two spalls removed from a cortical platform. The assemblage contains three unifacial points; one is on a standard flake, while the other two are on Levallois flakes. It should be noted these Levallois flakes were retouched into points, and are not derived from Levallois point production. Two points have obverse retouch, one is retouched inversely. Two points are triangular, and one is cordiform. Bifacial pieces are distinguished by invasive retouch on both faces. These tools include foliates/ovates, miscellaneous bifacial elements, or fragmentary pieces that fall into a continuum of bifacial reduction. Some of these miscellaneous elements exhibit few retouching blows, suggesting they may be preforms, while others are extensively reduced, indicating they may be exhausted bifacial cores (c.f. Kelly, 1988). The bifacial foliates/ovates are typically small and thin, with a transverse cross-section ranging from biconvex to slightly plano-convex. They are all made on unifacial blanks, with flat, invasive retouch. There are less than a handful of assemblages in Northeast Africa that have bifacial tools resembling Station One, these sites include: Bir Tarfawi, Bir Sahara East, N2 and Sai Island. The material at Bir Tarfawi and Bir Sahara East is exclusively manufactured from quartzitic sandstone. The assemblages were found in the western desert of Egypt, in sediments correlated with OIS 5 palaeolakes (Wendorf et al. , 1993). At Sai Island, on the Nile south of the Second Cataract, Van Peer et al. (2003: 189), report a lithic assemblage manufactured from quartz whose most prominent typological feature is the presence of thin bifacial foliates blanks were produced according to Levallois, Nubian, and discoidal reduction strategies. The assemblage was found in situ within black Nilotic silt; excavators correlate these sediments with the OIS 5 palaeolakes at Bir Tarfawi and Bir Sahara (Van Peer et al. , 2003). Site N2 was discovered within the Goshabi Formation, the oldest fluviatile aggradation recognized in the Dongola Reach. The assemblage is characterized by a rough Levallois core technology with a low index of faceting and the presence of bifacial reduction. It is interesting to note that, while most artifacts at N2 are manufactured from wadi chert and quartzite, several foliates are made on large quartz pebbles (Marks et al., 1971). The location of Station One on an inselberg overlooking the pre-Nilotic peneplain, combined with the presence of lowmass, high-velocity bifacial armatures, suggests the inhabitants of the site employed a subsistence strategy tied to large game moving throughout the savanna. Lzine (1989) describes a 500 km northward shift in Sahara vegetation zones during an early Holocene wet phase, which brought 200-500 mm of rainfall per annum and transformed the plains outside the Nile Valley into a grassland environment. It is conceivable

The Role of the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt in the Modern Human Expansion

Upper Pleistocene humid episodes resulted in a similar phytogeographic reconfiguration. Large ungulates would have moved into this ameliorated niche, bringing with them huntergatherers exploiting these resources.

