“Osteodontokeratic Culture”

• Bone-Tooth-Horn Culture

– Many broken long bones

• Dart: Early Culture of Australopithecines

– “Bloodthirsty Apes”

Australopithecine Reconstruction

• Small-bodied

• Fully bipedal

• Link to trees in early species

• Pronounced sexual dimorphism

– Multi-male / multi-female groups?

– Probably not monogamy

• Primarily vegetarians

• No evidence for tools

Australopithecine “Culture”

• Probably simple tools (like chimps & orangutans)

– No evidence of stone tools

– Possibly bone or horn digging tools

• Slightly larger brains than chimps

• No evidence of symbolic behavior (art, ritual, etc.)

• “Culture” probably similar to chimpanzees

Evolution of the Genus Homo

Homo habilis

• TIME: 2.5 - 1.5 my

• SITES: East & South Africa

• First hominid with stone tools

• expanded brain

– By 25-40%

– 650-780 cc

• Moderate body size

• Dentition smaller than australopithecines

Slide showing hominid phylogeny

First Archaeological Sites

• Material “Culture”

• First Appearance of Artifacts & Tools

• Human Agency and Deposition

Oldowan Tools

• Earliest stone tools

• Found with Homo habilis

• Cores, flakes, hammerstones

Hominid shift with Homo habilis

• Encephalization

• Technology

• Social Behavior

• Diet

Meat Eating

-probably more meat eating—but hunted or scavenged?

Homo erectus

African Homo erectus

• Larger cranial capacity

– around 750-900 cc

• Large body size

• “Human” proportions

• TIME: 1.8 mya – 800,000 yrs BP

• SITES: East & South Africa

Nariokotome Boy

Migration from Africa

-Big body, big brain, new tools

-First hominid to leave Africa

-Why?

Dmanisi

Asian Homo erectus

• Time Range: 1.8 mya – 50,000 yrs. BP

• Asia (China) & S.E. Asia (Java)

• Large brain (750 - 1250 cc)

• No chin

• Long low skull with thick bones

• Sagittal keel

• Prominent brow ridges

Slide showing Javan Homo erectus finds and E. Dubois

Slide showing geographic range of H. erectus

Culture of Homo erectus

• Complex Tools

• Housing

• Fire

• Hunting-Gathering

• Flexibility

• Long Learning Period

Long Learning Period

• Children born progressively “younger”

Acheulean handaxes

-first appear in Africa ~1.6 mya

Slide showing shelters at Terra Amata, France

Slide showing use of fire

Slide showing hunting

Slide showing recent finds in SE Asia

Archaic Homo sapiens

• large cranial capacity

• skull:

– less neck muscles

– more vertical forehead

– discontinuous brow ridges

• gracile postcrania

• TIME: 500,000 – 100,000 yrs BP

Archaic sites

• Definite cave occupation

• Fire in hearths

• Artifact clusters

• Mass hunting techniques

• Violence

• More elaborate tools and beginning of Levallois technique

Homo neanderthalensis

• Brain size 1300-1740 cc

• Low broad head

• Prominent brow ridges

• Midfacial prognathism

• Occipital bun

Slide showing geographic range of Neandertals

Neandertals

• Europe & Near East

• SITES: La Chapelle-aux-Saints, France; Shanidar, Iraq