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Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern among Holocene HunterGatherers in SouthernmostAfrica

Author(s): Judith SealySource: Current Anthropology, Vol. 47, No. 4 (August 2006), pp. 569-595Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of Wenner-Gren Foundation for AnthropologicalResearchStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/504163 .

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Current Anthropology Volume 47, Number 4, August 2006 569

Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern amongHolocene Hunter-Gatherers in Southernmost

Africa

by Judith Sealy

Integration of new biological information (stable isotope analyses of archaeological human skeletons)

with the archaeological sequence of southernmost Africa and with wider sociocultural studies of

hunters and gatherers shows that between 4,500 and 2,000 BP coastal hunter-gatherers buried on

the Robberg Peninsula and adjacent Plettenberg Bay ate large quantities of high-trophic-level marine

protein. This contrasts with more mixed diets reflected in skeletons from Matjes River Rock Shelter,

only 14 km along the shore. Assuming that the burials represent the populations that inhabited thesites, such clear economic separation could have come about only if these were two separate groups

of people who lived in clearly demarcated, mutually exclusive territories. Such a settlement pattern

directly contradicts ethnographic studies of southern African hunter-gatherers, all derived from inland

areas. Later Stone Age material culture, including the assemblages from these sites, shows many

similarities to that of twentieth-century Kalahari foragers, but settlement pattern and social orga-

nization were sometimes very different.

Reconstructions of archaeological hunting and gathering so-

cieties in southern Africa have, not surprisingly, drawn heavily

on the rich ethnographies of foragers in the sub-continent.

The issue of the applicability of ethnography to the study of

prehistoric societies is universal among archaeologists. Theproblem is particularly acute in the study of hunter-gatherers,

because although recent (ethnohistoric) accounts of hunting

and gathering people are undoubtedly valuable as sources of

insight into this way of life, our documentary record is partial

and skewed. It has long been recognized that recent hunter-

gatherer communities are a particular sub-set of those that

existed before the advent of farming and that they may have

been organized in different ways (Deetz 1968; Hodder 1986;

Schrire 1984; Wobst 1978; Woodburn 1980). It is, however,

much easier to recognize similarities between ancient and

modern societies than it is to detect differences. By combining

multiple lines of evidence, we may hope to achieve more

nuanced reconstructions of past societies.Among hunter-gatherers, peoples relationship to the land

is a central aspect of life. There is a long history of anthro-

pological interest in these relationships, including access to

land, how this is shared with others, its role in establishing

Judith Sealy is Associate Professor in the Department of Archae-

ology of the University of Cape Town (Private Bag, Rondebosch,

Cape Town 17701, South Africa [jcs@science.uct.ac.za]). This paper

was submitted 23 VI 05 and accepted 6 XII 05.

identity, kinship, and much more. In the wake of the Man

the Hunter conference, hunter-gatherers came to be seen as

generalized foragers in a picture informed, to a considerable

extent, by studies of the Kalahari San. Lee and DeVore (1968)

listed five features of generalized foragers: egalitarianism, lowpopulation density, lack of territoriality, minimal food storage,

and constantly shifting band composition. This picture has

shaped the study of hunters and gatherers worldwide, par-

ticularly in southern Africa, where the origins of many items

of twentieth-century Kalahari San material culture can be

traced in archaeological sites: ostrich-eggshell beads and water

containers, digging sticks, and light-draw bows, probablywith

poisoned arrows, among others. Researchers have also in-

ferred shared belief systems, with the result that nineteenth-

and twentieth-century San people from the Kalahari and ad-

jacent areas have provided the key to understanding Later

Stone Age rock paintings in a tradition several thousands of

years old. These links are not at issue. It is, however, unclearto what extent features such as land use, settlement patterns,

and exchange systems (for example) may have varied across

space and through time. This paper is an attempt to explore

some of these issues in a manner informed but not con-

strained by the rich literature on hunters and gatherers, par-

ticularly that from southern Africa.

Below, I reconstruct the likely settlement pattern and social

organization of Late Holocene hunter-gatherers along the

coast of southernmost Africa on the basis of differences in

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570 Current Anthropology Volume 47, Number 4, August 2006

bone chemistry in archaeological human skeletons. Land use

and band and individual mobility are major themes in hunter-

gatherer anthropology. Most researchers agree that mobility

depended upon the abundance and distribution of resources

in the environment (Binford 2001; Donald and Mitchell 1994;

Hitchcock 1982; Kelly 1983). Of course, this is not the whole

story: there are social as well as economic dimensions tomobility and settlement. Nevertheless, foragers in areas where

resources are sparsely distributed tended to be very mobile:

Kalahari San moved 613 times per year over distances of up

to 350 miles, in contrast to communities in North Pacific

coastal areas, which moved (on average) 2.3 times per year

over a mean distance of 30 miles (Binford 2001, table 8.04

[Kalahari figures exclude the Nharo]).1 These contrasting ex-

amples fit well with Robert Kellys view of residential mobility

as a way to position consumers relative to the locations of

food resources (1983, 294). Rich resources alone did not

necessarily produce settled communities, however; many re-

searchers argue that this required constraints on mobility due

to factors such as increasing population density (Binford 1968;Cohen 1977; Flannery 1973; Hitchcock 1982; Keeley 1988;

Kelly 1992, 1995; Price and Brown 1985).

Where coastal populations were concerned, the richness

and reliability of marine foods meant that there was less need

to be mobile (Bailey and Milner 2002; Bailey and Parkington

1988; Binford 1968; Cohen 1977). Population densities were

higher among coastal hunter-gatherers than in inland com-

munities and often accompanied by greater territoriality,

competition for resources, and conflict (Yesner 1980). Jordan

and Shennan (2003) describe the remarkable situation in

northern North America at the time of European contact,

where between 64 and 80 distinct languages were spoken in

California alone, compared with only 18 the Great Basin andPlateau. Concentrated, highly productive, and reliable re-

sources along the coast led to more settled communities with

localized ownership of resources. We do not have comparable

data for South Africa, because by the time that indigenous

languages first began to be documented coastal hunter-gath-

erers had often long since been displaced by food producers.

Archaeological indicators of mobility/sedentism are aften

equivocal, and even in well-studied areas such as the Cali-

fornia coast it has proved difficult to establish just how mobile

or otherwise archaeological communities were (Jones 2002).

For the Northwest Coast of North America, one research goal

is to document the origins of sedentary, complex hunter-

gatherer lifestyles, and the appearance of large shell middens

has often been taken as an indication of the start of semi- to

fully sedentary coastal settlement (Ames 1994). In contrast,

in South Africa, archaeologists have expected that hunter-

gatherers with clear commonalities with Kalahari foragers

would be mobile, and coastal shell middens have usually been

1. Kalahari data for seven groups, excluding the Nharo. Figures for

the North Pacific are means of data for 29 groups.

seen as one component of a more varied occupation pattern

(H. Deacon 1969, 1970; Inskeep 1987; Parkington 1972, 1976,

2001; Parkington et al. 1988). More recent archaeological

work has explored the possibility that, at least in the second

half of the Holocene, some communities became more settled

(Binneman 1995; Hall 1990; Jerardino Wiesenborn 1996; Ma-

zel 1989a, 1989b). Ambrose and Lorenz (1990) consideredthe likely archaeological expression of different types of social

and territorial organization for both Holocene and Pleistocene

hunter-gatherers in southern Africa.

Interpreting the Southern African Later Stone Age

Artefact-making traditions have been interpreted in different

ways over the past few decades. In the 1960s and 1970s, stone

tools were often considered in relation to the ecological set-

tings in which people found themselves, and possible cor-

relations were sought between artefact styles and subsistence

behaviours. In the past couple of decades the tendency has

been to think of stone tools also as markers of social networks.The Wilton stone-artefact-making tradition (J. Deacon 1972;

Goodwin and van Riet Lowe 1929) was widespread in South

Africa during the mid-Holocene, apart from the interior basin

of the country (J. Deacon 1974). The Wilton is not a ho-

mogeneous entity (cf. Parkington 1980; changes over time

indicated in table 1), but these assemblages are linked in that

they all have highly standardized microlithic stone artefacts,

incorporating a range of retouched formal tools. This stan-

dardization has been taken to indicate links between mid-

Holocene populations over large areas of the landscape, at

least to the extent that people subscribed to shared norms of

artefact manufacture. These assemblages are very different

from those found in earlier and later sites.Archaeologists working in southern Africa have tried to

draw on anthropological studies among the Kalahari San to

understand Later Stone Age societies. Since relatively few of

these studies have focused on material culture, those few have

tended to be especially influential, despite the variation doc-

umented among different San groups in different areas (Bar-

nard 1992). Thus Lyn Wadley has suggested that Wilton

segments (crescent-shaped backed stone microliths) and os-

trich-eggshell beads might have been part of xaro-type2 ex-

change networks in the Later Stone Age similar to those doc-

umented by Polly Wiessner among the Juhoansi (Wiessner

1983, 1994, 1997). Wadley (1987, 1989) has sought to identify

aggregation- and dispersal-phase camps among Later StoneAge sites in the Magaliesberg. Xaro has also been invoked as

a possible explanation for rich assemblages of grave goods

with infant burials in the Eastern Cape (Hall and Binneman

1987). In the Thukela River Basin of KwaZulu/Natal, Aron

2. The spelling xaro is used here in conformity with the standard

orthography in Patrick Dickenss (1994) English-Ju/hoan, Ju/hoan-En-

glish Dictionary. Older articles on the subject often use the spelling

hxaro.