INTO ARABIA: BIR KHASFA AND JIBAL ARDIF 3 Bir Khasfa is a surface scatter of chipped stone artifacts (>100,000 m2) on the Nejd Plateau in Oman (Figure 1). The site was first identified and collected by the Harvard Archaeological Survey in Oman in 1973 and 1975 (Pullar, 1974; Pullar and Jckli, 1978; Pullar, 1985), and more recent study has been carried out by the Central Oman Pleistocene Research project in 2002 and 2004 (Rose, 2004). The site was initially recorded due to the density of artifacts found at various elevations on a rock outcrop above the left bank of the Wadi Arah, where the wide, low-energy channel enters a small localized basin, bending from a northeastward to a northward orientation. The site is named for a nearby well (bir ) that today serves Beduin tribes throughout the Nejd. The local relief is formed by a crescent-shaped outcrop of Tertiary rock with abundant chert outcropping from within the inner basin, at the margins of an ancient playa lake. The raw material is a brown, high-quality chert found in angular slabs and thin plaquettes derived from an exposed Eocene bed named as the Rus Formation. The undulating surface of the Tertiary bed is covered by a mantle of aeolian sand ranging from 0 to 20 cm in depth, which rests upon a cemented petrogypsic horizon. Artifacts are primarily found on the surface and embedded no greater than five cm within the subsurface aeolian veneer. Even today, the water level is quite high and there appears to be occasional surface runoff in the basin below the site, attested to by the large number of trees and bushes seen flourishing in the depressed areas. Two 1 x 1 m test pits excavated from within this basin during the 2004 campaign revealed an interstratified mix of aeolian and lacustrine sediments, though no artifacts were identified within the buried deposit. At least three different geomorphic areas of the site were observed, each demonstrating different lithic technologies. The area just above the depression has an extensive lithic scatter with a large number of completed bifacial tools. A plethora of single-platform, unidirectional blades and cores were observed further away from the basin, at a higher elevation on the outcrop. A third industry, exhibiting diagnostic Neolithic artifacts, was identified on the top of a nearby inselberg. Survey and collection during the 2002 and 2004 campaigns focused exclusively on the bifacial scatter. Two findspots were systematically collected; although the
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scatters are approximately 150 m apart they do not necessarily represent specific reduction sites, rather distinct zones of one large homogenous scatter separated by areas of low density. They were chosen based on the frequency of completed tools (in most cases bifacial foliates) observed on the surface. It is clear from technological and typological observations that both areas collected at Bir Khasfa are more or less coeval, and will be treated here as such. A 2 x 5 m grid was sampled from Locus 1 using .5 x .5 m units. The second findspot is about 150 m to the southwest, just above the edge of the basin. At Locus 2, a 2 x 7 grid was placed over the area, again employing .5 x .5 m collection units. At both loci, artifacts were collected on the surface and within the shallow sandy-gypsum carpet. The Lithic Assemblage The total sampled area of 24 m 2 yielded 318 artifacts, of which 65.9% are debitage, 0.5% are cores, 20.9% are tools, and 12.6% are debris. The material is in nearly pristine condition artes are sharp, indicating minimal wind abrasion and/or rolling. The artifacts are all manufactured on chert, and have a medium patina, ranging in color from yellowish-orange to brown. Middle Holocene diagnostic artifacts on top of the nearby inselberg exhibit a pinkish-white patina, providing a clear differentiation from the Pleistocene artifacts. Technology Blanks at Bir Khasfa, which are predominantly trapezoidal, rectangular, and ovoid in shape, appear in the following frequencies: flakes (44.2%), followed by a significant number of eclat de taille (34.9%), cortical flakes and blades (15.5%), blade/lets (3.9%), and core trimming elements (1.6%). Most striking platforms are either unfaceted or crushed, less than 10% are dihedral or faceted. The presence/absence of lipping on the bulb of percussion, viewed as a potential indicator of soft hammer percussion, occurred on 23.6% of the pieces. Combined with the high frequency of crushed platforms (17.8%), it is likely hard hammer percussion was used for the initial roughing out of bifacial preforms. The lipping percentage rises to 47.4% when considering only clats de taille , suggesting the Bir Khasfa flint knappers switched to soft hammer percussion for thinning. Dorsal scar patterns are primarily unidirectional (40.7%), unidirectional-crossed (29.6%), radial (13.9%), transverse (7.4%), with the remaining percentage divided among parallel, converging, and crested. Just two cores were recovered at Bir Khasfa, of which one is an unidentifiable fragment. The other is a small radial core (~50 mm in maximum dimension), with alternating parametal exploitation across both faces of the piece. One face is flat, and may represent the exhausted working surface of a centripetal Levallois core.

From the Mediterranean basin to the Portuguese Atlantic shore: Papers in Honor of Anthony Marks Actas do IV Congresso de Arqueologia Peninsular

