Hominin exploitation of animal resources in the Gona Pleistocene archeological sites (Afar, Ethiopia)

Abstract

The Plio-Pleistocene sites of Gona (Afar, Ethiopia) have provided an important archaeological record (fauna and lithic tools) allowing detailed investigation of animal resource exploitations by early hominins in East Africa. The assemblages analyzed here are technologically grouped into Oldowan and Acheulian sites. Taphonomically, some of these assemblages appear well preserved, while others have poor surface preservations with biased skeletal representation of the animals. Yet, in both types of techno-complexes fossil bones with clear evidence of carcass processing (meat and marrow exploitation) have been found.We present here the evidence by grouping deposits chronologically into: a) Early Oldowan sites (2.6 to 2.5 Ma); b) Oldowan sites between 2.4 – 2.0 Ma, and c) Acheulian sites (1.5 – 1.7 Ma.). In general, cutmarks are more abundant than anthropic bone breakage damages.It is noteworthy that quantitatively, the cutmark evidence is more abundant in the Oldowan than in the Acheulean assemblages. In this sense, much of the evidence appears in the group of sites dated round 2.4-2.0 Ma, where the evidence is exceedingly abundant in the fossil assemblages of DAN2, characterized by an exceptionally excellent fossil preservation. The Gona Pleistocene sites provide crucial evidence for understanding animal resource exploitations by the earliest toolmakers.