Middle Stone Age (MSA) in sub-Saharan Africa / Middle Paleolithic (MP) in northern Africa

After the Acheulian, new stone tool-making and using traditions appear in Africa. This technology, called the MSA or MP, seems to replace the earlier Acheulian industries.

Anatomically modern humans also seem to have evolved at the same time the MSA emerged. Did these people who looked "modern" behave like modern humans too?

e.g., How "modern" was the behavior of MSA people, and how can we tell?

Today we will explore some data to help you understand how the regional technological traditions of the MSA compared to the ESA.

While the Early Stone Age traditions had relatively few formal "types" of tools, and focused mostly on cores and flakes or large tools (like Acheulian handaxes), MSA industries were different:

The MSA new technology is characterized by:

• New methods of preparing and flaking cores were used to create flakes of predictable shape and size. One such method is the Levallois method.
• A wider variety of specific types of tools were made, most of them made on flakes. Flakes were sometimes used without modification, but were often retouched into particular types (such as scrapers or points.)
• Tools were often hafted.

MSA themes:

• cultural variation in time/space:
  • continent-wide techniques (prepared core technology)
  • broad, regional technological traditions (variants)
  • emergence of symbolic artifacts
  • artifacts as markers of identity?
• hunting/gathering strategies,
  • locally specialized exploitation strategies?
  • ranging patterns and territory size?
  • response to impact of environmental changes?
  • how skilled were MSA hunters?

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TimeWeb Activity:

Connect to TimeWeb through the Prehistoric Puzzles site

• Use TimeWeb to compare the sites classified as
  • Culture Group: ESA sites
  • Culture Group: MSA and MP sites
• Do the MSA/MP sites and Acheulian sites have different geographical distributions?
• Do the MSA/MP sites and Acheulian sites appear to overlap in time?

• Note that the MSA and MP are divided into different sub-categories or "industries".
  • Where are these different industries found? (Do they overlap in space, or occur in different regions?)
  • Do these different industries occur during similar or different time periods?

• Which hominids were found associated with MSA/MP industries?