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Encyclopedia of Prehistory
Volume 1: Africa
Encyclopedia of Prehistory
General Editors: Peter N. Peregrine and Melvin Ember
Volume 1: Africa
Volume 2: Arctic and Subarctic
Volume 3: East Asia and Oceania
Volume 4: Europe
Volume 5: Middle America
Volume 6: North America
Volume 7: South America
Volume 8: South and Southwest Asia
Volume 9: Index to All Volumes
Encyclopedia of Prehistory
Volume 1: Africa
Edited by
Peter N. Peregrine
Lawrence University
Appleton. Wisconsin
and
Melvin Ember
Human Relations Area FilesIYale University
New Haven. Connecticut
Published in conjunction with the Human Relations Area Files
at Yale University
Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Encyclopedia of prehistory/edited by Peter N. Peregrine and Melvin Ember
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Contents: v. 1. Africa
ISBN 978-1-4684-7128-1 ISBN 978-1-4615-1193-9 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4615-1193-9
1. Prehistoric peoples-Encyclopedias. 2. Antiquities, Prehistoric-Encyclopedias. I.
Human Relations Area Files, Inc.
GN710 .E53 2000
960'.1 '03-dc21 99-049489
© 2001 Springer Science+Business Media New York
Originally published by Kluwer AcademiclPlenum Publishers in 2001
http://www.wkap.nll
10987654321
All rights reserved
A C.I.P. record for this book is available from the Library of Congress
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the
Publisher.
ADVISORY BOARD
STANLEY H. AMBROSE University of Illinois, Urbana
ROBERT E. ACKERMAN Washington State University
BETTINA ARNOLD University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee
RICHARD E. BLANTON Purdue University
UMESH CHATTOPADHYAYA University of Allahabad
JAMES DENBOW University of Texas, Austin
D. BRUCE DICKSON Texas A&M University
TIMOTHY K. EARLE Northwestern University
GARY M. FEINMAN The Field Museum
ANTONIO GILMAN California State University, Northridge
JONATHAN HAAS The Field Museum
MARY HELMS University of North Carolina, Greensboro
WILLIAM F. KEEGAN Florida Museum of Natural History
LAWRENCE H. KEELEY University of Illinois, Chicago
JAIME LITVAK KING Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico
PHILIP KOHL Wellesley College
ALEXANDER LESKOV German Archaeological Institute
WILLIAM D. LIPE Washington State University
JOYCE MARCUS University of Michigan
RONALD J. MASON Lawrence University
VINCENT PIGOTT University of Pennsylvania
THOMAS J. RILEY North Dakota State University
ANNA C. ROOSEVELT The Field Museum
JEREMY A. SABLOFF University of Pennsylvania
FRED SMITH Northern Illinois University
ANNE P. UNDERHILL The Field Museum
NIKOLAAS J. VAN DER MERWE Harvard University
RICHARD ZETTLER University of Pennsylvania
The Encyclopedia of Prehistory was prepared under the auspices and with the support of the
Human Relations Area Files (HRAF) at Yale University. The foremost international research
organization in the field of cultural anthropology, HRAF is a nonprofit consortium of 19
Sponsoring Member institutions and more than 400 active and inactive Associate Member
institutions in nearly 40 countries. The mission of HRAF is to provide information that
facilitates the cross-cultural study of human behavior, society, and culture. The HRAF
Collection of Ethnography, which has been building since 1949, contains nearly one million
pages of information, indexed according to more than 700 subject categories, on the cultures of
the world. An increasing portion of the Collection of Ethnography, which now covers more
than 365 cultures, is accessible electronically each year to member institutions. The HRAF
Collection of Archaeology, the first installment of which appeared in 1999, is accessible
electronically each year to those member institutions opting to receiving it. Each year the
Collection of Archaeology adds indexed full-text materials on a random sample of the major
traditions in the Encyclopedia of Prehistory. After a tradition has been included in the
Collection of Archaeology, HRAF plans to add materials on the complete archaeological
sequence relevant to the tradition.
