a late stone age camping-site in the upper zambezi valley

South African Archaeological Society

A Late Stone Age Camping-Site in the Upper Zambezi ValleyAuthor(s): R. R. InskeepSource: The South African Archaeological Bulletin, Vol. 14, No. 55 (Sep., 1959), pp. 91-96Published by: South African Archaeological SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3886600 .

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A LATE STONE AGE CAMPING-SITE IN THE UPPER ZAMBEZI VALLEY

R. R. INSKEEP*

The report that follows is submitted for two reasons, (a) it is probably the most complete analysis of a single Late Stone Age site in the Upper Zambezi valley, and (b) it is almost entirely the work of the students of the Winter School of Archaeology held during August 1958 at the Rhodes-Livingstone Museum.

The emphasis of the school was on African Pre- history and archaeological method, with additional instruction on some aspects of the presentation and publication of results. In order to give the course more meaning the excavation described below was fitted in on the fourth day of the course, after some instruction had been given on the drawing of stone implements and on excavation techniques. The subsequent practicals were largely devoted to the sorting and classifying of the material, and ultimately to the drawing of the implements and the plan.

A great deal of enthusiastic work was put in by all the students, but in particular I should like to record my thanks to Miss Shona Hurlin, whose drawings of the implements are reproduced here, and to Miss Ann Akeroyd for the plan, for which she was responsible from start to finish. It was the first time that either of them had turned their hands to this kind of work; let us hope it will not be the last.

The Site The site was discovered about twelve months ago by

the writer and Dr. and Mrs. J. D. Clark during the course of a picnic outing. It lies astride a track leading from the Katombora Road to the Zambezi River. The turn-off is 15 3 miles (24 5 km.) by road from the museum, and the site is 1-2 miles (2 km.) down the track from the turn-off.

The site consisted simply of a scatter of Late Stone Age debitage lying on the sandy surface of the Lower Terrace of the Younger Gravels, here formed of calcified silty sand, and light grey in colour. Between this terrace and the river is a lower terrace of recent alluvium, present not only in the Upper Zambezi valley above the Falls, but also in the Middle part of the valley between the Batoka and Kariba gorges. The siting is interesting because of this setting. Late Stone Age sites have so far never been found on the lowest terrace, composed of dark clayey alluvium, and it is assumed that during Late Stone Age times the terrace was in process of being deposited, perhaps in muddy meres bordering a relatively broad and sluggish Zambezi. Our site lies within about 100 yds. (90 in.) of the edge of this recent alluvium. It would therefore have been within easy reach of water and of the small game and water-birds that favour the moist reedy margins of the river. Away from the

river and within half a mile of the site odd outcrops of basalt protrude through the alluvial deposits. These often carry a scattering of chalcedony pebbles suitable for the manufacture of small implements. Elsewhere within a few hundred yards are small patches of gravel which might also have been used as raw material, while a mile away (16 km.), on the Katombora Road, is a large outcrop of chalcedony which appears to have been a quarry site right through from Middle Stone Age times.

The bush is fairly open with many suitable open camp sites, and the alluvium supports a light mopane bush with Fan Palm or Mulala, sansevieria, and a number of other species useful to a people so closely dependent on their environment.

The Excavation A base line was laid out across the centre of the

site and on either side of this a grid of yard (90 cm.) squares was laid out over the main area of scatter, as far as this could be ascertained. The material from each square was collected and bagged separately, so that distributions could, if necessary, be drawn of the various elements composing the industry. It was not, in fact, considered worth plotting such distributions, as the record has already been falsified by random collecting when the site was first discovered. The first few squares were surface collected and then excavated to a depth of between 1 and 2 in. (2-5- 5-0 cm.). This soon showed that there was virtually no material below the surface, except the few pieces that had found their way down crevices, or had been trampled in by animals during the rainy seasons. This being so the remainder of the site was merely scraped to the base of the soft, sandy crust, usually between I and 1 in. (0-6-2-5 cm.) deep.

The surface distribution of material was further distorted by the fact that a motor-track runs through the middle of the site. The formation of ruts produced sloping surfaces down which debitage has migrated, leading to a false density of material along the line of the track. This does not show particularly on the plan (fig. 1), because the material has been further redistributed north and south along the track by motor-wheels, and by rainwash in the wet seasons.

The plan indicates the distribution of total debitage, including waste flakes, cores, tools, etc. Those squares in which nothing was found are left blank. Squares with less than ten pieces are marked with a dash. The remaining squares have a dot for each group of ten pieces, or part of ten. Although the surface indica- tions suggested that the southern margin of the site lay well within the grid, the distribution shows that

* Until recently Keeper of Prehistoric Collections in the Rhodes-Livingstone Museum, Livingstone, Northern Rhodesia.