Typology The 64 tools identified in the Bir Khasfa assemblage, include bifacial pieces (37.5%), preforms (26.6%), sidescrapers (23.4%), endscrapers (7.8%), unifacial points (3.1%), and retouched pieces (1.6%). Of the 23 tools made from blanks, over a quarter are manufactured on clats de taille . Bifacial tools, by far the largest category at Bir Khasfa, are primarily leaf-shaped foliates, with a small percentage of ovate and cordiforms shapes (Figure 2: a-c). These diminutive pieces range between 30 and 70 mm in length, and between 6 and 16 mm in thickness. Nearly 90% of the pieces are biconvex, and all have flat, invasive retouch. There appears to be an even distribution between bifaces reduced from flakes versus those reduced from plaquettes. In cases where unifacial blanks were chosen for bifacial production, cortical pieces were almost always selected. There were 17 preforms, representing the entire continuum of bifacial reduction. There are a few examples of continuous marginal retouch along one preform edge, which demonstrates that edge grinding was carried out to prepare the platform for bifacial flaking. Of the 17 preforms, ten are broken in half, probably a result of shock during the thinning. One particular preform was quite large (~150 mm in length), exceeding the maximum dimension of locally available raw material. The size is reminiscent of preforms collected at Jibal Ardif 3, both in terms of techno-typological production and raw material selection, and potentially provides a link between the two findspots as part of the same kind of reduction sequence. Of the 15 sidescrapers collected at Bir Khasfa, nearly half are made on clat de taille . The retouch ranges from marginal to Quina, equally divided between inverse and obverse faces. There were five endscrapers, sensu latu . The pieces have continuous retouch on one narrow edge of a flake or blade; four have straight retouched edges while one endscraper has a convex working edge. Two unifacially retouched points were noted. One is a partly-bifacial foliate made on a blade with invasive, retouch covering the dorsal face and proximal portion of the ventral face, perhaps for bulbar thinning. The second retouched point is on a flake with semi-steep, inverse, converging bilateral retouch. JIBAL ARDIF 3 Approximately 100 km southwest of Bir Khasfa, also on the Nejd Plateau, is a series of hills and inselbergs called Jabal Ardif. The jagged landscape is mantled by a more or less continuous 40-km-long reg comprised of nodules, plaquettes, and slabs of chert. This Early Tertiary exposure is part of the chert-bearing Rus Formation; at its base is a 362

-5 m thick brecciated dolomitic limestone with fine-grained brown chert inclusions. The original chert/dolomite bedding is thoroughly modified by recrystallization and collapse from dissolution of evaporites, giving the present landscape its craggy relief (Platel et al., 1992). The hills rising above the chert regs are composed of white laminated, dolomitic, chalky limestone interstratified with dolomitic limestone breccia. This disparity in density leads to uneven erosion of the rock, producing frequent small, low rockshelters within the hills ( ibid. ). Lithic scatters with a palimpsest of technologies are ubiquitous on the Jibal Ardif reg surfaces. One such scatter, Jibal Ardif 3, is situated in the hills about 30 km south of Thumrait and five kilometers east of Wadi Dawkhah (Figure 1). The scatter is located on a flat plain between hills, on a landscape lined by a series of parallel limestone ridges spaced ten meters apart on average (rarely exceeding 10 cm in height and 20 cm in width). The ridges are formed by interstratified beds of folded, truncated limestone strata; subsequent erosional processes have had a greater effect on the softer chalky limestones, leaving prominent ridges comprised of the harder dolomitic stratum. The terrain is covered by a thin veneer of hard-packed gypsum evaporites, indicating poor drainage within the local basin. The Lithic Assemblage The site was initially identified by the high number of bifacial preforms and clats de taille scattered over a relatively small area. This apparent homogenous technology is unique among other scatters on the Jibal Ardif reg, which typically display mixed industries. Artifacts were recovered on the surface and imbedded in the evaporitic sediments. Patina ranges from a pinkish-gray to orangish-brown, depending on their position in the gypsum surface veneer. Lithics embedded in the gypsum had much lighter discoloration, while material exposed on the surface possessed a deeper patina. The material is in pristine condition, there is no rounding from wind abrasion or rolling. The sampled assemblage consists of 286 pieces collected in an area of 12 m2, including 71.8% debitage, 18.1% debris, 6.9% tools, and 3.2% cores. Every artifact is derived from the local fine-grained Eocene chert. Raw material is ubiquitous throughout the surface around the site, occurring in large, thin plaquettes that average 150-250 mm in length and 15-30 mm in thickness. These plaquettes are particularly conducive to the production of bifacial tools the site is clearly a workshop for the exploitation of this outcrop. Technology The blanks from Jibal Ardif 3 are primarily trapezoidal and ovoid in shape. Flakes make up 57.1% of the debitage,

