Prehistoric exchange and interaction in southeastern southern Africa: Marine shells and ostrich eggshell

African Archaeological Review

Volumn 13, Issue 1, 1996, Pages 35-76

  Mitchell, Peter J ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

Exchange; Interaction; Later Stone Age; Ostrich eggshell; Seashells; Southern Africa

Indexed keywords

EID: 0042509609     PISSN: 02630338     EISSN: 15729842     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1007/BF01956132     Document Type: Review

References (129)

1. Ambrose, S. H., and Lorenz, K. G. (1990). Social and ecological models for the Middle Stone Age in southern Africa. In Mellars, P. (ed.), The Emergence of Modern Humans, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, pp. 3-33.
2. Arbousset, T., and Daumas, F. (1967). Narrative of an Exploratory Tour to the Northeast of the Cape of Good Hope, Struik, Cape Town.
3. Barham, L. S. (1989). A preliminary report on the Later Stone Age artefacts from Siphiso Shelter, Swaziland. South African Archaeological Bulletin 44: 33-43.
4. Barham, L. S. (1992). Let's walk before we run: An appraisal of historical materialist approaches to the Later Stone Age. South African Archaeological Bulletin 47: 44-51.
5. Bender, B. (1981). Gatherer-hunter intensification. In Sheridan, A., and Bailey, G. N. (eds.), Economic Archaeology, British Archaeological Reports, Oxford, pp. 97-118.
6. Binneman, J. N. F. (1982). Mikrogebruikstekens op steenwerktuie; eksperimentele waarnemings en 'n studie van werktuie afkomstig van Boomplaasgrot, M.A. thesis, University of Stellenbosch, Stellenbosch.
7. Bleek, W. H. I., and Lloyd, L. (1911). Specimens of Bushmen Folklore, Allen, London.
8. Brooks, H. (1876). Natal: A History and Description of the Colony, Reeve & Co., London.
9. Cable, J. H. C. (1984). Economy and Technology in the Later Stone Age of Southern Natal, British Archaeological Reports, Oxford.
10. Cable, J. H. C., Scott, K., and Carter, P. L. (1980). Excavations at Good Hope Shelter, Underberg District, Natal. Annals of the Natal Museum 24: 1-34.
11. Carter, P. L. (1969a). Moshebi's Shelter. Lesotho 8: 13-23.
12. Carter, P. L. (1969b). Moshebi's Shelter. Unpublished site notebook. On file at the University Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge. Cambridge.
13. Carter, P. L. (1974). Melikane. Unpublished site notebook. On file at the University Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge.
14. Carter, P. L. (1978). The Prehistory of Eastern Lesotho. Ph.D. thesis, University of Cambridge, Cambridge.
15. Carter, P L., and Vogel, J. C. (1974). The dating of industrial assemblages from stratified sites in eastern Lesotho. Man (N.S.) 9: 557-571.
16. Carter, P. L., Mitchell, P. J., and Vinnicombe, P. (1988). Sehonghong: The Middle and Later Stone Age Industrial Sequence at a Lesotho Rock-shelter, British Archaeological Reports, Oxford.
17. Casalis, E. (1861). The Basutos, J. Nisbet, London (reprinted Morija Museum and Archives, Morija, 1992).
18. Cashdan, E. A. (1985). Coping with risk: Reciprocity among the Basarwa of northern Botswana. Man (N.S.) 20: 454-474.
19. Clancey, P. (1964). The Birds of Natal and Zululand, Oliver & Boyd, Edinburgh.
20. Clark, J. D. (1959). The Prehistory of Southern Africa, Penguin, Harmondsworth.
21. Clark, J. G. D. (1975). The Earlier Stone Age Settlement of Scandinavia, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
22. Clarke, D. L. (1968). Analytical Archaeology, Methuen, London.
23. Cohen, A. L., Parkington, J. E., Brundrit, G. B., and Van der Merwe, N. J. (1992) A Holocene marine climate record in mollusc shells from the southwest African coast. Quaternary Research 38: 379-385.
24. Davies, O. (1975). Excavations at Shongweni South Cave: The oldest evidence to date for cultigens in southern Africa. Annals of the Natal Museum 22: 627-662.
25. Deacon, H. J. (1972). A review of the post-Pleistocene in South Africa. South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series 1: 26-45.
