The Middle Paleolithic began in Egypt ca. 250,000-220,000 years ago. Handaxes became rare and then were no longer made, while smaller flake-tools became characteristic of this long period (up to 50,000-45,000 years ago). Flakes were made by the Levallois method, in which a core was specially prepared from a chert nodule from which flakes of a predetermined shape could then be struck (see Figure 4.2).
Middle Paleolithic tools have been found in the Nile Valley, in Egypt and Nubia, but the best preserved sites are in the Western Desert. Two sites excavated by Wendorf, Bir Sahara East (about 350 km west of Abu Simbel) and nearby Bir Tarfawi, had permanent lakes during wet intervals between 175,000 and 70,000 years ago. The savanna and savanna-woodland environment there supported large mammals such as rhinoceros, giant buffalos and camels, giraffes, and various antelopes and gazelles, but also small animals such as hares and wild cats. There were also fish in the lakes. The stone tools are of the (Saharan) Mousterian industry, which is the Middle Paleolithic stone tool industry known in other parts of Africa, Europe, and western Asia. In the Nile Valley, in Upper Egypt and Lower Nubia, there is evidence of Middle Paleolithic quarries and workshops, where cobbles from escarpment terraces were obtained for stone tool production.
After ca. 70,000 years ago the Western Desert was dry and cool, and human habitation was no longer possible except in the oases. In Upper Egypt near Qena, evidence of a late Middle Paleolithic culture dating to ca. 70,000-50,000 years ago has been identified by Pierre Vermeersch, an archaeologist at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium). Blades, which become the characteristic tool of the Upper Paleolithic, appear in the stone tool assemblage for the first time, suggesting a transitional phase. At the site of Taramsa-1, near the Ptolemaic temple of Hathor at Dendera, the oldest known skeleton
In Egypt has been excavated. Dating to ca. 55,000 years ago, it is the burial of an anatomically modern child. Although many factors could have led to the destruction of early burials such as this one, burials are uncommon until the Neolithic and later. A burial this old is unusual in any part of the Old World, not only in Egypt. The intentional act of burial, even a simple one which did not require much energy expenditure, suggests some form of commemoration of the dead by living members of the child’s family or social group that was of some social and/or symbolic significance to them.
Box 4-A Lithic analysis
Stone tools were used in Egypt from Paleolithic times through the Dynastic period, when metal tools remained costly and chert was readily available. Whereas stone tools from Dynastic sites have frequently been ignored, lithics at Paleolithic sites far outnumber any other artifacts, and are a major focus of prehistoric investigations. Tools of organic materials were certainly used in both prehistoric and Dynastic times, but stone tools have survived much better than organic ones.
Materials used for stone tools must first be identified. Petrological analysis of specially prepared stone thin sections, examined under a microscope by a geologist, is usually necessary to identify the exact source of a rock used for tools. Chert was the most common material for making lithic tools in Egypt because it fractured with a sharp edge, but other materials such as quartz and sandstone were also used. Sources of the type of rock used for tools must also be determined. Chert could often be obtained as nodules on the desert surface, but from Middle Paleolithic times there is evidence of surface mines and even an underground one. How far the stone tools were taken away from the source (and discarded) is also useful information, which can indicate widespread movements of people, raw materials, or finished tools. In the Lower Paleolithic stone tools were usually made and discarded near where the stone was obtained, whereas in the Middle Paleolithic there is evidence of stone quarries some distance from where they were used. Obsidian tools, which have an even sharper edge than chert ones, have been found in some Predynastic (Naqada culture) burials. Obsidian came from the southern Red Sea region, which indicates long-distance trade.
The context of where the stone tools were found is important. The best information about manufacturing and use of stone tools can probably be obtained when they are excavated in settlements. Sometimes there is evidence of specialized areas for lithic workshops. Information about tool use can also be obtained from hunting or fishing camps. When stone tools are found in burials they probably had a symbolic meaning. Paleolithic industrial sites include lithic workshops and quarries, whereas Dynastic sites with stone tools are industrial locations such as mines (for gold and other minerals), and quarries, where stone used for architecture and artifacts was obtained. In Predynastic and Dynastic times stone tools were used in much craft production, including the making of beads, cosmetic palettes, and stone vessels, but relevant sites are rare in Egypt.