The Role of the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt in the Modern Human Expansion

followed by clat de taille (27.1%), cortical flakes and blades (11.3%), and blade/lets (4.0%). Cortical striking platforms are most frequent (28.5%), also with a significant number of dihedral and faceted platforms (17.5%), and straight platforms (15.5%). Only 8.5% of all blanks exhibit any sign of lipping, indicating there was little or no soft hammer percussion used during reduction. Further evidence for hard hammer percussion, a large (261 mm) chert hammerstone was collected from the findspot. Dorsal scar patterns on the debitage are primarily unidirectional (45.2%) and unidirectional-crossed (34.5%). There were nine cores collected at Jabal Ardif 3. Because of the thin, rounded shape of the raw material, all of the cores are flat, non-volumetric. Most are radial cores, either with one or two working surfaces. There are three cores that have elongated point and flake scars removed via an opposed platform technique. In all three cases, both of the platforms are faceted, though one end appears to be supplementary with noninvasive blows for maintaining convexity. The cores exhibit a much deeper patina, therefore are thought to date to an earlier phase of occupations of the site. Typology There are no completed formal tools within the Jabal Ardif 3 assemblage, though 17 bifacial preforms were identified (Figure 2: l-m). They range in length from 60 to 200 mm, and between 12 and 28 mm in thickness. In every case, retouch quality is flat and invasive. The preforms exhibit several phases of reduction, from initial plaquette thinning to nearly completed tools. Though unfinished, they are primarily ovates and cordiforms, more a function of plaquette shape than a conscious choice of the knapper. Except for the early stage preforms, the bifaces are all biconvex in profile. Like Bir Khasfa, there was a mid-stage preform exhibiting continuous marginal retouch across one lateral edge (Figure 2: l), indicating that edge grinding was carried out to prepare for invasive bifacial flaking. Nearly half of the preforms are broken in half, of which six have been refit; in every case they show that a final heavy blow snapped the preforms during thinning, which is not surprising given the use of a hard chert hammerstone in reduction. When one considers the high ratio of preforms to total number of pieces in the assemblage (1 in 6), combined with the frequency of cortical platforms, cortical flakes, unidirectional scar patterns, and hard hammer percussion, it is clear the site functioned as a workshop for initial plaquette reduction. In every case, preforms were derived from plaquettes; unifacial blanks were not used for bifacial production, again a function of raw material availability rather than conscious choice.

DISCUSSION Prior to 1972, the Stillbay Culture was recognized throughout all of sub-Saharan Africa as an MSA entity with Levallois and discoidal cores, as well as flat bifacial foliates. Anthony (1972: 82) reevaluated this entity in relation to East Africa and concluded the Stillbay Culture does, in fact, not exist, based on its wide geographic distribution and variable technologies observed among the assemblages. This position was adopted by archaeologists working in Africa, and the subject has not been broached since. Anthony was correct in pointing out the Stillbay classification is too broad; however, the baby was thrown out with the bathwater. For the past 30 years, the term East African MSA has been used only as a temporal designation; scholars have neither defined the techno-typological attributes nor articulated the geographic distribution of this archaeological complex. Data has been presented from sites in East Africa, northern Sudan, and central Oman that suggest there are affinities among these three regions, most prominently the production of bifacial foliates. These tools are manufactured either from unifacial blanks or plaquettes, depending upon the nature of the locally available raw material. Bifacial thinning is always carried via flat, invasive retouch to achieve a foliate, ovate, or cordiform shaped-tool with a biconvex profile. In addition to the production of bifacial foliates, there is a variety of core technologies identified at these sites, including discoids, and centripetal Levallois cores, while convergent levallois the hallmark of the Levantine Mousterian are absent. This techno-typological package is geographically conscripted; there is no faonnage technology to the north in the lower Nile Valley, Levant, or Zagros Mountains, and west of the Rift Valley the Sangoan and Lupemban industries are typologically distinct with larger and more elongated bifacial tools. These MSA sites probably date to OIS 5 or OIS 3; a climatic episode in which the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt was periodically transformed into open and wooded savannas that were extensions of the East African phytogeographic zone. Therefore, the sites fall within a continuous, homogenous region that would have facilitated population expansion and contraction during cyclical phases of amelioration and desiccation. With this in mind, it is suggested there was a regional techno-complex that spanned East Africa, the eastern Sahara, and South Arabia during the last interglacial. The assemblages fall within a continuous phytogeographic niche and are linked by the presence of a fossile directeur. The proposed techno-complex originated in East Africa and expanded into the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt at the onset of pluvial conditions some 128,000 or 60,000 years ago. This asser63