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Sealy Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern in Holocene South Africa 571

Table 1. The Holocene Sequence at Nelson Bay Cave and Correlation with Matjes River Rock Shelter

Date BP

Nelson Bay Cave Matjes

River Rock

ShelterStone Artefacts Other Artefacts Food Remains

2,0003,300 Post-Wilton: Mostly

quartzite, large crudepieces, few retouched

tools (e.g., scrapers),

utilized pieces and

pie`ces esquillees

New types of shell pendants

and bone artefacts com-mon, pottery in last

2,000 years

Marine foods (esp.

yearling and second-year fish, seals)

common; no infor-

mation on shellfish

Layers A, B

3,3007,500 Wilton: Fine-grained raw

materials (esp. chal-

cedony), microlithic

artefacts (esp. small

[ mm] scrapers);! 20

quartz cores (before

4,500 BP), backed

tools (esp. segments)

(before 5,300 BP)

Perforated Donax shells be-

fore 4,500 BP

Bovid remains mostly

those of small

browsers; shellfish,

fish, and marine

mammals consumed

regularly, shellfish

more so after 4,500

BP

Layer C

7,50012,000 Albany: Mostly quartzite,

most common formal

tool large ( mm)1 20

scrapers

Bone ar tefacts, others? Range of species, both

grazing and brows-

ing bovids; marine

foods after ca.

12,00011,000 BP

as post-glacial sea

level rose

Layer D

Note: Dates are for Nelson Bay; at Matjes River the Layer D/C (Albany/Wilton) transition has been securely dated to just over 7,000 BP (Dockel

1998), but dates of the interfaces between the upper layers are uncertain and are suggested here by analogy with Nelson Bay.

Mazel (1989a, 1989b) used the types of backed artefacts, to-

gether with densities of non-lithic artefacts and ochre, to try

to map social regions and study their development through

time. Working along the south-eastern coast, Johan Binneman

has focused on the distribution of different stone artefact-

making traditions, interpreted as symbolic markers of iden-tity (1995, iv). In the Fish River Basin of the Eastern Cape,

Simon Hall (1990) integrated studies of tool type, raw-ma-

terial usage, food remains, and burials to develop a new ex-

planation for changes in hunter-gatherer societies in the sec-

ond half of the Holocene. Hall has shown that, from about

4,300 BP, people began to rely more on riverine resources

such as freshwater mussels, fish, and crabs and to construct

storage pits. He argued that this would have reduced the risk

of seasonal food shortages and facilitated an increasingly sed-

entary settlement pattern, especially in the context of a grow-

ing population. Reduced mobility led to closer identification

of people with the land, expressed through choice of raw

material for stone artefacts and through placement of burials.

Jerardino Wiesenborn (1996) has explored similar themes on

the west coast.

Some of this work has depended on direct analogies be-

tween Kalahari and Later Stone Age societies (e.g, archaeol-

ogists use of Wiessners work on xaroexchanges among the

Juhoansi). Others have pointed to differences in the South

African Later Stone Age record such as the presence of storage

pits in hunter-gatherer contexts after about 4,000 BP (Deacon

and Brooker 1976; Deacon, Deacon, and Brooker 1976; Hall

1990). Storing resources on a regular basis is one of the char-

acteristics of delayed-return strategies in which effort was

invested for future returns (Woodburn 1980, 1982), thus rais-

ing issues of ownership and possible unequal access to re-

sources. This is at odds with what we know of recent southern

African hunter-gatherers. Nevertheless, the Kalahari ethnog-

raphies continue to provide the framework for most inter-

pretations of Later Stone Age (and some Middle Stone Age)

archaeology, particularly in studies of social relations and land

use patterns. In a discussion of these questions, a recent paper

explicitly took the approach of transposing the set of ge-

neralised Kalahari expectations to the western Cape (Par-

kington 2001, 5). The implications of this are far-reaching: it

has been argued, for instance, that the immediate-return eco-

nomic strategies and the egalitarianism characteristic of Ka-

lahari foragers would have impeded the adoption of herding

in prehistory, since keeping domesticated animals involvedinvestment for future return and unequal distribution of re-

sources. If, however, South African hunter-gatherers were al-

ready practising delayed-return strategies, the shift to herding

would have required less of a cultural leap. In this case, spread

of this new way of life by diffusion (rather than migration)

would have been easier (Sadr 2004).

Below I address questions of prehistoric land use from an

entirely different perspective, drawing on a study of diet and

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572 Current Anthropology Volume 47, Number 4, August 2006

Figure 1. Places mentioned in the text. The horizontally hatched areaindicates the modern town of Plettenberg Bay.

economy across the Later Stone Age landscape through stable

isotope analysis of human skeletons.

Southernmost Africa and the Nelson Bay Cave Sequence

The southern coast of South Africa preserves an exceptionally

rich archaeological record, with the past 10,000 years being

particularly well represented. The coastal forelands are at-

tractive for human settlement. Temperatures are mild, with

a mean annual temperature of about 16C. Rainfall averages

around 800 mm per annum and occurs year-round (Schulze

1965, table 45, figs. 136 and 138). There is relatively little

seasonal fluctuation in climate. The coastal plain covers only

a limited area, however, and as one moves away from the

coast the altitude rises steeply to the Cape Fold Belt moun-

tains. Inland of this mountain chain lies the Karoo, the dry

interior basin of South Africa (fig. 1). There are thousands

of archaeological sites along the southern coast and inland as

far as the Fold Belt mountains, including deep stratified de-

posits in caves, open middens, both large and small, rockpainting sites, and more. The sequence is best known from

a few large cave sites, and one of these, Nelson Bay Cave, on

the Robberg Peninsula near Plettenberg Bay, has an especially

complete and well-documented sequence. Nelson Bay Cave

was systematically excavated by Ray Inskeep during four sea-

sons from 1964 to 1979 and by Richard Klein in 1970 and

1971. The findings have been reported in several papers and

monographs (J. Deacon 1984; Inskeep 1987; Klein 1972a,

1972b).

The Nelson Bay sequence is usually described in terms ofmajor culture/stratigraphic periods identified on the basis of

changes in stone artefacts (table 1). Briefly, the early Holocene

layers have yielded assemblages ascribed to the Albany In-

dustry, part of the more widespread Oakhurst Industrial

Complex. About 7,000 radiocarbon years ago, there was a

marked shift to microlithic artefact assemblages of the Wilton

Industrial Complex. Microlithic mid-Holocene assemblages

are widespread in southern Africa (see below).

At 3,300 BP, there was a very substantial change in the

stone tool assemblage at Nelson Bay Cave, as well as in non-

lithic artefacts and some food remains. Fish remains and seal

bone (particularly from young seals) became much more

common, indicating a greater focus on marine foods. Ter-

restrial food remains began to include bones of species such

as blue duiker, indicating the development of more densely

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Sealy Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern in Holocene South Africa 573

forested environments. Informal macrolithic post-Wilton as-

semblages similar to those found at Nelson Bay have also

been reported from the past few millennia at other coastal

sites (Binneman 1995; Sampson 1974; Van Noten 1974). The

overall impression is that we are seeing a far-reaching shift

in economy and material culture, one that is particularly well

documented and securely dated at Nelson Bay Cave but alsooccurred at other sites along the Cape coast.

About 2,000 (radiocarbon) years ago, pottery and domes-

ticated animals, in the form of sheep, appeared along the Cape

coast (Henshilwood 1996; Sealy and Yates 1994; Schweitzer

1979; Vogel, Plug, and Webley 1997; Webley 2001). This marks

the beginning of food production in this region and must

have considerably disrupted earlier hunter-gatherer lifeways.

Nelson Bay Cave does not, however, preserve a good sequence

of deposits from the last 2,000 years and has yielded little

pottery and few sheep bones (Inskeep 1987).

Excavations at other sites along the southern coast have

yielded very comparable terminal Pleistocene and Holocene

sequences or parts thereof (Binneman 1995; J. Deacon 1972,1984; H. J. Deacon 1976; Goodwin 1938; Hall 1990; Louw

1960; Schweitzer and Wilson 1982), confirming that this gen-

eral pattern extends across the southern part of South Africa.

Other Sites at Robberg/Plettenberg Bay

We have little archaeological information from the area now

covered by the town of Plettenberg Bay. Urban development

has destroyed open-air shell middens and other archaeological

remains. Isolated artefacts have been donated to museums,

as have a number of human skeletons. There is more infor-

mation from the Robberg Peninsula, where Nelson Bay Cave

is one of several dozen archaeological sites. Rudner and Rud-ner (1973) summarized much of the available information on

early-twentieth-century collections from these sites, many of

which involved uncontrolled digging and disturbance of ar-

chaeological deposits. These collections focused on the ac-

quisition of human skeletons and on highly decorated objects

such as painted stones and elaborate bone artefacts. Most of

this material is out of context and undated, and therefore it

is difficult to use it to extend our picture of life in the Robberg/

Plettenberg Bay area beyond that based on Nelson Bay Cave.

