Hominids, Pebble Tools and the African Villafranchian 2

Hominids, Pebble Tools and the African Villafranchian l F. CLARK HOWELL Washington University School of Medicine (St. Louis) T HE greatly accelerated pace of prehistoric research in the postwar years has made it necessary to reexamine certain problems in paleoanthropol­ ogy. This is especially true for Africa where primitive hominids and pebble tools have been discovered in deposits of recognized Villafranchian age. These discoveries raise the question of the relationship, if any, between these earliest stone implements and the Villafranchian hominids. A related problem is the place of the Pliocene-Pleistocene boundary and the age of the Villafranchian stage in Africa \\ ith reference to the Pleistocene sequence in other parts of the Old World. A review of the evidence for Pleistocene man south of the Sahara will be presented at another time, but it is worth while here to clarify certain points about the Villafranchian stage in Africa in view of some misconcep­ tions present in the literature. The first evidence of tool-making is found in deposits of the first pluvial (Kageran) stage in equatorial and southern Africa. Pebble tools of this age have been found on the eastern shores of Victoria basin at Kanam (Leakey 1936a, 1936b), and in the Kagera and Kafu river valleys west of the basin in Uganda (Wayland 1934; Lowe 1952); artifacts of comparable age have recently been found sealed in situ in ancient gravel deposits in the Vaal river basin (Lowe 1953). These implements, referred to the Kafuan stage of the Pre-Chelles­ Acheul industry, were manufactured from waterworn pebbles of quartz or quartzite with stone percussion flaking in one direction, and on only one side, to produce a single, adze-like cutting edge. Although artifacts of Kafuan type are found rolled and abraded in deposits of post-Kageran age at various locali· ties south of the Sahara, the industry may well be restricted to the first pluvial stage. The Oldowan, a derivative stage of the African Pre-Chelles-Acheul, is found in deposits of the early part of the second pluvial (Kamasian) stage. Some Oldowan implement types are found in the final phases of the Kafuan (Lowe 1952), however, so it is possible that this industry had its beginnings in the later part of the first pluvial stage. This problem may be clarified by future field work in northwestern and central Africa. Pebble tools of first end­ pluvial age (Kageran-Kamasian interpluvial) have been found recently in southern Morocco (Mortelmans, Choubert and Hollard 1952) and also in the vicinity of Casablanca (Biberson 1953). An industry termed the Kafilian, more advanced than the Kafuan, is known from the Congo and is of the same ap­ proximate age (Mortelmans 1947, 1949). These assemblages may well fill the gap between the Kafuan and the Oldowan.