When stone tools are excavated they are classified in a typology, as are other types of artifacts (especially potsherds), which makes it possible to compare tools from different sites. Classification of stone tools takes account of chronological, description, and functional attributes. After classification, percentages of the different tool types from a site or locality are calculated. When prehistoric stone tools have no stratigraphic context and are found on the desert surface, a broad typological classification is usually the only way to place them in a time frame.
In general, there is a reduction in the size of stone tools during the Paleolithic, from the large handaxes of the Lower Paleolithic to the Late Paleolithic micro-liths that would have been hafted to use as compound tools. Tools also become more specialized, in a wide variety of types for tasks from hide preparation to points for spears and arrows. The appearance of new tool types, such as grinding stones and sickle blades, may indicate a shift in subsistence strategies, such as the increasing importance of plants in the diet. The percentages of different tool types may give an indication of the amount of hunting that was done, which is particularly useful for the analysis of Neolithic sites.
Technology of stone tool production is also important to analyze. The technology of stone tools can be as simple as cobbles, which were picked up and used as hammerstones or throw stones, but most tools were the result of a reductive technique. Flaking, to shape a stone tool, is found in all Paleolithic periods, but ground and pecked stone tools do not appear until sometime in the Middle Paleolithic. The long chert knives of the late Predynastic, with regular ripple patterns of flakes removed on one side, were made by pressure flaking, a technique that would have required a great deal of skill so that the very thin blade (as little as 3 mm) would not break in the process (see Figures 4.3 and 4.4).
At lithic workshops all materials are collected, not only tools, but also the cores and debris from tool production. Sometimes stone is found in intermediate stages of production, from blanks to finished tools, and materials from all stages of production can be analyzed to determine the manufacturing process. Technological investigations also include lithic experimentation, where archaeologists try to replicate the process of ancient stone tool production.
Use of stone tools for specific tasks is analyzed microscopically, by examining areas of use on stone tools. The results of experiments with replicated stone tools that have been used on known materials can also be compared to what is found on ancient tools. Edge wear analysis can distinguish how a tool was used (for example, for cutting or punching) and on what types of materials, from cutting reeds to cutting bones. Harvesting grasses usually leaves a coat of silica on the surface of a sickle blade, which can often be seen by the unaided eye, but the presence of sickle sheen cannot determine whether the harvested grasses were wild or domesticated.
Figure 4.3 Middle Paleolithic flake tools. Drawing by Angela Close. Reprinted by permission
Figure 4.4 Late Predynastic ripple-flaked knife produced by pressure flaking. Source: D. L. Holmes, The Predynastic Lithic Industries of Upper Egypt, Part ii. Oxford: BAR International Series, 1989, p. 409
Box 4-B Absolute dating
For dating sites radiocarbon analysis of organic samples (charcoal, wood, bones, seeds, charred food remains, etc.) is the most frequently used method, giving the most probable range of dates for a sample in radiocarbon years bp (before present, where present is taken to be ad 1950). Radiocarbon dating can be used on samples dating from ca. 50,000/40,000 years ago, but not ones from earlier sites. Lower and Middle Paleolithic sites and climatic episodes have been dated using relative dating methods, such as thermoluminescence (TL), optical-stimulated luminescence, electron-spin resonance (ESR), amino-acid racemiza-tion, or absolute methods such as uranium series dating techniques.
Radiocarbon dating methods work by measuring the carbon 14 (a heavy carbon isotope with an unstable nucleus) content of a sample. When an organism is living it absorbs atmospheric carbon-dioxide or absorbs carbon compounds (carbohydrates, proteins, and lipids) from plants or animals, which are derived from atmospheric carbon-dioxide with about one part per trillion carbon 14. This process stops when that organism dies and the absorbed radiocarbon in the dead organism then begins to decay at a fixed rate. This rate is now measured by the carbon 14 half life of 5,730 years, which is the amount of time in which half of the carbon 14 nuclei decay.
Samples for radiocarbon dating from archaeological sites need to be taken and dried very carefully, so that they are not contaminated with more recent organic material. The sample needs to be removed from the ground with a metal trowel (not human fingers), and wrapped in plastic foil or placed in a plastic bag immediately (without any preservatives). Samples should be submitted to a radiocarbon laboratory for processing relatively quickly after collection so that they do not pick up contamination in storage.
Large samples can be dated by conventional methods, first developed by W. F. Libby in the 1940s. This method measures the carbon 14 content indirectly by measuring its radioactive beta decay.
Small samples need to be dated by the more recent direct atom counting technique, developed at the University of Toronto, called Accelerator Mass Spectro-
World History
