Abstract
A PBBLIMINABY report by Prof. C. van Riet Lowe on a discovery of faunal remains and stone implements of early man in the diamondiferous gravels of the Vaal River (see p. 53) is the first account in any detail to reach Great Britain of a firmly established archaeological succession in the early stone age cultures of South Africa, which, it is safe to predict, will be a standard of reference in future research. From the evidence of five sites on the Riverview Estates, a diagrammatic section of stratification has been constructed which shows a regular chronological succession of cultures in the Lower, Middle and Later Stone Ages from ‘Chellean’ to ‘Capsio-Aurignacian’. Points of special significance emerging are the identification of the much discussed so-called Victoria West industry, with its gigantic stone cores, as the factory d©bris of the Upper Stellenbosch of Lower Palaeolithic age; the occupation by man of the Vaal River Valley both during and after the deposition of the old river gravel the full significance of this will appear on publication of the palseontological evidence; the confirmation of the chronological relation of Upper Stellenbosch and Fauresmith cultures, the latter being shown by stratigraphie evidence to be of much later age; and the local specialisation in South African cultures and technique, which renders inept the application of a West European terminology. While the author refrains from broader inference, pending the opinion of experts on geological, climatological and palÅ” onto-logical evidence in a report now in preparation, the conclusion is warranted that this discovery will have more than local significance, especially as a contribution to the study of the great hand-axe culture, characteristic of Africa, but of highly specialised technique in South Africa, and distributed from Great Britain to India and even beyond.
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Cultural Succession in the South African Stone Age. Nature 136, 58 (1935). https://doi.org/10.1038/136058a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/136058a0