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The Natural Fracture of Pebbles from the Batoka Gorge, Northern Rhodesia, and its bearing on the Kafuan Industries of Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

J. Desmond Clark
J. Desmond Clark
Affiliation:
Rhodes-Livingstone Museum, N. Rhodesia
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Extract

At the Third Pan-African Congress on Prehistory, held in Livingstone in 1955, there was a symposium on the early Pebble Cultures of Africa. It became apparent from the discussion that followed that there was considerable divergence of opinion among prehistorians as to the criteria that distinguished artificial from natural fracture. Specimens that were acceptable as artifacts to some were not acceptable to others and it became clear that considerably more research was necessary into the way in which nature can fracture stone by percussion and in particular into the natural fracture of pebbles. It is especially important to know whether nature can simulate Kafuan- and Oldowan-type pebble tools. This is because the great majority of Kafuan tools from the type areas are abraded, often considerably, although Lowe mentions that Kafuan tools occur unrolled in the 175-foot terrace in the Kafu river as also in the 270-foot terrace in the Kagera Valley.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society , Volume 24 , December 1958 , pp. 64 - 77
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1958

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References

page 64 note 1 Lowe, C. van Riet, 1952. ‘The Pleistocene Geology and Prehistory of Uganda’. Part II Prehistory. Geol. Survey Memoir, VI, pp. 23 and 24Google Scholar.

page 64 note 2 Brain, C. K., Lowe, C. van Riet and Dart, R. A., 1955. ‘Kafuan Stone Artefacts in the Post-Australopithecine Breccia at Makapansgat’. Nature, 175, p. 16CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

page 64 note 3 Robinson, J. T. and Mason, R., 1957. ‘Occurrence of Stone Artefacts with Australopithecus at Sterkfontein’. Nature, 180, pp. 521–4CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

page 64 note 4 Op. cit. (note 1, above), pp. 19–23.

page 65 note 1 Clark, J. D., 1950. The Stone Age Cultures of Northern Rhodesia, Cape Town, pp. 121–6Google Scholar.

page 73 note 1 Lowe, C. van Riet, op. cit., p. 20.

page 75 note 1 Lowe, C. van Riet, op. cit. p. 29.

page 76 note 1 Confirmed following examination of Kafuan Collections in Museums in Britain.

page 76 note 2 Lowe, C. van Riet, op. cit., p. 27.

page 76 note 3 Lowe, C. van Riet, 1953. ‘The Kafuan Culture of South Africa’, S.Afr. Arch. Bull., VIII, no. 30, pp. 27–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

page 77 note 1 Lowe, C. van Riet, 1952, op. cit., p. 21.