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Proposal to sample 110 bone point fragments from 11 KwaZulu-Natal sites for species identification by means of ZooMS analysis

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ProposalDescription: 

Following a successful project to identify the animals used to make bone tools from contact-period sites in Gauteng and Limpopo (Bradfield et al. 2018) I now plan to extend my study into KwaZulu-Natal. I have chosen eleven sites with high numbers of suitable bone point fragments from which collagen may be extracted with minimal invasiveness (Table 1). These sites represent occupation periods covering the early contact period back to about 7 ka ago. This will allow me to track possible temporal changes in animal selection strategies and see whether and to what extent the introduction of domestic stock may have influenced these strategies. This application is for a permit to sample 10 mg of powder from 110 bone points and to export the powder samples to the University of York, UK, for collagen isotope analysis.

Expanded_Motivation: 

The identification to species of completely worked bone from archaeological sites is nigh impossible using traditional zooarchaeological morphological markers. Except for rare sites like Kasteelberg, where bone tools at different stages of manufacture have been found (Smith & Poggenpoel 1988), recourse is usually made to nineteenth and twentieth century accounts when postulating the species of animal targeted for bone tool manufacture (Bradfield 2014). Beyond a mere source of food animals played a symbolic role in most human societies (McGhee 1977; Ingold 1988; Ryan & Crabtree 1995; Willerslev 2007; Choyke 2013). Occasionally this symbolism was expressed through technology. Social Zooarchaeology is a growing sub-discipline that seeks to understand the symbolic role of animals in societies and the specialization of bone tool production, among other things (Russell 2012; St-Pierre et al. 2018). Recent studies have found that bone tools from North Africa were embedded within culturally-mediated technological strategies dating back at least 15 ka (Desmond et al. 2018). At Taforalt, Morocco, scientists have shown that each tool type was made from the bones of a specific animal. Such preferential selection clearly goes beyond mere considerations of mechanical suitability and speaks to a symbolic association. In the southern African context my study of bone tools from Limpopo and Gauteng shows that a narrower range of species was selected for tool manufacture than for food, while, at some sites, certain antelope species were selected for tools that are not present in the unmodified faunal remains (Bradfield et al. 2018). The conclusion, however, was that mechanical suitability also played a determining role in which animals were used to make tools. As far back as the Middle Stone Age at Sibudu we find certain bone being preferentially selected based, presumably, on mechanical suitability but with an element of symbolism (Bradfield 2018). Bone points in KwaZulu-Natal are common items in LSA deposits, but are also occasionally found in Iron Age settlements. There is some debate over whether the latter items were made by the farmers or were traded into the farmer settlements from neighbouring hunter-gatherer bands (cf. Voigt 1983; Mazel 1989; Hall et al. 2013; Morton & Hitchcock 2013). If they were made by the farmers we do not know if they were using readily available domesticates or hunted game. Likewise, bone tools made by hunter-gatherers may have been made from any of the numerous suitable animal species they preyed on, or they may have preferentially chosen certain species over others as we see in Gauteng and Limpopo (Bradfield et al. 2018).

ApplicationDate: 

Tuesday, May 21, 2019 - 15:35

CaseID: 

13842

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Citation
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Hall S (1994) Images of interaction: rock art and sequence in the Eastern Cape. In: Dowson T, Lewis-Williams JD (eds) Contested images. Witwatersrand University Press, Johannesburg pp. 61–82. Hall S, Lekgoathi S, Sadr K, Pearce D, Schoeman A (2013) Frontiers and interactions. Mapungubwe Reconsidered: Exploring beyond the rise and decline of the Mapungubwe state. Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection, Johannesburg. Ingold T (1988) What is an Animal? Unwin Hyman, London. Jolly P (1996) Symbiotic interaction between black farmer and southeastern San. Current Anthropology 37: 277–305. Maggs, T., and Ward, V. 1980. Drield Shelter: rescue at a Late Stone Age site on the Tugela River. Annals of the Natal Museum 24: 35-70. Mazel, A. 1986. Mgede Shelter: a mid and late Holocene observation in the western Biggarsberg, Tukela Basin, Natal, South Africa. Annals of the Natal Museum 27: 357-387. Mazel, A. 1988. Nkupe Shelter: report on excavations in the eastern Biggarsberg, Thukela Basin, Natal, South Africa. Annals of the Natal Museum 29: 321-377. Mazel, A. 1989. Peopoel making history: the last ten thousand years of hunter-gatherer communities in the thukela Basin. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 1: 1-168. Mazel, A. 1990. Mhlwazini Cave: the excavation of Late Holocene deposits in the northern Natal Drakensberg, Natal, South Africa. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 2: 95-133. Mazel, A. 1992. Collingham Shelter: the excavation of late Holocene deposits, Natal, South Africa. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 4: 1-51. Mazel, A. 1996. Maqonqo Shelter: the excavation of Holocene deposits in the eastern Biggarsberg, Thukela Basin, South Africa. Natal Museum Journals of Humanities 8: 1-39. Mazel, A. 1997. Mzinyashana Shelters 1 and 2: excavations of mid and late Holocene deposits in the eastern Biggarsberg, thukela Basin, South Africa. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 9: 1-35. McGhee R (1977) Ivory for the sea woman: the symbolic attributes of a prehistoric technology. Canadian Journal of Archaeology 1: 141-149. Morton F, Hitchcock R (2014) Tswana Hunting: Continuities and Changes in the Transvaal and Kalahari after 1600. South African Historical Journal 66: 418-439. Plug, I. 1996. The hunter’s choice: faunal remains from Maqonqo Shelter, South Africa. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 8: 41-52. Plug, I. 2002. Faunal remains from Mzinyashana, a Later Stone Age site in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Southern African Humanities 14: 51-63. Russell, N. 2012. Social Zooarchaeology: Humans and Animals in Prehistory. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge & New York. Ryan, K., Crabtree, P. 1995. The symbolic role of animals in archaeology. In: MASCA Research Papers in Science and Archaeology No 12. University Museum, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. Smith A, Poggenpoel C (1988) The technology of bone tool fabrication in the South-Western Cape, South Africa. World Archaeology 20: 103-114. St-Pierre, C., Choyke, A., and Ikram, S. 2018. Bone and Society: a short introduction. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 20: 853–855 Voigt, E. 1983. Mapungubwe: an archaeological interpretation of an Iron Age community. Transvaal Museum Monograph 1. Voigt, E., and Peters, J. 1994. The faunal assemblage from Wosi in the Thukela Valley. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 6: 105-117. Whitelaw, G. 1994. KwaGandaganda: settlement patterns in the Natal Early Iron Age. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 6: 1-64. Whitelaw, G. (2017). “Only fatness will bring rain”: agriculturist rainmaking and hunter-gatherers. Southern African Humanities 30: 101-24. Willerslev R (2007) Soul Hunters: Hunting, Animism and Personhood among Siberian Yukaghirs. University of California Press, California.
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