Prepared core reduction strategies at Kudo Koppie and the modern human behaviour debate

Abstract

The aim of this thesis is to describe the prepared core reduction strategies employed at Kudu Koppie, a stratified terminal Earlier Stone age/Sangoan and MSA archaeological site located in the Limpopo region of northern South Africa, and relate lithic reduction to the variables ohime and raw material. A technological analysis of the prepared cores and endproducts of Kudu Koppie suggests that both the Sangoan and MSA toolmakers employed the Levallois Volumetric Concept, but often exploited a nodule' s natural convexities and form. The MSA toolmakers used a greater variety of prepared core methods and more intensely exploited cryptocrystalline nodules, the scarcity of which may have resulted in a more "formalized" application of the Levallois Volumetric Concept. These observations are considered in light of their cognitive and economic implications, and within the context of the behavioural modernity debate.