From the Mediterranean basin to the Portuguese Atlantic shore: Papers in Honor of Anthony Marks Actas do IV Congresso de Arqueologia Peninsular

tion rests upon the two assumptions: 1) the sites examined in this paper date to the Upper Pleistocene, and 2) lithic industries that developed in the Arid Belt must derive from neighboring refugia because there was little or no human occupation within the Saharo-Arabian Arid Belt during the Penultimate Glaciation due to hyperarid conditions. Further work must be carried out throughout East Africa and the Arid Belt to test these assumptions; until then this proposition is conjecture.

GRESHAM, T. 1984. An investigation of an Upper Pleistocene archaeological site in northern Somalia. M.A. Thesis. University of Georgia, Athens. GUICHARD, J. & GUICHARD, G. 1965. The Early and Middle Paleolithic of Nubia: a preliminary report. In F. Wendorf (Ed.), Contributions to the Prehistory of Nubia, pp. 57-166. Dallas: Fort Burgwin Research Center and Southern Methodist University Press. 1968. Contributions to the study of the Early and Middle Paleolithic of Nubia. In F. Wendorf (Ed.), The Prehistory of Nubia , Volume 1, pp. 148-193. Dallas: Fort Burgwin Research Center and Southern Methodist University Press. DE HEINZELIN DE BRAUCOURT, J. & PAEPE, R. 1965. The geological history of the Nile Valley in Sudanese Nubia: preliminary results. In F. Wendorf (Ed.), Contributions to the Prehistory of Nubia , pp. 29-56. Dallas: Fort Burgwin Research Center and Southern Methodist University Press. IRWIN, H. T.; WHEAT, J. B. & IRWIN, L. F. 1968. University of Colorado investigations of Paleolithic sites in the Sudan, Africa . University of Utah Anthropological Papers, 90. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. KELLY, R. L. 1988. The three sides of a biface. American Antiquity , 63: 717-734. KURASHINA, H. 1978. An examination of prehistoric lithic technology in east- central Ethiopia . Ph.D. Dissertation. University of California, Berkeley. LZINE, A.-M. 1989. Late Quaternary vegetation and climate of the Sahel. Quaternary Research, 32: 317-334. MARKS, A. E. 1968. The Mousterian industries of Nubia. In F. Wendorf (Ed.), The Prehistory of Nubia , Volume 1, pp. 194-314. Dallas: Fort Burgwin Research Center and Southern Methodist University Press. MARKS, A. E.; SHINER, J. L.; SERVELLO, F. & MUNDAY, F. 1971. Flake assemblages with Levallois techniques from the Dongola Reach. In J. L. Shiner (Ed.), The Prehistory and Geology of Northern Sudan , Part 1. Report to the Nation Science Foundation, Grant GS 1192. MARKS, A. E. 1990. The Middle and Upper Palaeolithic of the Near East and the Nile Valley: the problem of cultural transformations. In P. Mellars (Ed.), The Emergence of Modern Humans: An Archaeological Perspective , pp. 56-80. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. MARKS, A. E.; MCKINNEY, C. & ROSE, J. I. In preparation. Uranium Series dating of wood, enamel, and ostrich eggshell from the Khormusan. MERRICK, H. V. 1975. Change in later Pleistocene lithic industries in eastern Africa . Ph.D. Dissertation. University of California, Berkeley. MONIGAL, K. 2002. The Levantine leptolithic: blade technology from the Lower Palaeolithic to the dawn of the Upper Palaeolithic. Ph.D. Dissertation. Southern Methodist University. PLATEL, J. P.; ROGER, J.; PETERS, T. J.; MERCOLLI, I.; KRAMERS, J. D. & LE MTOUR, J. 1992. Geological Map of Salalah, Explanatory Notes . Muscat: Ministry of Petroleum and Minerals.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First and foremost, I thank Tony Marks for allowing me to study the Station One assemblage, as well as his encouragement and support in preparing this paper. I am grateful to Nuno Bicho for inviting me to present at this symposium, despite the fact that the peninsula discussed in this paper is thousands of kilometers from Iberia. My thanks to Lucy Addington for her illustrations of the Station One material, and Vitaly Usik for his drawings from Bir Khasfa and Jabal Ardif 3. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the 2004 Central Oman Pleistocene Research team, including Vitaly Usik, Diego Angelucci, Teresa Medici, Daniel Richter, Ali al-Mahrooqi, and Saeed al-Suqri.

