Iberomaurusian
 | |
| Geographical range | Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya (not shown on map). |
|---|---|
| Period | Upper Paleolithic or Epipalaeolithic |
| Dates | c. 25/23,000 – c. 11,000 cal BP |
| Type site | La Mouillah |
| Major sites | Taforalt, Ifri N'Ammar, Afalou, Tamar Hat, Taza, Ouchtata |
| Preceded by | Aterian |
| Followed by | Cardium pottery, Capsian, Mushabian |
| The Paleolithic |
|---|
| ↑ Pliocene (before Homo) |
| ↓ Mesolithic |
The Iberomaurusian is a backed bladelet lithic industry found near the coasts of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. It is also known from a single major site in Libya, the Haua Fteah, where the industry is locally known as the Eastern Oranian.[note 1] The Iberomaurusian seems to have appeared around the time of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), somewhere between c. 25,000 and 22,500 cal BP. It would have lasted until the early Holocene c. 11,000 cal BP.[1]
The name of the Iberomaurusain means "of Iberia and Mauritania". Pallary (1909)'s coined this term[2] to describe assemblages from the site of La Mouillah in the belief that the industry extended over the strait of Gibraltar into the Iberian peninsula. This theory is now generally discounted (Garrod 1938),[3] but the name has stuck.
Pallary (1909) originally described the industry based on material found at the site of l'Abri Mouillah.[2]
In Algeria but not Morocco, the industry is succeeded by the Capsian industry, whose origins are unclear. The Capsian is believed either to have spread into North-Africa from the Near East,[4] or have descended from the Iberomaurusian.[5][6]. In the western Maghreb, the Iberomaurusian is succeeded by the Cardial culture after a long hiatus.[7]
Alternative names
Because the name of the Iberomaurusian implies Afro-European cultural contact now generally discounted,[3] researchers have proposed other names:
- Mouillian or Mouillan, based on the site of La Mouillah (Goetz 1945-6).
- The Oranian, based on the Algerian region of Oran (Breuil 1930, Gobert et al. 1932, McBurney 1967, Barker et al. 2012).
- The Epipalaeolithic (Roche 1963).
- The Late Upper Palaeolithic (of Northwest African facies, Barton et al. 2005).
Timeline of sites
What follows is a timeline of all published radiocarbon dates from reliably Iberomaurusian contexts, excluding a number of dates produced in the 1960s and 1970s considered "highly doubtful" (Barton et al. 2013). All dates, calibrated and Before Present, are according to Hogue and Barton (2016). The Tamar Hat date beyond 25,000 cal BP is tentative.
Genetics
In 2013, Iberomaurusian skeletons from the prehistoric sites of Taforalt and Afalou were analyzed for ancient DNA. All of the specimens belonged to maternal clades associated with either North Africa or the northern and southern Mediterranean littoral, indicating gene flow between these areas since the Epipaleolithic.[8] The ancient Taforalt individuals carried the mtDNA Haplogroup N subclades like U6, H, JT and V, which points to population continuity in the region dating from the Iberomaurusian period.[9] In 2016 it has been identified mtDNA haplogroups H or U, T2b, JT or H14b1, J, J1c3f, H1, R0a1a, R0a2c, H2a1e1a, H2a2a1, H6a1a8, H14b1, U4a2b, U4c1, U6d3.[10]
Loosdrecht et al. (2018) analysed genome-wide data from seven ancient individuals from the Iberomaurusian Grotte des Pigeons site near Taforalt in eastern Morocco. The fossils were directly dated to between 15,100 and 13,900 calibrated years before present. The scientists found that all males belonged to haplogroup E1b1b, common among Afroasiatic males. The male specimens with sufficient nuclear DNA preservation belonged to the paternal haplogroup E1b1b1a1 (M78), with one skeleton bearing the E1b1b1a1b1 parent lineage to E-V13, one male specimen belonged to E1b1b(M215*). These Y-DNA clades are closely related to the E1b1b1b (M123) subhaplogroup that has been observed in skeletal remains belonging to the Epipaleolithic Natufian and Pre-Pottery Neolithic cultures of the Levant. Maternally, the Taforalt remains bore the U6a and M1b mtDNA haplogroups, which are common among modern Afroasiatic-speaking populations in Africa. A two-way admixture scenario using Natufian and modern West African samples as reference populations inferred that the seven Taforalt individuals bore 63.5% Natufian-related and 36.5% Hadza-like ancestries, with no apparent gene flow from the Epigravettian culture of Paleolithic southern Europe. The scientists indicated that further ancient DNA testing at other Iberomaurusian archaeological sites would be necessary to determine whether the Taforalt samples were representative of the broader Iberomaurusian gene pool. Since the Natufian samples, which are chronologically younger than the Taforalt samples by several thousands of years, were inferred to lack substantial African ancestry, the researchers also hypothesized that a Maghreb center of evolution for the Natufian-related ancestry could only be plausible if the admixture that was inferred for the Taforalt individuals either occurred after the population ancestral to the Natufians had moved into the Levant or if that admixture event was a locally-confined phenomenon at the Taforalt site.[11]
See also
Notes
- ^ The "Western Oranian" would refer to the Iberomaurusian in Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, but this expression is seldom used.
References
- ^ "New radiocarbon dates for the earliest Later Stone Age microlithic technology in Northwest Africa". Quaternary International. 413: 62–75. 2016-08-22. doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2015.11.144. ISSN 1040-6182.
- ^ a b Pallary, P., 1909. Instructions pour la recherche préhistorique dans le Nord-Ouest de l'Afrique, Algiers.
- ^ a b Template:Cite article
- ^ Camps, G., 1974. Les Civilisations Préhistoriques de l'Afrique du Nord et du Sahara, Paris: Doin
- ^ Lubell, D., Sheppard, P. & Jackes, M., 1984. Continuity in the Epipalaeolithic of North Africa with Emphasis on the Maghreb. Advances in World Archaeology, 3, pp.143–191
- ^ Irish, J.D., 2000. The Iberomaurusian enigma: North African progenitor or dead end? Journal of Human Evolution, 39(4), pp.393–410
- ^ mankind, International Commission for a History of the Scientific and Cultural Development of Mankind History of; Mankind, International Commission for the New Edition of the History of the Scientific and Cultural Development of (1994). History of Humanity: Prehistory and the beginnings of civilization. Taylor & Francis. p. 514. ISBN 9789231028106.
- ^ Kefi R, Bouzaid E, Stevanovitch A, Beraud-Colomb E. "MITOCHONDRIAL DNA AND PHYLOGENETIC ANALYSIS OF PREHISTORIC NORTH AFRICAN POPULATIONS" (PDF). ISABS. Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 March 2016. Retrieved 17 January 2016.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|deadurl=ignored (|url-status=suggested) (help) - ^ Bernard Secher; Rosa Fregel; José M Larruga; Vicente M Cabrera; Phillip Endicott; José J Pestano; Ana M González. "The history of the North African mitochondrial DNA haplogroup U6 gene flow into the African, Eurasian and American continents". BMC Evolutionary Biology. Retrieved 26 January 2016.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|last-author-amp=ignored (|name-list-style=suggested) (help) - ^ On the origin of Iberomaurusians: new data based on ancient mitochondrial DNA and phylogenetic analysis of Afalou and Taforalt populations, 2016.
- ^ "Pleistocene North African genomes link Near Eastern and sub-Saharan African human populations". Science. American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS): eaar8380. 2018-03-15. doi:10.1126/science.aar8380. ISSN 0036-8075.
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