Walking around the peninsula today, however, one sees large

quantities of post-Wilton material. A 2-m-deep test trench

dug in Hoffmans Cave, about 300 m east of Nelson Bay Cave,

yielded two radiocarbon dates on shell: BP (UW-3,190 110

204) from the top of the midden and BP (UW-3,770 100

205) from the bottom (Fairhall, Young, and Erickson 1976).

Uncalibrated dates on shell are typically about 400 years older

than those on charcoal, so the older of these two determi-

nations is very close to the date of 3,300 BP on charcoal for

the Wilton/post-Wilton transition at Nelson Bay Cave. At

Cave D, near the tip of the Robberg Peninsula, shells asso-

ciated with a burial were dated to BP (Pta-014)1,925 33

(Rudner and Rudner 1973; Vogel and Marais 1971). Of

course, more recent occupation is likely to be more visible

than older remains, but it is clear that there is a great deal

of evidence, from multiple sites, of occupation in the second

half of the Holocene.

Matjes River Rock Shelter

Matjes River Rock Shelter is a rocky overhang on the western

side of the mouth of the Matjes River, which flows out into

the Indian Ocean about 14 km east of Robberg. The shelter

is a long, east-facing sandstone wall which would have af-

forded some shelter and was much used as a camp-site during

the past 10,000 years. This occupation has left one of the

largest shell middens in southern Africa, with deposits up to

10 m deep extending over an arc roughly 50 m long by 16

m wide in the centre (Louw 1960). Most of the archaeological

remains consist of shells, the debris from many meals of shell-

fish collected on the rocks and along the beach below the site.

In addition, there are animal bones, stone artefacts, and items

manufactured out of ostrich eggshell, marine shell, ivory, andother materials. As at other sites along the South African coast,

there are few plant remains.

Excavations at Matjes River Rock Shelter were initiated by

Dreyer in the 1920s and continued by Hoffman and Meiring

in the 1950s (Dreyer 1933; Hoffman 1958; Louw 1960). None

of these men were trained archaeologists, and excavation

methods were crude. We have little detailed contextual in-

formation on the finds, and a good deal of material, including

most of the food waste, was discarded. In 1994, Hilary Deacon

and Willemien Dockel, of the University of Stellenbosch, car-

ried out limited further excavations at the site to clarify ques-

tions of stratigraphy and dating (Dockel 1998). The bulk of

the sample from Matjes River, however, comes from exca-vations in the first half of the twentieth century.

This material was described by Louw (1960). Although his

report is problematic in many ways (Inskeep 1961; Singer

1961), it provides a rough guide to the sequence. Louw di-

vided the deposits into four major stratigraphic layers: from

top to bottom, A, B, C, and D. The sequence is similar to

that at Nelson Bay Cave. Layer A was a shallow layer from

which relatively little material was recovered, making it dif-

ficult to characterize. It did, however, yield a few potsherds,

which means that at least part of Layer A dates to within the

last 2,000 years. The large quantity of archaeological deposits

at Matjes River and the wealth of finds recovered attest to

intensive occupation at the site over a long period.

Dreyers excavations centred on a large trench dug through

the deposits at the back of the shelter to reveal the back wall.

In Later Stone Age cave sites, graves are often located in this

area, and we have the remains of about 120 individuals from

Matjes River Rock Shelter, many of them infants or children

(Morris 1992; my own observations). There are probably

more skeletons in the remaining unexcavated deposits. This

is the largest number of individuals recovered from a Stone

Age site in southern Africa. Nearly all the skeletons are in-

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574 Current Anthropology Volume 47, Number 4, August 2006

complete because of both disturbance of graves by subsequent

interments in prehistory and careless excavation and curation.

Even so, these skeletons preserve a wealth of information

about many aspects of life in the Later Stone Age (Clayton,

Sealy, and Pfeiffer 2006; Dewar and Pfeiffer 2004; Pfeiffer and

Sealy 2006; Stock and Pfeiffer 2004).

Matjes River Rock Shelter is the best-known site in thearea, but there are many more Later Stone Age sites nearby.

Wilson (1988) reported on Forest Hall shelter, about 800 m

east of Matjes River, and there are other sites as one continues

eastward along the Tsitsikamma coastline. Some were inves-

tigated in the first half of the twentieth century (FitzSimons

1923, 1926; Schauder 1963), but no reports were published

and these sites have received less attention from archaeologists

in recent years.

Stable Carbon and Nitrogen Isotope Analysis

Stable isotope measurements of human skeletons are now

widely used in archaeology to investigate ancient diets andhence to try to infer aspects of economy, social organization,

or other facets of life in the past (Katzenberg and Harrison

1997; Schoeninger and Moore 1992). Isotope techniques have

been particularly successful in the investigation of the im-

portance of marine compared with terrestrial foods, since in

most parts of the world these have clearly distinguishable

stable carbon and/or nitrogen isotope ratios (Richards, Price,

and Koch 2003; Richards, Schulting, and Hedges 2003;

Schoeninger, DeNiro, and Tauber 1983; Sealy and van der

Merwe 1986, 1988; Tauber 1981; Walker and DeNiro 1986;

Yesner 1988). The approach relies upon variations in the ratio

of naturally occurring stable (non-radioactive) isotopes of

carbon and nitrogen . The smaller, lighter13 12 15 14( C/ C) ( N/ N)isotope tends to react more rapidly than the12 14( C or N)

heavier one in the chemical reactions that make13 15( C or N)

up the global carbon and nitrogen cycles. This leads to pat-

terned variation in the abundance of compared with13C

compared with that we can use as natural12 15 14C and N N

tracers (for a general summary of this topic, see Hoefs 1997).

In the case of carbon, the ratio of a given material13 12C/ C

is expressed relative to that of Peedee Belemnite (PDB) marine

limestone, the generally accepted standard material. Most liv-

ing organisms contain less than PDB, which means that13C

their values are negative13 13 13 12d C (d C p {[ C/ C sample stdparts per thousand, or per mil, ab-13 12C/ C ] 1}# 1,000sample

breviated as ). The greatest shifts in occur during13 12C/ C

photosynthesis, when plants preferentially fix rather12CO2than out of atmospheric carbon dioxide because mol-13CO2ecules containing the smaller, lighter atom diffuse more12C

easily into the photosynthetic tissues of plants and because

enzymes involved in photosynthesis preferentially assimilate

at the expense of . The value of atmospheric12 13 13C C d C

is at present about . Most plants photosynthesize byCO 82means of the Calvin-Benson or pathway, which discrim-C3inates strongly against , with the result that the average13C

value of plants is around 27, with a range from13d C C3about 22 to 34 (OLeary 1995). Some species, mostly

tropical grasses, use the Hatch-Slack or pathway, in whichC4discrimination is less pronounced; values of plants13d C C4average 13, with a range from about 8 to 16.

Contemporary atmospheric values have become more13d C

negative since the Industrial Revolution because of the com-bustion of fossil fuels derived from plants; the currentC3value is around 8, but for most of the Holocene it has

been closer to 6.5 (Indermuhle et al. 1999). Thus we

should add 1.5 to measurements of modern organisms13d C

to approximate pre-industrial values. In animals, carbon and

nitrogen are derived from food. Animals that eat plantsC3have bone collagen (the major constituent of bone protein)

values about 5 more positive than their food; therefore13d C

the values for -consumers are typically -20 or 21 (forC3archaeological samples) and for -consumers around 6.C4Mixtures of and foods lead to intermediate values. InC C3 4the ocean, photosynthesis is carried out by plankton and ma-

croalgae, which may use the C3 and/or the photosyntheticC4pathway.

Terrestrial vegetation in the southern Cape is a mosaic of

forest, bush, and grassland in which trees and bushes are

and grasses include both and species (Vogel, Fuls,C C C3 3 4and Ellis 1978). Foods eaten by prehistoric humans were,

however, predominantly . Plant foods consisted mainly ofC3fruits and berries, which are all , and the starchy under-C3ground storage organs of plants. There is no evidence thatC3people ate grasses. grasses are likely to have contributedC4to human diets principally via the meat of grazing animals

such as alcelaphine antelope and buffalo. Grazers were, how-

ever, not common in the excavated faunal assemblage from

Nelson Bay Cave, reflecting the limited extent of grassland inthe surrounding environment (Inskeep 1987; Klein 1972a;

1972b). Thus the overall character of the terrestrial human

diet was , with a minor contribution. The ofseafood13C C d C3 4would have varied, depending on the items chosen, with filter-

feeding shellfish such as mussels having values around 16

and seal meat about 12 (Muller 2002; Sealy and van der

Merwe 1986). In previous isotopic work along the South Af-

rican coast, the average value for a mixed marine-based13d C

diet has been estimated at around 16.