26. Deacon, H. J. (1976). Where hunters gathered: A study of Stone Age people in the eastern Cape. South AfriCan Archaeological Society Monograph Series 1: 1-231.
27. Deacon, J. (1984a). Later Stone Age people in southern Africa and their descendants. In Klein, R. G. (ed.), Southern African Prehistory and Palaeoenvironments, A. A. Balkema, Rotterdam, pp. 221-328.
28. Deacon J. (1984b). The Later Stone Age of Southernmost Africa, British Archaeological Reports, Oxford.
29. Deacon, J. (1986). "My place is the Bitterpits": The home territory of Bleek and Lloyd's/Xam San informants. African Studies 45: 135-156.
30. Dennell, R. W. (1983). European Economic Prehistory: A New Approach, Academic Press, London.
31. Derricourt, R. M. (1977). Prehistoric Man "in the Ciskei and Transkei, Struik, London.
32. Dingle, R. V., and Rogers, J. (1972). Effects of sea-level changes on the Pleistocene palaeoecology of the Agulhas Bank. Palaeoecology of Africa 6: 55-58.
33. Dornan, S. S. (1909). Notes on the Bushmen of Basutoland. Transactions of the South African Philosophical Society 18: 437-450.
34. Drayson, A. W. (1858). Sporting Scenes Among the Kaffirs of South Africa, Routledge, London.
35. Earle, T. K., and Ericson, J. E. (1977). Exchange Systems in Prehistory, Academic Press, New York.
36. Ellenberger, D. F. (1912). History of the Basuto Ancient and Modern, Caxton, London (reprinted Morija Museum and Archives, Morija, 1992).
37. Ericson, J. E. (1977). Egalitarian exchange systems in California: A preliminary view. In Earle, T. K., and Ericson, J. E. (eds.), Exchange Systems in Prehistory, Academic Press, New York, pp. 109-126.
38. Flannery, K. V. (1972). The cultural evolution of civilization. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 3: 339-428.
39. Gamble, C. (1983). Culture and society in the upper Palaeolithic of Europe. In Bailey, G. N. (ed.), Hunter-Gatherer Economy in Prehistory: An European Perspective, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 201-211.
40. Gamble, C. (1986). The Palaeolithic Settlement of Europe, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
41. Gordon, R. J. (1984). The !Kung in the Kalahari exchange: An ethnohistorical perspective. In Schrire, C. (ed.), Past and Present in Hunter-Gatherer Studies, Academic Press, New York, pp. 195-224.
42. Hall, M. (1987). The Changing Past: Farmers, Kings and Traders in Southern Africa, 200-1860, David Philip, Cape Town.
43. Hall, S. L. (1990). Hunter-gatherer-fishers of the Fish River Basin: A Contribution to the Holocene Prehistory of the Eastern Cape, D.Phil. thesis, University of Stellenbosch, Stellenbosch.
44. Hall, S. L., and Binneman, J. N. F. (1987). Later Stone Age burial variability in the Cape: A social interpretation. South African Archaeological Bulletin 42: 140-152.
45. Hall, S. L. (1985). Edgehill and Welgeluk. In Hall, S. L., and Binneman, J. N. F. (eds.), Guide to Archaeological Sites in the Eastern and Northeastern Cape, Southern African Association of Archaeologists, Grahamstown, pp. 1-38.
46. Heinz, H. J. (1966). The Social Organization of the !kō Bushmen, M.A. thesis, University of South Africa, Pretoria.
47. Hodder, I. (1984). Archaeology in 1984. Antiquity 58: 25-32.
48. Humphreys, A. J. B. (1982). Cultural material from burials on the farm St Clair, Douglas area, northern Cape. South African Archaeological Bulletin 37: 68-70.
49. Humphreys, A. J. B. (1984). Sociable arrows. The Digging Stick 1: 2-3.
50. Humphreys, A. J. B. (1991). On the distribution and dating of biracial tanged and barbed arrowheads in the interior of South Africa. South African Archaeological Bulletin 46: 41-43.
51. Humphreys, A. J. B., and Thackeray, A. I. (1983). Ghaap and Gariep: Later Stone Age studies in the northern Cape. South African Archaeological Society Monograph Series 2: 1-328.
