The Ain Boucherit-Ain Hanech Oldowan sequence, Algeria

Abstract

The Ain Boucherit-Ain Hanech research area is located c. 10 km north of the city of El Eulma (Sétif Province) on the high plateaus of eastern Algeria. The area includes several Lower Pleistocene archaeo-paleontological sites, namely Ain Boucherit, Ain Hanech, and El Kherba. This chapter provides an up-to-date synthesis of the archaeological, chronostratigraphic, and paleontological records of the Ain Boucherit, Ain Hanech, and El Kherba Early Pleistocene sites. The Ain Boucherit-Ain Hanech sequence currently documents the first evidence for hominin stone tool use and carnivory in North Africa, penecontemporaneous with evidence for similar technologies found in East Africa. The sequence covers a succession of multiple Oldowan occupations dated between c. 2.44 and 1.78 Ma. The study area lies along the southern fringe of the Mediterranean zone, characterized by a riparian habitat that changed through time into an open and dry landscape. The inhabitant hominins lived nearby waterholes or along a shallow river embankment, a choice probably directed by the presence of stone raw materials in a nearby riverbed and a passage of game that could be exploited for meat and marrow acquisition. The hominins manufactured various core-forms (choppers, polyhedrons, and spheroids) and flakes, which they used in meat processing, including skinning, evisceration, defleshing, and bone marrow acquisition activities. Taphonomic evidence supports a primary access to animal carcasses by Ain Boucherit-Ain Hanech hominins.