In the case of nitrogen, of a given material is ex-15 14N/ N

pressed relative to air. Samples containing more than air15 N

have positive values (calculated in the same way as15d N

values above) and those containing less have negative13d C

values. Atmospheric nitrogen gas is fixed into ammo-(N )2nium, nitrates, and nitrites by nitrogen-fixing organisms. The

first two are taken up by plants and incorporated into plant

proteins and may subsequently be converted by animals into

animal proteins. After an organism dies, its nitrogen-con-

taining compounds may be broken down into nitrogen gas

by microorganisms (denitrification) and returned to the

atmosphere. There is fractionation (i.e., a shift in the 15N/14N ratio) associated with each of these steps. Because of the

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Sealy Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern in Holocene South Africa 575

differential distribution of nitrification and denitrification on

land and in the sea, terrestrial values tend, on average,15d N

to be lower than those in the oceans, particularly for animals

(consumers high in the food chain). Consumers have 15d N

values 34 more positive than the food that they eat, and

top carnivores have the most positive values of all (Minagawa

and Wada 1984; Schoeninger and De Niro 1984; Schoeninger,De Niro, and Tauber 1983). Nitrogen in animal or human

diets comes from protein, and therefore the value of15d N

consumers tissue tells us about the nitrogen isotopic com-

position of the protein component of their diets.

The mean value for terrestrial herbivores from Nelson15d N

Bay Cave between 500 and 9,000 BP is 4.7 1.0 (np

25) (fig. 2). People who ate entirely terrestrial diets would be

expected, therefore, to have values in their bone collagen15d N

of approximately 8934 more enriched than their

(protein) food. Shellfish, especially filter-feeders such as mus-

sels, which are low in the marine food chain, have values15d N

of ca. 510. The values of modern brown mussels15d N

(Perna perna) collected from the Robberg Peninsula averaged7.7 0.8 (np 19), statistically indistinguishable from the

value of 7.4 0.5 (np 12) for mussels collected near

Matjes River Rock Shelter (Muller 2002). Animals higher in

the food chain have more positive values (for measure-15d N

ments of animals from the ocean at Cape Town, see Sealy et

al. 1987). Predators such as seals yield significantly more pos-

itive values: mean for a sample of archaeological seal15d N

bones from Nelson Bay Cave was 16.8 1.7 (np 9)

(Muller 2002).

Understanding the dietary origins of carbon (and hence

) in body tissues is more complicated than for nitrogen,13d C

since dietary proteins, carbohydrates, and fats all contain car-

bon, which may contribute to tissue synthesis in the con-sumer. We are concerned here with interpreting in bone13d C

collagen, which is a protein tissue, so we need to consider

the pathways by which carbon is incorporated into proteins

in the consumers body. We know that essential amino acids

have to be incorporated in their entirety from the diet, and

therefore the carbon atoms in those molecules must derive

from dietary protein. About 30% of the carbon atoms in

collagen are in essential amino acids. The remainder are in

non-essential amino acids that may also derive from dietary

protein, or the carbon skeletons may be partly or wholly

synthesized in the body from carbohydrates or, less com-

monly, lipids (Howland et al. 2003). We do not yet fully

understand what controls these pathways, and they probably

depend on the nutritional and energetic state of the individual,

in females whether they are pregnant or lactating, and other

factors. It may well be the case that, in individuals eating

high-protein diets (such as the coastal hunter-gatherers we

are concerned with here), carbon in collagen comes mostly

from dietary protein. We should bear in mind, however, that

and values of bone collagen may track somewhat13 15d C d N

different components of the diet.

Bone (including bone collagen) grows most quickly during

early life, as the skeleton grows and matures. In adults, bone

is continually resorbed and re-formed, with attendant collagen

replacement. Because this process occurs at different rates in

different parts of the skeleton and slows with age, it is difficult

to know exactly how long a period a particular tissue sample

represents. Adult bone collagen has, however, been deposited

over at least a decade and probably more (Libby et al. 1964;Stenhouse and Baxter 1976). This means that the and13d C

values provide a long-term average of diet over many15d N

years.

Dietary reconstructions based on stable isotope measure-

ments are best treated in a comparative framework. The dif-

ficulty of knowing the exact isotopic composition of the diet

and the metabolic complications mentioned above mean that

it is currently not possible to quantify the contributions of

different foods to complex mixed diets such as those com-

monly eaten by people. Provided that the isotopic values of

foodstuffs remain constant, it is possible to use isotopic di-

etary evidence as a powerful measure of relative diet: to in-

vestigate whether one group ate more or less of a particularcategory of foods than another. Isotope-based reconstructions

of diet have sometimes conflicted with reconstructions based

on the identification of excavated food residues (Bailey and

Milner 2002; Claassen 1988). This may stem from several

causes but is often at least partly the result of poor temporal

and/or geographical fit between the material used in the iso-

topic analyses and the excavated food waste. This is not a

problem in the study presented here. Used with care, isotopic

evidence of past diets can provide a powerful, secure line of

evidence that can be used to adjudicate among the multiple

competing hypotheses with which excavated archaeological

evidence is often consistent (e.g., Inskeep 1987, 3035).

Materials and Methods

The 69 skeletons analysed in this study were drawn from

museum collections. Forty-five come from the Robberg Pen-

insula and the adjacent Plettenberg Bay, while 22 come from

Matjes River Rock Shelter and 2 are from sites about 800 m

east of Matjes River (see fig. 1 and table 2). Some of these

skeletons were dug up by early collectors in the first half of

the twentieth century. Some were revealed accidentally in the

course of construction work, and some are from controlled

archaeological excavations. In only one case, however, was

there sufficient archaeological context to provide a reliable

date, so each individual (except Burial 2 from Nelson Bay

Cave) has been directly dated by radiocarbon dating of bone

collagen. To avoid complications in the interpretation of the

isotope results due to the effects of breast-feeding, only adult

skeletons have been included (Clayton, Sealy, and Pfeiffer

2006; Katzenberg, Herring, and Saunders 1996).

Stable isotope ratios were measured in the Archaeometry

Laboratory in the Department of Archaeology at the Uni-

versity of Cape Town. Small samples of bone were decalcified

in dilute (ca. 2%) hydrochloric acid, rinsed in distilled water,

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576 Current Anthropology Volume 47, Number 4, August 2006

Figure 2. values of human skeletons from Robberg/Plettenberg Bay15d N(diamonds) and Matjes River (squares), together with archaeological an-imal bones from Nelson Bay Cave (triangles), all plotted against uncal-ibrated radiocarbon date BP. Data for animals from Sealy (1996). Crossesnear y-axis indicate mean one standard deviation for modern brownmussels from Robberg (inside plot area, 7.7 0.8, np 19) and MatjesRiver (outside plot area, 7.4 0.5, np 12), and archaeological sealbones from Nelson Bay Cave (16.8 1.7, np 9). Size of symbols asplotted encompasses mean one standard deviation of the radiocarbondetermination. As in Richards, Schulting, and Hedges (2003), dates have

not been calibrated because of the difficulty of knowing the magnitudeof the marine correction factor: this is usually estimated at ca. 400 years,but a recent series of comparisons of paired shell and charcoal samplesfrom Matjes River Rock Shelter yielded offsets ranging from 425 to 35

years (Dockel 1998). The maximum correction for bones in this studyis about 200 years (most positive is , excluding the very recent13d C 11.1outlier from Matjes River). Calibration does not significantly alter theallocation of points to the three time brackets shown here. Vertical linesdemarcate points between 4,500 and 2,000 BP.

soaked overnight in 0.1 M sodium hydroxide, and then soaked

in distilled water until neutral. The resultant acid-insoluble

bone protein, loosely termed collagen, was freeze-dried.

Collagen preservation was excellent: C/N ratios and weight

percent carbon and nitrogen of all samples were characteristic

of well-preserved collagen (Ambrose 1990; DeNiro 1985; van

Klinken 1999). This is as expected in a basic (high-pH) shell

midden burial environment. The isotope ratios were mea-

sured on a Finnigan-MAT 252 ratio mass spectrometer cou-

pled with a Carlo-Erba preparation unit. The standard de-

viation of repeated determinations of homogeneous material

was less than 0.2 for both carbon and nitrogen. Carbon

isotope results are expressed relative to PDB, nitrogen relative

to ambient inhalable reservoir.

Results

The values for skeletons from Robberg/Plettenberg Bay15d N

range from 8.0 to 18.3, with from 18.4 to 11.1.13d C

Skeletons from Matjes River show a slightly smaller range,with between 9.6 and 15.9 and between 15.615 13d N d C

and 11.3 with one outlier at 5.6 (table 2, figs. 2 and

3).