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PULLAR, J. 1974. Harvard archaeological survey in Oman, 1973: flint sites in Oman. Arabian Seminar , 4: 33-48. 1985. A selection of aceramic sites in the Sultanate of Oman. Journal of Oman Studies , 7: 49-88. PULLAR, J. & JCKLI, B. 1978. Some aceramic sites in Oman. Journal of Oman Studies, 4: 53-71. QUINTANA-MURCI, L.; SEMINO, O.; BANDELT, H.; PASSARINO, G.; MCELREAVEY, K. & SILVANA SANTACHIARA-BENERECETTI, A. 1999. Genetic evidence of an early exit of Homo Sapiens Sapiens from Africa through eastern Africa. Nature Genetics, 23: 437-441. ROSE, J. I. 2004. The Question of Upper Pleistocene Connections between East Africa and South Arabia. Current Anthropology , 45 (4): 551-555. In press. New evidence for the expansion of an Upper Pleistocene population out of East Africa, from the site of Station One, Northern Sudan. Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 14 (2), in press. SELLET, F. 1995. Levallois or not Levallois: does it really matter? Learning from an African case. In H. L. Dibble and O. Bar-Yosef (Eds.), The Defi-

nition and Interpretation of Levallois Variability, pp. 279-292. Madison: Prehistory Press. SOLECKI, R. S.; DE HEINZELIN, J.; STIGLER, R. L.; MARKS, A. E.; PAEPE, R. & GUICHARD, J. 1963. Preliminary statement of the prehistoric investigations of the Columbia University Nubian expedition in Sudan, 1961-62. Kush, 11: 70-92. VAN PEER, P. 1998. The Nile corridor and the out-of-Africa model: an examination of the archaeological record. Current Anthropology, 39: 115-131. VAN PEER, P.; FULLAGAR, R.; STOKES, S.; BAILEY, R. M.; MOEYERSONS, J.; STEENHOUDT, F.; GEERTS, A.; VANDERBEKEN, T.; DE DAPPER, M. & GEUS, F. 2003. The Early to Middle Stone Age Transition and the Emergence of Modern Human Behaviour at site 8-B-11, Sai Island, Sudan. Journal of Human Evolution , 45: 187-93. WENDORF, F. & SCHILD, R. 1974. A Middle Stone Age Sequence from the Central Rift Valley, Ethiopia . Warsaw: Polska Akademia Nauk. WENDORF, F.; SCHILD, R. & CLOSE, A. E. 1993. Egypt during the Last Interglacial: the Middle Paleolithic of Bir Tarfawi and Bir Sahara East. New York: Plenum Press.

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FIGURE 1. Map showing potential routes of expansion out of Africa during the Upper Pleistocene, and sites mentioned in text that demonstrate the East African MSA techno-typological package.

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FIGURE 2. Bifacial foliates and preforms: a-c Bir Khasfa, Oman; d Midhishi 2, Somalia (after Gresham, 1984: Figure 4.4); e-g Porc Epic, Ethiopia (after Clark and Williamson, 1984: Figure 7); h-i Station One, Sudan; j-k Gademotta and Kulkuletti, Ethiopia (after Wendorf and Schild, 1974: Plates 20, 51); l-m Jabal Ardif 3, Oman.

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