91



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this was not in fact the case. There was, however, very little material beyond the southern edge and it is thought that perhaps only a couple of yards have been missed. It is thus possible to calculate pretty accurately the total area of occupation. Allowing for scatter beyond the camp area (which can be seen fairly clearly on the plan) and assuming that the industry was carried on in and among a group of windbreaks (and not in a central area surrounded by shelters) the total area would be in the order of 100 sq. yds. (85 m. sq.).

On the southern edge of squares A5 and A6 scraping revealed a dark area which had the appearance of being a hearth hollow. But as the true association of this with the Late Stone Age occupation could only be demonstrated by skimming a very large area across and around the site (best done in the rainy season) it was decided to ignore this feature for the time being. It is worth nothing, however, since, if the association of fireplaces with Late Stone Age camp-sites of this kind could be demonstrated, they would give yet a further indication of the size of the hunting group.

The Artefacts Conditions were not favourable for the preservation

of organic remains and only stone artefacts were found. A total of 4,112 pieces was collected, some half-dozen pieces in quartz and the remainder in chalcedony, and these are analysed in the following table (table I). Column A represents the random collection made when the site was first discovered; B represents the material from the excavated grid; C and D represent the material scattered along the motor-track to the north and south of the grid respectively.

TABLE I

A B C D TOTAL Miscellaneous pebbles 2 4 - - 6 Hammerstones 2 15 1 1 19 Waste flakes 84 3,344 248 97 3,773 Cores: Single platform 8 58 7 - 73

Bipolar - 2 - 3 5 Miscellaneous 14 86 10 - 110

Core rejuvenation flakes - 2 - - 2 Crescents (various) 35 36 6 2 79 Scrapers 17 14 1 - 32 Core scrapers - 1 - - I Backed blades 6 3 - - 9 Utilized flake - 1 - - 1 Drill - 1 - - 1 Obliquely blunted blade - l - -

4,112

The most . striking thing to emerge from this analysis is the extremely high proportion of waste flakes as against recognizably finished tools. The flakes were fairly closely examined for signs of utilization, but only one piece showed signs of splintering along a cutting edge. This does not, of course, mean that many of the flakes may not have

been utilized for cutting soft materials, or even as arrow-barbs, etc. But in the absence of direct evidence we can draw no conclusions about this.

Miscellaneous Pebbles. These would appear to have been carried on to the site as raw material and not used. Some may have been hammerstones which showed insufficient signs of use to be classifiable.

Hammerstones. The specimen illustrated (fig. 3, no. 13) is typical of the size and form of the hammerstones. The material may be either chalcedony, quartzite or silicified sandstone.

Cores. It is interesting to note that the proportion of bipolar cores (fig. 3, no. 1) is extremely low, and none of the typical pitted anvils which reflect the technique were found. Of the recognizable types of core those with a single platform (fig. 3, nos. 10 and 12) predominate. The miscellaneous cores comprise mainly multi-platform, or nobbly, cores and a few pseudo-disc cores, some of which had only been struck part way, around their circumference.

Crescents. This is the largest group of definite tools, but the term does in fact embrace a number of types which must certainly have had various more or less exclusively different uses. Eight crescents show signs of trimming from both faces, but the remainder are all trimmed from the main flake surface towards the dorsal face.

The term 'crescent' has generally been applied indiscriminately to any tool of reasonably small proportions which has a relatively straight cutting edge formed by the intersection of a primary flake surface with the main flake surface, and has a thick- ened, curved back, blunted by secondary working to facilitate hafting or handling. Such a broad term is obviously inadequate when one compares such examples as fig. 2, nos, 10, 16 and 21, and when one considers the evidence for the uses to which crescents were put. Descriptions of arrows used by early Bushmen leave no doubt that some of the smaller and more delicate crescents such as figure 2, nos. 10 to 14 were used as arrow-barbs, while the more U-shaped specimens (fig. 2, nos. 15 and 16) may well have been transverse arrowheads. Certainly these tiny, delicately made things could never have been intended for heavy duty or rough work, and rarely show signs of utilization. On the other hand such thick and clumsy looking specimens as figure 2, nos. 18-22, could never have graced the shaft of a reed arrow, and often show considerable signs of battering along the cutting edge. As Dr. J. D. Clark has recently pointed out (S. Af. Archaeol. Bull., XIII, 52, Dec. 1958, pp. 144-52), these specimens are undoubtedly woodworking tools closely analogous to the Elouera adzes from New South Wales, Australia.

Unfortunately when the crescents from a site such as this are set in a typological sequence there is no sharp division into two or three types, but rather a graded series from one extreme to the other. They can, however, be sorted into the following classes with some reasonable degree of certainty.