In figure 2, values (which, as argued above, are likely15d N

to provide a more direct index of marine/terrestrial protein

intake) are plotted against radiocarbon date. Analyses of a

series of archaeological animal bones from Nelson Bay Cave

show that the baseline environmental values for have15d N

not shifted significantly during the period of interest. At Rob-

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Sealy Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern in Holocene South Africa 577

Table 2. Stable Isotope Measurements, Sex Estimation (Where Possible), and Radiocarbon Dates for All Skeletons

UCT Lab No. Museum Acc. No. Locality C13d N15d Sex Radiocarbon Date (BP) Sample

7302&620 SAM-AP 5051 Robberg 18.4 12.4 OxA-V-2053-48 207 25 Cranium (styloid)

10989 SAM-AP 5053 Robberg 11.1a 15.9a OxA-V-2065-41 370 27 Cranium

ALB 282 Beacon Island 17.0 8.0 F Pta-8580 570 50 Fibula and ribs

5234 NMB 1704 Plettenberg Bay

12.2 9.3 F Pta-6963 760 50 Left femur10138 ALB (from JB) Robberg 13.4 13.1 Pta-8932 850 50 Ribs

7299 SAM-AP 4898 Robberg 13.1 1 3.4 OxA-V-2053-49 1,226 26 Mandible

5220 UCT 254 Beacon Island 15.7 9.3 M Pta-6820 1,270 50 Left femur

10851 NMB 1707 Plettenberg Bay 14.9 10.6 OxA-V-2064-53 1,394 24 Cranium

10847 NMB 5 Plettenberg Bay 14.3 11.5 OxA-V-2064-49 1,423 26 Cranium

5211 SAM-AP 1878(A) Robberg (Cave E) 13.0 14.4 M Pta-6592 2,170 20 Ribs

5209 SAM-AP 1146 Robberg 14.7 13.1 M Pta-6646 2,240 20 Left femur

5219 UCT 246 Plettenberg Bay 12.0 15.1 F Pta-6812 2,290 60 Ribs

5214 SAM-AP 1889 Robberg (Cave E) 11.5 17.5 M Pta-6594 2,310 50 Left humerus

5215 SAM-AP 1893 Robberg 11.7 16.6 M Pta-6613 2,360 20 Ribs

ALB 50 Plettenberg Bay 11.3 16.9 M Pta-8557 2,380 45 Fibula and ribs

7304&619 SAM-AP 5052 Robberg 11.1 18.3 OxA-V-2053-46 2,416 27 Cranium

7316 SAM-AP 3030 Robberg 13.3 15.1 Pta-7940 2,570 50 Tibia

7301&616 SAM-AP 5050 Robberg 11.7 16.7 F Pta-7927 2,580 60 Innominate

5232 NMB 1639 Robberg Cave 12.2 15.9 F Pta-6965 2,590 60 Ribs

5212 SAM-AP 1878(B) Robberg (Cave E) 12.0 15.9 Pta-2145 2,620 35 Femurb

7311 SAM-AP 5049 Robberg 12.1 16.1 F? Pta-7934 2,740 50 Tibia

5425 UCT 345 NBC Burial 2 12.5 14.7 F ca. 2,750 Ribb

5235 NMB 1705A Plettenberg Bay 12.9 14.4 F Pta-6964 2,780 60 Left femur

7314&614 SAM-AP 5048 Robberg 12.3 16.6 F? Pta-7924 2,780 60 Femur

7305 SAM-AP 6016 Robberg 12.4 1 3.7 OxA-V-2053-45 2,813 29 Mandible

7309&612 SAM-AP 1131 Robberg 13.5 13.2 F? OxA-V-2053-44 3,065 29 Maxilla

5599 NMB 1705B Plettenberg Bay 13.1 13.4 N Pta-6978 3,070 60 Left femur

5208 SAM-AP 1145 Robberg 12.5 15.3 M Pta-2284 3,210 70 Left metatarsalb

5426 UCT 347 NBC Burial 4 14.3 1 3.3 M OxA-V-2055-35 3,236 33 Rib

5210 SAM-AP 1871 Robberg (Cave D) 12.4 16.2 F Pta-2273 3,310 60 Right fibulab

5213 SAM-AP 1879 Robberg 11.1 17.5 M Pta-2283 3,440 60 Ribsb

7319 SAM-AP 1894 Robberg (Cave F) 12.9 1 5.2 OxA-V-2053-43 3,511 30 Mandible

10852 UCT161 Plettenberg Bay 12.1 16.0 OxA-V-2064-54 3,541 26 Cranium

7313&617 SAM-AP 4980 Plettenberg Bay 12.6 15.2 F? Pta-7941 3,605 20 Femur

10846 NMB 4 Robberg 14.2 14.2 OxA-V-2064-48 3,940 27 Cranium7300&615 SAM-AP 3026 Robberg 12.1 16.8 F Pta-7925 3,980 60 Temporal bone and rib

5216 SAM-AP 3021 Robberg 12.0 15.7 F Pta-6595 4,030 60 Right femur

5233 NMB 1640 Robberg Cave 12.0 16.3 F Pta-6983 4,120 60 Left femur

8459 SAM-AP 6326 Nelson Bay Cave 15. 5 10.4 OxA-V-2055-37 4,865 36 Large calcaneum

8458 SAM-AP 6325 Nelson Bay Cave 15. 2 11.2 OxA-V-2055-36 4,897 35 Small calcaneum

10849 NMB 1319 Plettenberg Bay 13.0 13.8 OxA-V-2064-51 5,251 29 Cranium

7303 SAM-AP 1129 Robberg 11.8 17.3 OxA-V-2053-47 5,379 34 Cranium

7395 NMB 1312 Plettenberg Bay 13.2 13.8 M Pta-7983 5,980 50 Fibula

11058 SAM-AP 5055 Plettenberg Bay 12.5a 15.6a OxA-V-2065-42 6,995 50 Cranium

9145 NMB 1324 Robberg 12.5 16.0 OxA-V-2055-38 7,245 40 Cranium

7407 Not accessioned Matjes River 5.6 9.6 OxA-11965 271 20 Rib

7613 SAM-AP 4661 Piet se Bank 13.1 14.4 OxA-V-2055-34 1,310 30 Cranium

7317 SAM-AP 4632 Piet se Bank 15.1 11.8 OxA-V-2053-42 2,183 26 Cranium

5230 NMB not acc MSk 2 Matjes River 15.1 13.4 F? Pta-6944 2,200 50 Ribs

5603 Matj Riv skel #1 Matjes River

13.8 13.6 F Pta-6952 2,280 60 Ribs5225 NMB 1241A Matjes River 12.7 13.5 F? Pta-6958 2,970 60 Right femur

10848 NMB 1242 Matjes River 14.8 11.5 OxA-V-2064-50 3,030 26 Cranium

5222 NMB 1440 Matjes River 15.0 11.4 F? Pta-6948 3,040 60 Right femur

5223 NMB 1273 Matjes River 15.4 11.6 M Pta-6942 3,050 60 Ribs

7408 NMB MSk 5 Matjes River 14.0 10.1 OxA-11939 3,277 31 Fibula

5226 NMB 1241B Matjes River 15.0 12.9 F? Pta-6950 3,290 90 Right femur

5601 NMB 1271 Matjes River 12.9 13.0 F? Pta-6957 3,570 50 Ribs

5224 NMB 1275 Matjes River 15.6 11.9 M Pta-6986 4,850 60 Right femur

5221 NMB 1437 Matjes River 13.8 13.2 M Pta-6947 4,940 70 Left femur

7398 NMB 1596 Matjes River 13.7 10.7 OxA-11937 4,956 32 Humerus

7404 NMB SN4 Matjes River 13.6 13.7 M OxA-11938 5,025 35 Phalange

5227 NMB 1274 Matjes River 13.6 13.2 F Pta-6981 5,120 50 Right fibula

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578 Current Anthropology Volume 47, Number 4, August 2006

7415 NMB Gr1 rib A Matjes River 12.8 13.8 M OxA-11940 5,148 33 Rib

7416 NMB Gr1 rib B Matjes River 11.8 15.9 F OxA-11941 5,368 35 Rib

5602 NMB not acc SS2 Matjes River 13.5 13.0 F Pta-6976 5,370 70 Ribs

5600 NMB not acc SS3 Matjes River 14.6 13.9 M? Pta-6975 5,390 70 Right femur

10850 NMB 1448A Matjes River 13.9 12.9 OxA-V-2064-52 7,295 32 Cranium

5228 NMB 1281 Matjes River 15.0 12.8 M? Pta-6988 7,420 80 Right tibia

5229 NMB 1342 (p MR1) Matjes River 11.3 1 4.9 F OxA-V-2064-56 9,688 36 Ulna

Note: N, Neutral/nonsexable.aMeasured at the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Laboratory.bUsed for stable isotope measurements only; date already available at the start of this project.

berg/Plettenberg Bay, only 7 of 45 skeletons are older than

4,500 BP. This is too few to see a clear pattern, if one exists,

but these individuals show substantial variation in . Be-15d N

tween 4,500 and 2,000 BP, skeletons from Robberg/Pletten-

berg Bay show uniformly enriched values, all . This15d N 1 13

is a relatively large sample (29 individuals), so the observation

is robust. These are the remains of people who ate substantial

quantities of seafood, including high-trophic-level animal

food such as the meat of seals and/or carnivorous fish. In

some cases it was possible to assess the sex of the individual.The values of male and female skeletons are very similar,15d N

at least between 4,500 and 2,000 BP. Men and women seem

to have eaten similar proportions of high-trophic-level sea-

foods. After 2,000 BP, there is a sharp decline in the 15d N

values of skeletons from Robberg/Plettenberg Bay. At that

time, hunter-gatherer lifeways were disrupted by the emer-

gence of herding societies along the southern and western

coasts of South Africa. The marked shift in values may15d N

be linked to the adoption of domesticated stock in the region.