52. Jacobson, L. (1987). The size variability of ostrich eggshell beads from central Namibia and its relevance as a stylistic and temporal marker. South African Archaeological Bulletin 42:55-58.
53. Jacobsen, L., Pineda, C. A., Peisach, M., Morris, D., and Pillay, A. E. (1994). A preliminary report on the PIXE analysis of ostrich eggshell and its potential for provenance studies in southern Africa. Unpublished poster presented at 29th International Symposium on Archaeometry, Ankara.
54. Jolly, P. (1993). Strangers into Brothers: Interaction Between South-eastern San and Southern Nguni/Sotho Communities, M.A. thesis, University of Cape Town, Cape Town.
55. Kaplan, J. (1990). The Umhlatuzana Rock Shelter sequence: 100,000 years of Stone Age history. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 2: 1-94.
56. Kaplan, J. (1992). Archaeological excavations at Liphofung Cave. Report submitted to the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority.
57. Kaplan, J. (1993). The archaeology of the Muela rock-shelter. Report submitted to the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority.
58. Kilburn, R., and Rippey, E. (1982). Sea-shells of Southern Africa, Macmillan, Johannesburg.
59. Klein, R. G. (1972). The late Quaternary mammalian fauna of Nelson Bay Cave (Cape Province, South Africa): Its implications for megafaunal extinctions and environmental and cultural change. Quaternary Research 2: 135-142.
60. Lee, R. B. (1979). The !Kung San: Men, Women and Work in a Foraging Society, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
61. Leslie, M. (1989). The Holocene sequence from Uniondale rock shelter in the eastern Cape. South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series 6: 17-32.
62. Maclean, G. L. (1984). Roberts' Birds of Southern Africa, Trustees of the John Voelcker Bird Book Fund, Cape Town.
63. Maggs, T O'C. (1976). Iron Age Communities of the Southern Highvel~ University of Natal Press, Pietermaritzburg.
64. Maggs, T. O'C. (1980). Msuluzi Confluence: A seventh-century Early Iron Age site on the Tugela River. Annals of the Natal Museum 24: 111-145.
65. Maggs, T. O'C., and Ward, V. (1980). Driel Shelter: Rescue at a Later Stone Age site on the Tugela River. Annals of the Natal Museum 24: 35-70.
66. Manhire, A. H., Yates, R., and Parkington, J. E. (1986a). Nets and fuUy-recurved bows: Rock paintings and hunting methods in the western Cape, South Africa. World Archaeology 17:161-173.
67. Manhire, A. H., Parkington, J. E., Mazel, A. D., and Maggs, T. O'C. (1986b). Cattle, sheep and horses: A review of domestic animals in the rock art of southern Africa. South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series 5: 22-30.
68. Marshall, L. (1976). The !Kung of Nyae-Nyae, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.
69. Mauss, E. (1925). The Gift, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London.
70. Mazel, A. D. (1986a). Mgede Shelter: A mid- and late Holoeene observation in the western Biggarsberg, Thukela Basin, Natal. Annals of the Natal Museum 27: 357-387.
71. Mazel, A. D. (1986b). Mbabane Shelter and Sinhlonhlweni Shelter: The last two thousand years of hunter-gatherer settlement in the central Thukela Basin, Natal, South Africa. Annals of the Natal Museum 27: 389-453.
72. Mazel, A. D. (1988a). Nkupe Shelter: Report on excavations in the eastern Biggarsberg, Thukela Basin, Natal. Annals of the Natal Museum 29: 321-377.
73. Mazel, A. D. (1988b). Sikhanyisweni Shelter: Report on excavations in the Thukela Basin, Natal, South Africa. Annals of the Natal Museum 29: 379-406.
74. Mazel, A. D. (.1989). People making history: The last 10,000 years of hunter-gatherer communities in the Thukela Basin. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 1: 1-168.
75. Mazel, A. D. (1990). Mhlawazini Cave: The excavation of Late Holocene deposits in the northern Natal Drakensberg, South Africa. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 2: 95-133.
76. Mazel, A. D. (1992a). Fear of running: A reply to Barham. South African Archaeological Bulletin 48: 51.
77. Mazel, A. D. (1992b). Gender and the hunter-gatherer archaeological record: A view from the Thukela Basin. South African Archaeological Bulletin 47: 122-126.
