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1. Comparing Prehistoric and Historic Hunter-Gatherer Mobility in Southern Kenya
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1 Comparing Prehistoric and Historic Hunter-Gatherer Mobility in Southern Kenya Sibel B. Kusimba and Chapurukha M. Kusimba This chapter compares the land-use patterns of prehistoric and historic huntergatherers of south-central Kenya. We examine hunter-gatherer mobility patterns during the Later Stone Age (LSA) based on lithic and faunal data from Lukenya Hill.We use similar data to examine mobility patterns of historic hunter-gatherers at Kisio Rock Shelter, Tsavo National Park, south-central Kenya.Tsavo’s Iron Age hunter-gatherers coexisted with farmers and herders and possessed iron tools and pottery. A marked decrease in mobility characterizes the land-use patterns of historic hunter-gatherers of south-central Kenya as compared to Paleolithic hunter-gatherers of a similar environment. Such comparisons can increase our understanding of the particular histories of ethnographically and historically known hunter-gatherers and the appropriate uses of hunter-gatherer ethnographic analogy in archaeology. Archaeologists have long used the ethnographic record of hunter-gatherer societies as a productive source of models of prehistoric hunter-gatherer cultures. Using information from societies like the !Kung San, Lee and DeVore (1968:11–12) assembled an empirical model of hunter-gatherer societies that emphasized high mobility, flexible social arrangements, and exchange and kinship alliances.This model was abundantly applied to prehistoric situations ranging from East African fossil hominids to late prehistoric groups in the northeastern United States (Shott 1992:846). Over time, however, a revisionist perspective has urged consideration of how local his- torical factors influence diversity in hunter-gatherer societies such as that of the !Kung San.Archaeologists are increasingly noting discrepancies between ethnographic and archaeological cases (Sealey and Pfeiffer 2000) and appreciating diversity rather than employing a single empirical model (RowlyConwy 2001).Archaeology has an important role to play in understanding hunter-gatherer diversity since many empirical cases are contained in historical and archaeological as well as ethnographic records (Mutundu 1999). Africa has the world’s longest history of hominid habitation.Furthermore, it may well have the world’s longest history of habitation by behaviorally and physically modern hunter-gatherers who have possessed complex tools and language capabilities for as long as 50,000 years or more (McBrearty and Brooks 2000). Africa also has a rich ethnographic and historical record of hunter-gatherer cultures persisting into historic times and the present day (Lee and Daly 1999; Stiles 1992). Because of its long continuous history of hunter-gatherer societies, East Africa is an appropriate place to examine how they changed over time. One of the most important changes such societies underwent was the introduction of food production and food producing societies into their areas of habitation. In many cases, hunter-gatherers developed exchange relationships with food producers, and indeed survived because of, not in spite of, such relationships (Headland and Reid 1989). Nevertheless, food producers often politically dominated hunter-gatherers (Smith 1998; Thorp 1996;Wadley 1996; but see Cronk and Dickson 2001). In this chapter,we use archaeological data from stratified sites at Lukenya Hill in the Athi Plains of Kenya to infer the site and land-use patterns of its late Pleistocene LSA inhabitants.Using similar data we examine site and landuse patterns from Kisio Rock Shelter inTsavo,Kenya,where hunter-gatherers lived from 1000 CE to the mid-20th century (Fig. 1.1). Finally, we suggest reasons why Paleolithic hunter-gatherers in south-central Kenya appear to have been significantly more mobile than their historic counterparts. Both the Lukenya and Kisio sites are in an Acacia-Commiphora bushland typical of arid East Africa (White 1983).The Tsavo region is drier than the Athi Plains, receiving around 300 mm of rain per year compared to around 500 mm of rain per year in the Athi Plains. Significantly, it is also at a much lower altitude (200–600 m, compared to 1600–1800 m at Lukenya Hill) and very hot. Due to its poor soils and desert climate, it has an abundance of animals that need very little water and can tolerate poor-quality forage (Olindo, Douglas-Hamilton, and Hamilton 1988; Wijngaarden and van Engelen 1985). The present-day Tsavo fauna includes elephant, buffalo, Burchell’s zebra, kudu, impala, warthog, dik-dik, and rock hyrax; large carnivores including lion, leopard, and spotted hyena; primates such as baboon and vervet monkey; and many species of insectivores, birds, reptiles, and amphibians. In faunal assemblages from Lukenya Hill, Marean found an extinct small alcelaphine,the extinct giant buffalo Pelorovis antiquus,oryx, East African Archaeology: Foragers, Potters, Smiths, and Traders 2...