Skeletons from Matjes River Rock Shelter show less chro-

nological variation in . Most have values of around 13,15d N

indicating that people ate a mixed diet with more terrestrial

food and/or low-trophic-level marine food such as shellfish.

Prior to 4,500 BP, on the basis of the small sample available,

values for skeletons from Matjes River Rock Shelter are15d N

not significantly different from those from Robberg/Pletten-

berg Bay (Mann-Whitney Z-value p 0.93, ).0.30 !p! 0.40

Between 4,500 and 2,000 BP, however, the difference is highly

significant (Mann-Whitney Z-value p 4.29, ).p! 0.0001

There are only two skeletons from Matjes River dated younger

than 2,000 BP. The most recent (UCT 7407, BP)271 20

has very positive for its value (d15Np 9.6, d13C13 15d C d N

p 5.6). This combination of values is outside the range

for Cape coastal hunter-gatherers, and the sample clearly de-

rives from an individual who ate substantial quantities C4foods. By this time, farmers practising -based agricultureC4(sorghum, millet, and possibly maize) had settled a few hun-

dred kilometers east of Matjes River. -consumers have beenC4recorded from the southern Cape from the second millen-

nium AD (e.g., UCT 67 and NMB 1704 [Sealy 1997]).

Discussion

It is clear that, at least between about 4,500 and 2,000 BP,

people who were buried on the Robberg Peninsula and in the

area of the modern town of Plettenberg Bay had had a spe-

cialized economy and consumed a great deal of high-trophic-

level marine protein. In contrast, people who were buried at

Matjes River Rock Shelter, only 14 km to the east, had eaten

much more mixed diets incorporating more terrestrial food

and/or low-trophic-level marine food such as shellfish. The

Robberg/Plettenberg Bay values stand out as unusual in the

context of the southern Cape as a whole (Sealy and Pfeiffer

2000). The most enriched values, 17 18, ap-15d N

proach figures reported for skeletons from the Northwest

Coast of North America and Inuit skeletons from Canada and

Alaska (Schoeninger, DeNiro, and Tauber 1983). Clearly,these

individuals ate a great deal of high-trophic-level marine

protein.

The inhabitants of Robberg had a special foraging oppor-

tunity in the form of access to seals. The word Robberg

means Seal Mountain, and the Robberg Peninsula is home

to one of the rare mainland colonies of Cape fur seals (Arc-

tocephalus pusillus) along the southern African coast. Most

seal colonies are on off-shore islands, where the animals are

protected from terrestrial predators. Today, the colonies clos-

est to Robberg are on islands in Algoa Bay, about 250 km tothe east, and Mossel Bay, 150 km to the west (Rand 1972;

Shaughnessy 1993). The fact that Robberg is a long narrow

peninsula with a restricted connection to the rest of the coast-

line may have afforded some protection from carnivores. In

the first half of the twentieth century there was also a small

colony on Beacon Island, a couple of kilometres east of Rob-

berg, within Plettenberg Bay. This is an island only at high

tide; it would have been accessible from the shore at low tide.

The present-day nature and distribution of seal colonies

have been significantly affected by intensive hunting over the

past few centuries. Seals have been harvested commercially

in South Africa since the seventeenth century, with 45,000

animals being taken by Dutch sealers near the Cape of GoodHope in 1610 alone (Hart 1957 in Shaughnessy 1984) in

addition to the catches of English and French sealers. By the

late nineteenth century, at least 23 colonies had been wiped

out (Oosthuizen and David 1988). A colony was, however,

still present at Robberg; a license was granted in 1909 to

harvest seals from Seal Point, near the tip of the peninsula,

and also at Seal Ledges and Walker Point, on the mainland

near Knysna, where colonies no longer exist (Shaughnessy

1984). Vic Cockroft of the Centre for Dolphin Studies and

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Sealy Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern in Holocene South Africa 579

Ocean Safaris in Plettenberg Bay, studying the documents

relating to commercial sealing, has calculated that the Robberg

colony in the nineteenth century probably consisted of around

6,000 animals, compared with ca. 3,000 in March 2003 (per-

sonal communication). Today, the Robberg seal colony is sit-

uated on the eastern side of the peninsula, on a very precip-

itous stretch of rocky coastline. Seals can often be seen battlingto climb out of the water onto the steep rocks, and space on

shore is very limited. Before commercial sealing took its toll,

it is likely that the colony was located at Suidoosbank, near

the tip of the peninsula (Vic Cockroft, personal communi-

cation), where the rocks slope much more gently and there

is a large area of flat rock.

Cape fur seals do not migrate, but they travel and feed over

long distances, up to 50 miles from land (Rand 1967). They

are land-based during the breeding season in spring and early

summer, but they feed at sea in autumn and winter. Thus

breeding colonies are large in summer and small in winter.

Oosthuizen and David (1988, fig. 2) report that at the large

seal colony at Cape Frio, in Namibia, up to 10,000 animalsare present in summer, falling to around 1,500 in winter. The

Robberg colony is today a hauling-out colony, where seals

rest on rocks, rather than a breeding colony and may have

been so in the past. Some animals are, however, to be found

there at all times of the year.

A seal colony such as this would have been a major at-

traction to hunter-gatherers. Food refuse from coastal ar-

chaeological sites commonly includes seal bones; in most ar-

eas, people were able to obtain only animals that washed up

sick or dead and perhaps the occasional individual that came

ashore and could be killed. The age profiles of seals in most

Later Stone Age sites reflect this: the majority of animals are

ca. nine-month-old weanlings, at the age when their mothersare pregnant with the next pup and insist that the previous

years offspring find their own food. Weaker juveniles com-

monly succumb at this stage and are washed up dead or dying

on the shorerich pickings for hunter-gatherers. Seal remains

from Nelson Bay Cave, while still dominated by juveniles,

include more older animals, as one would expect if hunters

had access to a seal colony rather than having to rely on wash-

ups. Animals younger than nine months are, however, not

represented, which supports the idea that this was a hauling-

out colony rather than a breeding colony even in prehistoric

times (Klein and Cruz-Uribe 1996, fig. 5; Klein, Cruz-Uribe,

and Skinner 1999, fig. 2). Estimates of sustainable cull rates

vary, but Cape fur seals reproduce fast: females are sexually

mature by their second year, and they pup every year. Un-

disturbed seal colonies for which records have been kept in

recent decades can grow quite rapidly (Branch and Branch

1981). In addition, it is likely that only about one in five

young males becomes a harem master (Vic Cockroft, personal

communication). Considerable numbers of animals could

therefore have been hunted without compromising the via-

bility of the population.

Seal bones are present at Nelson Bay Cave from the early

Holocene, when the sea reached approximately its present

level after the post-glacial warming, onwards. They are more

common, however, in levels post-dating 3,300 BP. It is not

clear when the Robberg seal colony was first established. The

shoreline shifted in the mid-Holocene, when sea level rose by

about 13 m (Compton 2001; Marker and Miller 1993; Red-

dering 1988). This high stand is dated to ca. 6,000 BP atKnysna (Marker and Miller 1993) and 5,000 BP at Keurbooms

River, with a return to present mean sea level by shortly after

4,000 BP (Reddering 1988). This would have affected seal

colonies, but the animals may simply have followed the rising

and falling shoreline without substantially shifting the location

of the colony.

Cape fur seals eat fish and are near the top of the marine

food chain (their principal predators, apart from man, are

sharks and orcas). Archaeological seal bones from Nelson Bay

Cave have high values: 16.8 1.7 (np 9) (Muller15d N

2002). Consumption of seal meat would, therefore, have con-

tributed substantially to elevated values in human bone15d N

collagen. A seal colony would have provided a rich year-roundstorehouse of food, both meat and blubber. Fat is known to

be a particularly desirable resource to hunter-gatherers, since

the meat of most wild animals is very lean. The rarity of

readily accessible seal colonies must have made those that

existed especially attractive, and these must have been key

localities on hunter-gatherers mental maps of their landscape.

Other foods would also have contributed to high val-15d N

ues at Robberg/Plettenberg Bay. The geographical position of

the Robberg Peninsula, extending 4 km out into the ocean,

with deep water on either side, means that it offers particularly

good fishing opportunities, and deep-water fish species not

usually caught by shore-based anglers are regularly taken from

Robberg. Fish bones are prominent among the excavated foodremains from Nelson Bay Cave, as well as the bones of sea

birds such as cormorants and gannets. The Nelson Bay Cave

assemblage includes bones of the yellowtail fish (Seriola la-

landii), a species not usually caught from the shore and un-

common in archaeological sites. Yellowtail are carnivorous fish

and therefore have relatively high values (13.7 0.615d N

[np 5] [muscle tissue of modem fish]). Yellowtail started

to become a regular part of the fish assemblage at Nelson Bay

Cave above unit 78 (ca. 4,500 BP), reaching about 40% of

the minimum number of individual fish in a number of the

units from 63 (ca. 3,300 BP) to 54 (Inskeep 1987, fig. 68A).

Since yellowtail are twice as large as any of the other fish

caught regularly at Nelson Bay Cave they contributed a sig-

nificant proportion of the total quantity of fish flesh (Pog-

genpoel 1984).

