Robert Hosfield

Mapping the human record: population change in Britain during the Early Palaeolithic

Abstract This chapter examines the changing human demography of Britain during the Lower and early Middle Palaeolithic using Palaeolithic handaxe densities in the Middle Thames and Solent rivers as proxies for relative population. Peak populations are suggested for Marine Isotope Stages (MISs) 13 and 11, and population decline is indicated after MIS 10. This data is compared to the individual site records for the early Middle Palaeolithic, where a similar pattern of decline in the number of sites is discernible. Differences between the British and mainland northwest European records may be explained by the changing palaeogeography of Britain. In particular, the progressive subsidence of the floor of the North Sea Basin made recolonisation of Britain during warm events increasingly difficult. Finally, models are put forward for interpreting population change in relation to the climatic record, the subsidence of the North Sea Basin and the changing ability of humans to withstand cold conditions.

Settlement, society and cognition in human evolution : landscapes in mind

This volume provides a landscape narrative of early hominin evolution, linking conventional material and geographic aspects of the early archaeological record with wider and more elusive social, cognitive and symbolic landscapes. It seeks to move beyond a limiting notion of early hominin culture and behaviour as dictated solely by the environment to present the early hominin world as the outcome of a dynamic dialogue between the physical environment and its perception and habitation by active agents. This international group of contributors presents theoretically informed yet empirically based perspectives on hominin and human landscapes. Includes 17 contributions by both well-known and up-and-coming scholars of the Palaeolithic and human evolution Recognises, celebrates and builds on the contributions made by Clive Gamble to the study of the Palaeolithic Challenges common assumption that early hominin culture and behaviour was dictated solely by the environment, thus restoring the role of agency in the discussion of early hominin evolution

Micro-abrasion of flint artifacts by mobile sediments: a taphonomic approach

Fluvial redeposition of stone artifacts is a major complicating factor in the interpretation of Lower Palaeolithic open-air archaeological sites. However, the microscopic examination of lithic surfaces may provide valuable background information on the transport history of artifacts, particularly in low energy settings. Replica flint artifacts were therefore abraded in an annular flume and examined with a scanning electron microscope. Results showed that abrasion time, sediment size, and artifact transport mode were very sensitive predictors of microscopic surface abrasion, ridge width, and edge damage (p < 0.000). These results suggest that patterns of micro-abrasion of stone artifacts may enhance understanding of archaeological assemblage formation in fluvial contexts

Recent work at the Lower Palaeolithic site of Corfe Mullen, Dorset, England

Changes in the geological interpretation of the history of the ancient Solent river basin have focused attention on the handaxes discovered in the Corfe Mullen area during quarrying before the Second World War. Recent geological research suggests that the fluvial terrace the handaxes are associated with may pre-date the Anglian glaciation. This is important because it contributes to the question of just when the Solent basin was first occupied by hominins, and how this relates to other areas of possible contemporary pre-Anglian occupation such as the Boxgrove Marine embayment. However, the artefacts were believed to come from the bluff of the river terrace and were thus not in situ. This paper explores that question and re-examines the context from which the handaxes at Corfe Mullen were discovered.

Less of a bird’s song than a hard rock ensemble

Corbey et al. (2016) propose that the Acheulean handaxe was, at least in part, under genetic control. An alternative perspective is offered here, focusing on the nature of the Acheulean handaxe and the archaeological record, and re‐emphasizing their status as cultural artefacts. This is based on four main arguments challenging the proposals of Corbey et al. Firstly, handaxes do not have to track environmental variation to be a cultural artefact, given their role as a hand‐held butchery knife or multi‐purpose tool. Secondly, while handaxe shapes do cluster around a basic bauplan, there is also significant variability in the Acheulean handaxe record, characterized by site‐specific modal forms and locally expressed, short‐lived, idiosyncratic traits. Critically, this variability occurs in both time and space, is multi‐scalar, and does not appear to be under genetic control. Thirdly, handaxes were produced in social contexts, within which their makers grew up exposed to the sights and sounds of artefact manufacture. Finally, the localized absences of handaxes at different times and places in the Lower Paleolithic world is suggestive of active behavioral choices and population dynamics rather than genetic controls.

The Palaeolithic and Mesolithic Periods

The Royal Archaeological Institute’s Summer Meeting 2016 was held in Wiltshire, focusing on recent archaeological research in the county from prehistory to recent times. The Institute had last visited the county in 1947, and the opportunity to encounter new ways of presenting sites and monuments to the public were considered, as well as results from excavations and building analyses. In a change from the usual format, it was decided that this Report should contain longer general statements of research achievements and opportunities for future investigation than previously, and that summaries of the places visited should be available online so that they can be accessed without restriction through the Institute’s website. This has allowed more illustrations and information to be in each entry, and helps to promote the Institute’s role as an academic and educational charity. The online entries can be accessed from http://www.royalarchinst.org/publications/summer-meetingreports and then ‘Wiltshire’. The Institute is grateful to those who were guides and hosts during the visit, particularly John Hare, who also gave the introductory lecture, and Tim TattonBrown. Others were David Cornelius-Reid (Amesbury), Timothy Darvill and Susan Greaney (Stonehenge), Adrian Green (Salisbury Museum), John Waddington (Old Deanery, Salisbury), Mary South and Amanda Richardson (Clarendon Palace), Bryn Walters (Littlecote), Marden henge (Amanda Chadburn and Jim Leary), Devizes Museum (David Dawson), Pam and Ivor Slocombe and Bruce Eaton (Bradford-onAvon), Anthony Emery, Paul Jack and Robert Fuller (Great Chalfield), Joshua Pollard (Avebury), Ed McSloy (Malmesbury), and David Field (Salisbury Plain Training Area). The meeting was organized by David A. Hinton (former President RAI) and Caroline Raison (Assistant Meetings Secretary, RAI).

What use is the Palaeolithic in promoting new prehistoric narratives

Imagine a situation in which the world and the universe are as old as we know them to be, but in which people came into being in 4004 BC. Let us think for a minute about what implications such a scenario would have for our notions of the historical process. However people came to be (and we might have to invoke some form of divine intervention for such a sudden appearance), it is likely that people would be disengaged from the physical and causal processes of the rest of the universe. With our biological ties severed and the work of Darwin undone for the human realm, culture and human exceptionalism would inevitably loom large. Humans could not be seen as emerging through an evolutionary process in tandem with other organisms, nor would we be linked to the broader history of the universe through the operation of physical or chemical processes as normally understood. The radical discontinuity between people and everything else would require a special explanatory framework for humans. This might in turn lead to a division of knowledge, in some parts of the world at least, between those who study the social, cultural, philosophical, anthropological and historical aspects of people and those interested in the physical and biological worlds. No reputable humanities scholar or social scientist believes that people are 6004 years old. But many act as if this were the case, so that the last few thousand years are when people became interestingly human, started farming for a living, dwelling in cities and commenced mass production and consumption. The rest is history: mass-consuming urbanites demonstrating culture at a level not glimpsed in any other species, the origins of which lie in a control of natural resources from which we are set apart. It is as if the Palaeolithic never happened.