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P1 – Archeology and Archeozoology

PI: Ralf Vogelsang | Agazi Negash, Alemseged Beldados

Post-Doc: Götz Ossendorf

PhD-Student: Minassie Girma

Overview

The question since when humans conquered high mountains and the age and evolution of the making of a tropical alpine human environment is the focus of archeological landscape surveys and rock shelter excavations. In addition to the lithic artifact analysis, archeozoological (Joséphine Lesur), archeobotanical (Ethiopian counterpart Alemseged Beldados), and Obsidian provenance studies (Ethiopian counterpart Agazi Negash) contribute to identify the nature of past human settlements in high elevations. In collaboration with Anthrosol investigation (P2), and Paleoecology (P4), we examine the spatial and diachronic interplay between humans and their environment during the late Quaternary landscape evolution.

Achievements

1. Evidence of the world’s oldest human high elevation residential site, characterized by the use of Afroalpine resources including giant-mole rats as key food source of prehistoric Middle Stone Age foragers

2. Human presence during several distinct prehistoric phases and
under changing environmental and climatic conditions

3. Variety of different adaptive strategies during LSA settlement (site
functions, subsistence, long-distance networks)

Photo: FOR 2358
Image of an found prehistoric biface, found at the rockshelters on the Santetti plateau.
Photo: FOR 2358
Excavations inside a rockshelter at Sanetti Plateau, Bale Mountains

 

Figure 1 & 2: Unifacial point (Middle Stone Age); excavation and sampling at Fincha Habera rock shelter during the 2017 field trip

Publications

Ossendorf G, Groos AR, Bromm T, Tekelemariam MG, Glaser B, Lesur J, Schmidt J, Akçar N, Bekele T, Beldados A, Demissew S, Kahsay TH, Nash BP, Nauss T, Negash A, Nemomissa S, Veit H, Vogelsang R, Woldu Z, Zech W, Opgenoorth L & Miehe G (2019) Middle Stone Age foragers resided in high elevations of the glaciated Bale Mountains, Ethiopia, Science 365 (2019), 583-587.

Reber D , Gelaw MF, Detsch F, Vogelsang R, Bekele T, Nauss T & Miehe G (2018) High-Altitude Rock Shelters and Settlements in an African Alpine Ecosystem: The Bale Mountains National Park, Ethiopia. Human Ecology 46(4), 587–600.

Cooperation Partners