94



1 5

1 2 13

FIG. 3



TABLE 11

(a) Small, neat crescents of the type that might be used as arrow-barbs, or as units in other relatively delicate composite tools .. .. 26

(b) U-shaped, possibly transverse arrowheads .. 5 (c) Thick and chunky, less symmetrical than (a)

but showing no signs of battering on the cutting edge .. . .. .. .. 16

(d) Thick sectioned, chunky crescents with marked signs of battering on the cutting edge 27

(e) Broken and unclassifiable .. .. 5

TOTAL 79

This is interesting as it straightaway suggests a far greater woodworking activity on the site than the analysis in table I might suggest.

Scrapers. These may be divided as follows: (a) Thumbnail scrapers .. .. 15 (b) End-scrapers .. .. 2 (c) Small nosed scraper .. .. ..

(d) Notched or hollow scrapers .. .. 5 (e) Straight-edged scrapers on thick flakes .. 3 (f) Convex scrapers on thick flakes .. 3 (g) Miscellaneous .. .. .. 3

TOTAL .. 32

The evidence from Melkhoutboom suggests that some thumbnail scrapers were hafted as small adzes for working wood, or possibly horn or bone. This kind of use for a scraper-like tool is again supported from Australia by the Tula adzes which closely resemble some of the scrapers of the 2nd Intermediate and Late Stone Age. At least one of the Melkhout- boom thumbnail 'scrapers' showed evidence of having been resharpened by flaking subsequent to having been fitted into its haft with a black mastic. In support of this three of our own thumbnail 'scrapers' are nothing more than the stumps of considerably larger specimens which have been reduced by repeated resharpening.

The hollow and notched scrapers may well have been used as spokeshaves in the making of arrows and bowstaves.

Backed Blades. These clearly fall into two groups which are exemplified in figure 2, nos. 1-4 and 6-8. The larger, heavier blades of the first group could well have been used directly in the fingers for cutting or skinning in the manner demonstrated by Dr. Leakey at the Third Pan-African Congress on Prehistory. The tiny slender specimens of the second group must surely have been designed as parts of composite tools, possibly knives.

Drill (fig. 2, no. 9). This tool has been given a small 'ear' or point by blunting very steeply down the

straight edge, and by a small amount of retouch at one end of the curved side. It might perhaps be better described as an awl for piercing skins or bark. It is not likely to have been used in the manufacture of ostrich eggshell beads as none of this material was found on the site.

Obliquely Blunted Blade (fig. 2, no. 5). This being the only specimen of its kind it is considered quite likely that it represents an unfinished crescent. Conclusions

The assemblage described above agrees quite well with Clark's Upper Northern Rhodesia Wilton, although the relative abundance of thumbnail scrapers and largish crescents might indicate affinities with the Lower Northern Rhodesia Wilton. The strati- graphical evidence for subdividing these two variants is not as good as might be desired, and we must seriously consider if we are not dealing simply with facies, or occupational differences.

The area of occupation is extremely small and in itself suggests a temporary, dry-season hunting-camp. It is noteworthy that none of the larger elements such as bored stones, polished axes, grinding stones, rubbers and pestle-stones, which occur on some sites in the valley and on the sand-scarp, were present. It is highly likely that these are generally to be associated with the larger and more permanent home sites. A winter-season camp is further suggested by the fact that the surface of the calcified sand terrace on which the site occurs is subject to considerable flooding during the rains today, and if the recent alluvium were being deposited during Late Stone Age times the situation is likely to have been worse, as a higher river-level is implied.

It would seem then that we are dealing with the temporary camping-site of a small group of hunter- gatherers, taking advantage and shooting small and perhaps larger game. The considerable emphasis in the stone-tool kit on light woodworking tools suggests the kind of activity which must have been common at this time of year in these temporary halting-places: the replenishing of arrows, the making of bow staves, perhaps spears and possibly small game and bird traps, as well as light containers.

Finally, it is to be hoped that the kind of complete examination of surface sites of this kind exemplified by the present report, which is well within the scope of the trained amateur, will be carried out more and more in the. future. Detailed knowledge of the areas of occupation will throw valuable light on the sizes of various hunting groups, and the detailed analysis of total assemblages of artefacts considered in relation to the immediate setting and size of the site will eventually enable us to see much more clearly these elusive hunters of the past.

REFERENCES

Clark, J. D. The Stone Age Cultures of Northern Rhodesia, S. Af. Archaeol. Soc. 1950. Clark, J. D. 'Certain Industries of Notched and Strangulated Scrapers in Rhodesia, Their Time Range and

Possible Use', S. Af. Archaeol. Bull., XIII, 50. Clark, J. D. 'Some Stone Age Woodworking Tools in Southern Africa', S. A/. Archaeol. Bull., XIII, 52. Hewitt, J. 'Artefacts from Melkhoutboom', S. Afr. J. Sci., XXVIII, pp. 540-8. 1931. Mitchell, S. R. Stone Age Craftsmen. Tait, Melbourne, Australia. 1949.

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a late stone age camping-site in the upper zambezi valley

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