78. Mazel, A. D. (1992c). Collingham Shelter: The excavation of late Holocene deposits, Natal, South Africa. Natal Museum Journal of Humanities 4: 1-51.
79. Mazel, A. D. (1992d). Early pottery from the eastern part of southern Africa. South African Archaeological Bulletin 47: 3-7.
80. Mazel, A. D. (1994). Extending the distribution of bifacial tanged and barbed arrows into central Natal. South African Archaeological Bulletin 49: 53.
81. Merrick, H. V., and Brown, F. H. (1984). Obsidian sources and patterns of source utilization in Kenya and northern Tanzania: Some initial findings. African Archaeological Review 2: 129-152.
82. Mitchell, P. J. (1993a). Archaeological investigations at two Lesotho rock-shelters: The terminal Pleistocene/early Holocene assemblages from Ha Makotoko and Ntloana Tsoana. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 59: 39-60.
83. Mitchell, P J. (1993b). Late Pleistocene hunter-gatherers in Lesotho: Report on fieldwork at Sehonghong rock-shelter, July to September 1992. Nyame Akuma 39: 43-49.
84. Mitchell, P. J. (1993c). The archaeology of Tloutle rock-shelter, Maseru District, Lesotho. Navorsinge van die Nasionale Museum, Bloemfontein 9: 77-132.
85. Mitchell, P. J. (1994). The archaeology of the Phuthiatsana-ea-Thaba Bosiu Basin, western Lesotho, southern Africa: Changes in Later Stone Age regional demography. Antiquity 68: 83-96.
86. Mitchell, P. J. (1995a). Revisiting the Robberg: New results and a revision of old ideas at Sehonghong rock-shelter, Lesotho. South African Archaeological Bulletin 50: 28-38.
87. Mitchell, P. J. (1995b). Pressure-flaked projectile points in the southern African Later Stone Age (in preparation).
88. Mitchell, P. J., and Vogel, J. C. (1994). New radiocarbon dates from Sehonghong rock-shelter, Lesotho. South African Journal of Science 90: 280-288.
89. Mitchell, P. J., Yates, R., and Parkington, J. E. (1994a). At the transition: The archaeology of the Pleistocene/Holocene boundary in southern Africa. Unpublished paper delivered at the Society for American Archaeology, Anaheim, CA.
90. Mitchell, P. J., Parkington, J. E., and Yates, R. (1994b). The recent Holocene archaeology of western and southern Lesotho. South African Archaeological Bulletin 49: 27-56.
91. Moore, J. A. (1983). The trouble with know-it-alls: Information as a social and ecological resource. In Moore, J. A., and Keene, A. S. (eds.), Archaeological Hammers and Theories, Academic Press, New York, pp. 173-192.
92. Opperman, H. (1987). Later Stone Age Hunter-Gatherers of the Drakensberg Range and its Foothills, British Archaeological Reports, Oxford.
93. Parkington, J. E. (1977). Follow the San, Ph.D. thesis, University of Cambridge, Cambridge.
94. Parkington, J. E. (1980). Time and place: Some observations on spatial and temporal patterning in the Later Stone Age sequence in southern Africa. South African Archaeological Bulletin 35: 73-83.
95. Parkington, J. E., and Poggenpoel, C. (1971). Excavations at De Hangen, 1968. South African Archaeological Bulletin 26: 3-36.
96. Parkington, J. E., and Poggenpoel, C. (1987). Diepkloof Rock Shelter. In Parkington, J. E., and Hall, M. (eds.), Papers in the Prehistory of the Western Cape, South Africa, British Archaeological Reports, Oxford, pp. 269-293.
97. Pineda, C. A., Peisach, M., Jacobsen, L., and Sampson, C. G. (1990). Cation-ratio differences in rock patinas on hornfels and chalcedony using thick target PIXE. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research B 49: 332-335.
98. Plug, I. (1993). The macrofaunal and molluscan remains from Tloutle, a Later Stone Age site in Lesotho. Southern African Field Archaeology 2: 44-48.
99. Renfrew, A. C. (1973). Before Ovilization, Penguin, Harmondsworth.
100. Renfrew, A. C. (1977). Alternative models for exchange and spatial distribution. In Earle, T. K., and Ericson, J. E. (eds.), Exchange Systems in Prehistory, Academic Press, New York, pp. 141-179.