Contributors
Stanley Ambrose Northridge, California
Department of Anthropology United States
University of Illinois
Urbana, Illinois
Alicia L. Hawkins
United States
Department of Anthropology
University of Toronto
Sibel Barut-Kusimba Toronto, Ontario
Department of Anthropology Canada
The Field Museum
Chicago, Illinois
Maxine Kleindienst
United States
Department of Anthropology
University of Toronto
Christopher DeCorse
at Mississauga
Department of Anthropology
Mississauga, Ontario
Syracuse University
Canada
Syracuse, New York
United States
Christiana Kohler
Australian Center for Egyptology
Harold Dibble
Macquarie University
Museum of Archaeology
Sydney, New South Wales
and Anthropology
Australia
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
United States David Lubell
Department of Anthropology
Antonio Gilman University of Alberta
Department of Anthropology Edmonton, Alberta
California State University Canada
vii
viii Contributors
Susan Keech McIntosh Andrew Smith
Department of Anthropology Department of Archaeology
Rice University University of Capetown
Houston, Texas Rondebosch
United States South Africa
Fred Smith
Sheryl Miller
Department of Anthropology
Department of Anthropology
Northern Illinois University
Pitzer College
DeKalb, Illinois
Claremont, California
United States
United States
Sam Spiers
Department of Anthropology
Peter N. Peregrine
Syracuse University
Department of Anthropology
Syracuse, New York
Lawrence University
United States
Appleton, Wisconsin
United States
Lyn Wadley
Department of Archaeology
Dmitry Proussakov University of Witwatersrand
Department of History and Culture Johannesburg
of the Ancient East South Africa
Institute of Oriental Studies
Moscow Fred Wendorf
Russia Department of Anthropology
Southern Methodist University
Dallas, Texas
John H. Robertson
United States
Behavioral Sciences Department
Mount Royal College
Frank Winchell
Calgary, Alberta
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
Canada
Arlington, Virginia
United States
Collette Roubet
Hans-Peter Wotzka
Museum National d'Historie Naturelle
Seminar fUr Vor- und Fruhgeschichte
Institute de Paleontologie Humaine
Universitat Frankfurt
Paris
Frankfurt am Main
France
Germany
Stephen H. Savage Thomas Wyrwoll
Tempe, Arizona Frankfurt am Main
United States Germany
Preface
The Encyclopedia of Prehistory represents also defined by a somewhat different set of
an attempt to provide basic information sociocultural characteristics than are eth
on all archaeologically known cultures, nological cultures. Major traditions are
covering the entire globe and the entire defined based on common subsistence
prehistory of humankind. It is designed as practices, sociopolitical organization, and
a tool to assist in doing comparative material industries, but language, ideology,
research on the peoples of the past. Most and kinship ties play little or no part in
of the entries are written by the world's their definition because they are virtually
foremost experts on the particular areas unrecoverable from archaeological con
and time periods. texts. In contrast, language, ideology, and
The Encyclopedia is organized accord kinship ties are central to defining ethno
ing to major traditions. A major tradition logical cultures.
is defined as a group ofp opulations sharing There are three types of entries in the
similar subsistence practices, technology, Encyclopedia: the major tradition entry,
and forms of sociopolitical organization, the regional sub tradition entry, and the
which are spatially contiguous over a rela site entry. Each contains different types of
tively large area and which endure tempo information, and each is intended to be
rally for a relatively long period. Minimal used in a different way. The major tradi
areal coverage for a major tradition can tion entry is a general summary of infor
be thought of as something like 100,000 mation about a single major tradition; it
square kilometers, while minimal tempo provides descriptive information about
ral duration can be thought of as some the environment and culture of the people
thing like five centuries. Major traditions whose lifeways comprised the tradition.
are not quite like cultures in an ethnolog The major tradition entry lacks formal
ical sense because, in addition to socio references but provides a list of suggested
culturally defining characteristics, major readings. Although the geographical and
traditions generally have a more extended temporal range of the major tradition
temporal dimension. Major traditions are entry was stipulated for the authors, they
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