Contrary to initial expectations, there is no significant in-

crease in the values of human skeletons after 3,300 BP15d N

coinciding with the marked changes in food residues and

artefact assemblages at Nelson Bay Cave. Post-3,300-BP levels

yielded substantially more fish remains and more bones of

juvenile seals than older layers. We do not have information

on the relative importance of shellfish before and after this

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580 Current Anthropology Volume 47, Number 4, August 2006

time (Inskeep 1987, 273). If there is archaeological evidence

for a more marine-oriented diet after 3,300 BP, why do we

not see correspondingly higher values in the skeletons?15d N

This is something of a puzzle, but the explanation may have

to do with the trophic levels of the marine foods consumed.

If consumption of lower-trophic-level marine foods such as

planktivorous fish and perhaps shellfish also increased at thistime, then the average value of the diet as a whole may15d N

not have shifted substantially. We need further work to un-

derstand this issue properly. For the moment, we should note

that there was indeed a wider variety of fish species in levels

post-dating 3,300 BP than in earlier layers (Inskeep 1987,

235).

If we turn this issue around and look at it from an ar-

chaeological point of view, it is remarkable that the specialized

economy at Robberg/Plettenberg Bay, with its focus on high-

trophic-level marine foods, persisted across the major culture-

stratigraphic boundary at 3,300 BP. We know that this was a

time of widespread change across the entire region. The shift

in stone tool types from the formal microlithic Wilton toinformal macrolithic assemblages made mostly on locally

available quartzite beach cobbles is the most archaeologically

visible and hence widely documented component of the suite

of changes observed at Nelson Bay Cave. It extended along

much of the Cape coast (Binneman 1995; Sampson 1974; Van

Noten 1974), although nowhere else is it as securely dated as

at Nelson Bay Cave. In other words, this is a change from a

curated technology (the Wilton) to an expedient onea con-

trast argued elsewhere to be deeply rooted in socioeconomic

practice, specifically risk-management strategies (Binford

1977). In the southern Cape this wide-ranging change in stone

tool-making tradition took place across established economic

and social structures without necessarily re-configuring them.In a pioneering study more than 30 years ago, Nick Shack-

leton measured oxygen isotope ratios in growth increments

in Patella tabularisshells from early and mid-Holocene layers

at Nelson Bay Cave. (This species has recently been reassigned

to Scutellastra tabularis [Ridgway et al. 1998]). Shackleton

found patterned variations in across the shells cor-18 16O/ O

responding to summer/winter fluctuations in water temper-

atures. In each of his 15 specimens the most recent growth

increments indicated lower water temperatures: these shellfish

were harvested in the winter months (Shackleton 1973). He

inferred that at this time, between 9,000 and 5,000 BP, the

cave was occupied in the winter. Shackleton chose to work

on Scutellastra tabularis because it is the largest species of

limpet in South Africa. The shells are robust and tend to be

well preserved, and the growth increments are sufficiently

large to be easily sampled. It is, however, a relatively rare

species at Nelson Bay Cave: in most levels it contributed only

a few percent of the total shellfish assemblage, rising to a

maximum of 5% in layers dating to 11,000 to 10,000 BP and

again at about 5,000 BP (Klein 1972a, fig. 4). Inferences about

the seasonality of occupation of the site based on this one

species may be correct; certainly, Shackletons results are re-

markably consistent. It would, however, strengthen the ar-

gument to have similar analyses of other, more common shell

types. Subsequent attempts to apply this technique have en-

countered problems, especially poor preservation of the out-

ermost growth increments in shells from older layers. Some

success has, however, been achieved with Turboopercula from

the last 5,000 years. Turbo is a more common species thanScutellastra tabularis, and the opercula are well suited to ox-

ygen isotope measurements. Analysis of 76 specimens has

yielded much more variable results, indicating that shells were

collected in all seasons of the year (my own unpublisheddata).

In the period of most interest here, after 4,500 BP, oxygen

isotope analyses of shells indicate that Nelson Bay Cave was

occupied in all seasons.

Matjes River Rock Shelter, by contrast, offered no special

foraging opportunities. The fishing spots in this area are sim-

ilar to those all along the southern Cape coast, and there are

no records of seal colonies in the vicinity in historic times.

Unsystematic excavation practice at the site has meant that

food remains were mostly discarded. Examination of the re-maining sections shows that shellfish were abundant. Fish

bone is present, but we do not know the range of species that

were caught or their relative importance. There are a few seal

bones among the small extant sample of excavated animal

bones, but these occur in almost all Later Stone Age sites and

may derive from washed-up animals, as described above.

Quantitative studies of the available excavated materials are

impossible. On the basis of the values, however, it is15d N

clear that diets at Matjes River Rock Shelter included more

low-trophic-level marine foods such as shellfish and/or more

terrestrial foods than those at Robberg/Plettenberg Bay

This hypothesis is supported by the results of the regression

of on for the two data sets (skeletons older than15 13d N d C2,000 BP only, in order to exclude possible food producers)

(fig. 3). The shallower slope at Matjes River (i.e., lower

for given values) is what one would expect for15 13d N d C

lower-trophic-level foods, and the lower value indicates2r

dietary heterogeneity.

The isotopic measurements reported here are of bone col-

lagen, which, as outlined above, is a tissue that turns over

slowly in adult life. The isotopic values integrate foods eaten

over at least the last decade of life and probably longer. Dif-

ferences in between Robberg/Plettenberg Bay and Matjes15d N

River therefore reflect long-term dietary differences at the scale

of individual lifetimes, differences that were maintained over

a decade or more. If the people who were buried in a par-

ticular area were also resident there, then the pattern could

only have arisen in a situation in which there was considerable

social albeit not geographic distance between the two

areas. I infer that there was a territorial boundary between

Robberg/Plettenberg Bay and Matjes River, very likely marked

by the estuary of the Bietou/Keurbooms River (cf. Dockel

1998). This is a prominent feature in the landscape; it is (by

South African standards) a very large estuary, too deep and

wide to wade across. Another boundary existed between the

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Sealy Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern in Holocene South Africa 581

Figure 3. N versus C for skeletons from Robberg/Plettenberg Bay15 13d d(diamonds) and Matjes River (squares), individuals older than 2,000 BPonly.

coast and the site of Whitchers Cave, 14 km inland. Skeletons

from Whitchers Cave had isotope values indicating that they

did not consume marine foods and therefore must not have

spent time on the coast (Sealy and Pfeiffer 2000). This cave

is in the Fold Belt, which here lies close to the coast. It is

very rugged country, dissected by deeply cut river valleys and

difficult to traverse.

Wider Implications

Thus I propose that we can begin to reconstruct an archae-

ological landscape in which, by ca. 4,500 BP, the coastal areas

of the southern Cape were partitioned into territories occu-

pied by separate hunter-gatherer groups. These appear to have

been separated by clear geographic boundaries, and individual

and group mobility was limited to demarcated areas. Further

work may draw out additional details, but the picture thus

far contradicts the generalized forager model derived from

southern African hunter-gatherer ethnographies (although

some groups, notably the !ko, did defend territories [Heinz

1972]). It remains to be seen whether marriage partners, for

example, were obtained from outside territories; further iso-

topic work may enable us to answer this question.

This finding becomes less surprising when viewed in the

context of the wider literature on territoriality among hunter-

gatherers. Elizabeth Cashdan (1983) described two very differ-

ent approaches to controlling access to resources (in situations

in which control is necessitated by competition). The first op-

erates through restricting membership of the social group that

permits use of resources in a given area (social boundary de-

fence). The second involves excluding outsiders from a defined

area of land (economic defence or perimeter defence). Social

boundary defence tends to occur in regions where resources

are thinly distributed and variable or unpredictable. As a result,

territories are large, and the work costs of patrolling them are

high. In addition, expert knowledge of where resources are

located is critical to foraging success, and therefore newcomers

need to link up with locals who have this expertise. Cashdan

argued that Kalahari San groups employ social boundary de-

fence with reciprocal access. The degree of defence varies from

area to area, depending on how much pressure there is on

resources. This system of spatial organization is clearly related

to many features of Kalahari San social organization, including

fluid band membership, with very permeable spatial and social

boundaries. Individuals in societies employing social boundary

defence are often very mobile and may move over sizable areas.