101. Renfrew, A. C., and Bahn, P. (1991). Archaeology: Theory, Method and Practice, Thames and Hudson, London.
102. Renfrew, A. C., and Shennan, S. (1981). Ranking, Resource and Exchange, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
103. Root, D. (1983). Information exchange and the spatial configuration of egalitarian systems. In Moore, J. A., and Keene, A. S. (eds.), Archaeological Hammers and Theories, Academic Press, New York, pp. 193-219.
104. Sampson, C. G. (1988). Stylistic Boundaries Among Mobile Foragers, Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.
105. Sealy, J. C., and Van der Merwe, N. J. (1986). Isotope assessment and the seasonal mobility hypothesis in the southwestern Cape of South Africa. Current Anthropology 27: 135-150.
106. Sealy, J. C., and Yates, R. (1994). The chronology of the introduction of pastoralism to the Cape, South Africa. Antiquity 68: 58-67.
107. Shennan, S. (1975). The social organization at Branč. Antiquity 49: 279-288.
108. Silberbauer, G. B. (1981). Hunter and Habitat in the Central Kalahari, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
109. Smith, A. B., Sadr, K., Gribble, J., and Yates, R. (1991). Excavations in the southwestern Cape, South Africa, and the archaeological identity of prehistoric hunter-gatherers within the last 2000 years. South African Archaeological Bulletin 46: 71-91.
110. Smits, L. G. A. (1983). Rock paintings in I..esotho: Site characteristics. South African Archaeological Bulletin 28: 62-76.
111. Softer, O. (1985). The Upper Palaeolithic of the Central Russian Plain, Academic Press, New York.
112. Tanaka, J. (1980). The San, Hunter-Gatherers of the Kalahari, University of Tokyo Press, Tokyo.
113. Tyson, P. D. (1986). Climatic Change and Variability in Southern Africa, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
114. Vinnicombe, P. (1976). People of the Eland, University of Natal Press, Pietermaritzburg.
115. Vogel, J. C., Fuls, A., and Visser, E. (1986). Pretoria radiocarbon dates. III. Radiocarbon 28: 1133-1172.
116. Wadley, L. (1987). Later Stone Age Hunters and Gatherers of the Southern Transvaal: Social and Ecological Interpretations, British Archaeological Reports, Oxford.
117. Wadley, L. (1989a). Gender relations in the Thukela Basin. South African Archaeological Bulletin 44: 122-126.
118. Wadley, L. (1989b). Legacies from the Later Stone Age. South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series 6: 42-53.
119. Wadley, L. (1991). Rose Cottage Cave: Background and a preliminary report on the recent excavations. South African Archaeological Bulletin 46: 125-130.
120. Wadley, L. (1992a). Rose Cottage Cave: The Later Stone Age levels with European and Iron Age artifacts. South African Archaeological Bulletin 47: 8-12.
121. Wadley, L. (1992b). Reply to Barham: Aggregation and dispersal phase sites in the Later Stone Age. South African Archaeological Bulletin 47: 52-55.
122. Wadley, L. (1993). The Pleistocene Later Stone Age of Africa south of the Limpopo. Journal of World Prehistory 7: 243-296.
123. Wiessner, P. (1977). Hxaro: A Regional System of Reciprocity for Reducing Risk Among the !Kung San, Ph,D. thesis, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
124. Wiessner, P. (1982). Risk, reciprocity and social influences on !Kung San economics. In Leacock, E., and Lee, R. B. (eds.), Politics and History in Band Societies, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 61-84.
125. Wiessner, P. (1983). Style and social information in Kalahari San projectile points. American Antiquity 46: 253-276.
126. Wilmsen, E. N. (1982). Exchange, interaction and settlement in north-west Botswana: Past and present. In Hitchcock, R. R., and Smith, M. R. (eds.), Settlement in Botswana, Heinemann, Johannesburg, pp. 98-109.
127. Wilmsen, E. N. (1988). Land Filled with Flies: A Political Economy of the Kalahari, University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
128. Wobst, H. M. (1974). Boundary conditions for Paleolithic social systems: A simulation approach. American Antiquity 39: 147-178.
129. Woodburn, J. (1982). Egalitarian societies. Man (N.S.) 17: 431-451.