THE MOSSEL BAY LITHIC VARIANT: 120 YEARS OF MIDDLE STONE AGE RESEARCH FROM CAPE ST BLAIZE CAVE TO PINNACLE POINT

摘要

George Leith's investigations at Cape St Blaize Cave in the late 1880s laid the foundations for an influential set of studies on the Middle Stone Age in and around Mossel Bay. Those studies, and particularly the descriptions of the lithics from Cape St Blaize, have figured prominently in discussions of Middle Stone Age lithic variation in South Africa. The lithics from Cape St Blaize form the basis of the Mossel Bay, which has been variously defined as a culture, industry, variant, technique, and sub-stage. We review past and present usage of the Mossel Bay lithic variant and conclude that our understanding is fraught with ambiguity and lack of precision due to the selective nature of the original collection and the lack of a complete published description and analysis of the type-site. We then report on the first complete study of the Cape St Blaize lithic sample and compare it to more recent, complete, and well-dated samples from nearby Pinnacle Point. The Cape St Blaize collection differs from those at Pinnacle Point in several important ways, despite the relative proximity. To correctly define the Mossel Bay, the original type-site needs to be reinvestigated with better stratigraphic control, unbiased samples, and radiometric dating.