This system is also linked to extensive social networks, main-

tained through exchange or other relationships, which furnish

a safety net of friends and relatives whom people can visit

(sometimes for extended periods) in times of need.Perimeter defence, on the other hand, occurs in areas where

resources are dense and predictable and the costs of defence

are less than the benefits that accrue from controlling the

resource (Dyson-Hudson and Smith 1978). Territories tend

to be quite small, since it is energetically feasible to defend

territorial boundaries only if these are relatively short. Bound-

aries need to be easily recognizable and are marked by land-

scape or other features. Social groups have their own terri-

tories, and individuals do not usually move into foreign

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582 Current Anthropology Volume 47, Number 4, August 2006

territories. Ethnographically, perimeter defence strategies have

been documented among the Maidu and Cahuilla in Cali-

fornia, the Owens Valley Paiute, the Wanniyala-aetto (Veddah)

in Sri Lanka, and possibly the Ainu in Japan. In the past,

when hunter-gatherers occupied more of the worlds highly

productive land, perimeter boundary defence was probably

more common.These two categories may be the ends of a spectrum, and

a simplistic either/or classification is likely to underestimate

the complexity of territorial organization among hunting and

gathering peoples. Even so, perimeter defence certainly fits

the isotopic evidence from the southern Cape better than the

ethnographic/social-boundary-defence model. Cashdan has

noted, further, that we might expect competition to be re-

lated to the magnitude of temporal variation in resource

abundance; if populations are regulated to environmental

resources they are presumably regulated to the lean times, and

consequently populations in varying environments would be

below carrying capacity much of the time. We might therefore

expect greater competition where resources do not fluctuatetemporally (Cashdan 1983, 63). The southern coast of South

Africa is productive, with little seasonal fluctuationjust such

an environment as is described by Cashdan.

To sum up, I propose that hunter-gatherers living in the

area of Robberg/Plettenberg Bay and Matjes River between

about 4,500 and 2,000 BP were more settled than previously

thought. They lived in exclusive, demarcated territories with

clearly defined boundaries. We cannot yet trace all these

boundaries, but one ran between Plettenberg Bay and Matjes

River Rock Shelter, very likely along the Keurbooms/Bietou

estuary, and there was another between the coast and

Whitchers Cave. Future work should try to map the extent

of these territories. A comparison of the excavated artefactualassemblages from Nelson Bay Cave and Matjes River Rock

Shelter is already under way to investigate whether the eco-

nomic differences reported here have material cultural cor-

relates. Two clearly differentiated social groups living in close

proximity to one another might well have expressed group

affiliation through styles of artefact manufacture and use.

We need to develop ways of exploring how a more settled

lifestyle might have articulated with other aspects of life: for

example, exchange networks, including exchange of marriage

partners. I suggest that extensive systems of formal gift-giving

relationships, as documented in the Kalahari, are inconsistent

with the settlement pattern and type of social organization

proposed here. The best-documented system is of course Ju/

hoansi xaro, but analogous arrangements have been docu-

mented among the Nharo and the Nama, though not among

the G/wi (Barnard 1992). This is not to deny the existence of

trade and exchange at Nelson Bay and Matjes River: at both

sites there are items such as ostrich eggshell that probably came

from some distance away. Ostriches are dry-land birds, not

found along the southern Cape coast in historic times, and the

ostrich eggshell in these sites may have come from as far away

as the Karoo. I would argue, however, that in the more tightly

bounded, socially constrained world proposed here, people

would not have neededor been ableto maintain extensive

social networks which, apart from their role in redistributing

goods, provided rights of access to alternative places of resi-

dence and resources in times of need. This is explicitly rec-

ognized: xaro is about unreliable food and water, or at least

it was in the past (Ju/hoan man quoted in Wiessner 1997,167). Such residential mobility conflicts with the pattern in

figure 2 and so could not have been practised in this area

between 4,500 and 2,000 BP. Any exchange relationships that

existed must have been embedded in a different set of social

practices.

There are a number of other questions. How would people

have resolved disputes? Does a more settled lifestyle imply a

greater degree of social complexity (cf. Rowley-Conwy

2001), and how might we go about investigating this question

in the archaeological record? There are no obvious indicators

of accumulation of wealth in the 4,5002,000 BP levels at

Nelson Bay Cave compared with earlier layers. The frequen-

cies of decorative items such as beads and marine shell pen-dants vary through the sequence but are not significantly

higher after 4,500 BP. Some burials were more elaborate than

others, with a greater quantity and variety of grave goods. At

Klasies River, about 100 km east of Matjes River, and at Wel-

geluk, some infant burials were especially richly adorned (Hall

and Binneman 1987). Individual burials are, however, very

variable, and it is not apparent that any social ranking is being

expressed. Hall and Binneman suggested that the elaborate

juvenile burials might represent accumulations of goods ob-

tained in xaro-like exchange networks while the child was still

too young to reciprocate (but see caveat above).

Burials deserve fuller discussion, especially in the light of

work on placement of burials as a means of marking the land-scape in hunter-gatherer societies in Australia (Pardoe 1988),

Mesolithic Europe (Rowley-Conwy 1988, 2001, 2004) and the

Eastern Cape Province of South Africa (Hall 1990, 2000). These

researchers and others have argued that territorial hunter-gath-

erers often (though not always) bury their dead in designated

cemeteries which serve, in part, to express ancestral links to

the land. Is Matjes River Rock Shelter, with its ca. 120 human

burials, a cemetery? This question needs to be considered in

the light of the density of occupation at the site (itself an

interesting issue that might repay closer investigation). As de-

scribed above, Matjes River Rock Shelter is an enormous shell

midden. In addition to burials, it contains a whole range of

domestic residues indicating that it was also an important oc-

cupation site. Along the Cape coast, human burials are often

associated with middens, whether these are in caves, in rock

shelters, or in the open. Many burials from the southern Cape

occur as isolated instances in small open middens or sometimes

are not associated with other archaeological remains at all(Mor-

ris 1992). There is no detectable separation of burial sites from

living sites. On Robberg, burials have been found in all the

large cave sites (Nelson Bay Cave, Cave D, Cave E, etc.) (Morris

1992, table 2). There is therefore no evidence forexclusiveburial

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Sealy Diet, Mobility, and Settlement Pattern in Holocene South Africa 583

Figure 4. Painted seal scapula found in cave at the Knysna Heads

(from Willcox 1963, pl. xvi). Specimen is reported to be inches3

78long (Willcox 1963, 48).

sitescemeteries as Pardoe (1988) defines them. In other parts

of the world, however, this criterion of exclusivity is given less

weight, and Matjes River Rock Shelter might well be considered

a cemetery. On the basis of the evidence we have at present, I

doubt that one can sustain an argument for the existence of

cemeteries in this region. The situation may be different in the

Eastern Cape (Hall 1990).Hitchcock (1982) discussed the implications of sedentism

for San communities along the Nata River, in Botswana. He

found that, with increased territorial identification and de-

marcation, rights of access to territories were more often in-

herited through the male line (compared with the situation

among mobile bands, where inheritance was through both pa-

ternal and maternal lines). This may be one example of in-

creased male influence, which Woodburn (1980) has noted is

often associated with the adoption of delayed-return strategies.

Along the Nata River, collection and storage of surplus foods

became a more regular strategy, with children increasingly in-

volved in household labour. Group size declined (though not

all case studies show this pattern) and marriage partnerstendedto be drawn from closer to home, as argued for territorial

communities along the Murray River in Australia (Pardoe

1988). Hitchcock documented changes in sharing patterns: with

increased sedentism, a greater proportion of sharing was among

close relatives. Economic specialists, such as hunt leaders and

traditional medical practitioners, became more important, and

leaders came to have more influence. Arguments could no

longer be settled by one or both parties moving away, so that

some form of conflict resolution was required. Because Hitch-

cocks study describes hunter-gatherers who were becoming

more sedentary partly because of access to domesticated foods,

a degree of caution is required. Even so, some of these obser-

vations provide material for formulating hypotheses to test inthe archaeological record. For example, were marriage partners

drawn from nearby groups between 4,500 and 2,000 BP com-

pared with earlier (or later) times? More detailed physical an-

thropological work might be able to answer this question.

Future work will explore how the model of southern Cape

hunter-gatherer societies developed here articulates with the

excavated artefactual record. For the present, one can reach

beyond economy and settlement pattern to a tantalizing hint

of the cognitive and symbolic world of southern Cape hunter-

gatherers in the form of a unique artefact: a painted bone

recovered from a cave at Knysna in the late nineteenth century.

The original is in the British Museum, and I have not seen it.

It has been described as a lion scapula, but, judging from the

photograph published by Willcox (1963, pl. xvi, reproduced in

fig. 4), this identification is almost certainly wrong. It is prob-

ably a seal scapula (Graham Avery, personal communication).

It is painted with several somewhat enigmatic black figures, one

resembling a seal and another that may depict two similar

superimposed creatures or, alternatively, a birdlike being. This

is the only painting on bone known from South Africa, but

the style is similar to that of images painted and engraved on

rock in many parts of the subcontinent. David Lewis-Williams

and others have shown conclusively that these paintings ex-

pressed aspects of a complex belief system that encompassed,

inter alia, ideas about how people came to be differentiated

from animals and about interactions between animals and peo-

ple in the spirit world. There is no mention of seals in the

(exclusively inland) southern African hunter-gatherer ethnog-

raphies, but animals that move between one realm and another,

such as flying birds or snakes that live both above and below

ground, were accorded special significance (Bleek and Lloyd

1911; Lewis-Williams and Dowson 1990). Seals, as animals that

live both on land and in the sea, fall into this category. Hunter-gatherers would have known that seals are unusual, among

marine creatures, in several ways: they breathe air, and they are

warm-blooded animals that suckle their young. These char-

acteristics, combined with the probable economic importance

of seals, may have singled them out as special animals, and they

may have had special symbolic associations.

I would like, now, to situate this study in a wider context,

relating it to what we