Abstract
Backed pieces became widespread in the Upper Pleistocene and Holocene and are part of the classic definitions for the Later Stone Age in many parts of Africa. However, the association of backed pieces with Later Stone Age is not clear in the Horn of Africa. These pieces are present in both Middle Stone Age (MSA) and Later Stone Age (LSA) contexts. To what extent was the “backing phenomenon” homogeneous or diverse between and within the two periods? Here, we start with a review of the literature on backed pieces in the Horn of Africa, noting the lack of terminological consensus and the absence of a shared typology in the region. We then describe the variability of backed pieces using two complementary approaches: (1) multivariate statistical analysis on a set of 28 attributes of 188 artifacts from eight securely dated contexts and (2) 2D geometric morphometric analyses on the same dataset. The two approaches provide complementary results, which allow us to identify and discuss the chronological trends in backing technology and morphology, without introducing a new terminology or proposing a new formal “descriptive” typology.
Résumé
Les pièces à dos abattu deviennent omniprésentes au Pléistocène récent et à l’Holocène, et sont donc partie intégrante des définitions classiques du Later Stone Age. Cependant, l’association des pièces à dos abattu avec le Later Stone Age est peu claire dans la Corne de l’Afrique. En effet, elles se retrouvent à la fois dans des assemblages Middle Stone Age ou Later Stone Age. Dans quelle mesure le « phénomène des pièces à dos abattu » est-il homogène ou relève de processus différents entre et au sein de ces deux périodes? Dans cet article, nous présentons une synthèse critique de la littérature mentionnant les pièces à dos abattu dans la Corne de l’Afrique, et soulignons l’absence d’un consensus sur l’usage d’une terminologie ou d’une typologie commune dans la région. Nous décrivons ensuite la variabilité des pièces à dos abattu en s’appuyant sur deux approches complémentaires: (1) une analyse statistique multivariée en reposant sur 28 variables de 188 pièces provenant de huit contextes datés de façon absolue, et (2) une analyse de géométrie morphométrique en 2D. Les deux approches ont livré des résultats complémentaires, qui permettent d’identifier et de discuter les tendances chronologiques affectant les pièces à dos, sans avoir à introduire de nouvelles dénominations ni à proposer une nouvelle typologie « descriptive ».
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Acknowledgments
We thank the Ethiopian Authority for Research and Conservation of Cultural Heritage for permission to access the collections. Authorization to study the materials used here were granted by François Bon and Asamerew Dessie (Ziway-Shala), David Pleurdeau and Zelalem Assefa (Goda Buticha), and Xavier Gutherz (Mochena Borago). We also thank Steven Brandt, Amélie Diaz, and Behailu Habte for the access to unpublished data and comments during the analysis. We thank Latifa Sari and Giuseppina Mutri for the organization of the session at the UISPP in Paris in June 2018 and their patience during the preparation of this article. We would like to sincerely thank the three anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments that helped improve the manuscript, as well as Christopher “Opa” Hainsworth for correcting the English.
Funding
This project has received funding from the French National Research Agency Big Dry Project (Project No. ANR-14-CE31-0023) and the Joint Research Project (PRC) HORN—a joint project between the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the Ministry of Science & Technology of the State of Israel (MOST). AL was successively funded by (1) a H2020 Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant (No. 655459 “PleisTechnoVar”); (2) an EURIAS fellowship co-funded by the Institute of Advanced Studies in Bologna and by the Marie Curie Actions, FP7; and (3) postdoctoral fellowship from the Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO file 12U9220N). CM was funded by a postdoctoral grant from the Fyssen Foundation.
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Archaeological time period: Middle and Later Stone Age
Country and region discussed: Horn of Africa
Electronic Supplementary Material
Electronic supplementary materials (ESM) for the paper can be downloaded here: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.7825607 (doi:https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.7825607)
ESM 1
List of variables recorded and their definitions (.pdf). (PDF 121 kb)
ESM 2
Database of backed pieces used in the analysis (.csv) (CSV 26 kb)
ESM 3
Photographs of artifacts (.zip) (ZIP 399618 kb)
ESM4
R Project (.zip) compiling all R scripts and data sets used in the analysis (ZIP 10295 kb)
ESM 5
Tables of the results of the Kruskal-Wallis and pair-wise Mann-Whitney test on the quantitative variables used in the analysis (.pdf). (PDF 208 kb)
ESM 6
Tables of the results of PERMANOVAs tests on outlines and open curves (.pdf) (PDF 179 kb)
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Leplongeon, A., Ménard, C., Bonhomme, V. et al. Backed Pieces and Their Variability in the Later Stone Age of the Horn of Africa. Afr Archaeol Rev 37, 437–468 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10437-020-09401-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10437-020-09401-x