Collaborative Research: Archaeological Investigation and Paleoenvironmental Context of Mining at the Tsodilo Hills, Western Kalahari Desert

乔治·布鲁克博士将与劳伦斯·罗宾斯博士合作，在博茨瓦纳的喀拉哈里沙漠进行考古和古环境研究。他们将把工作重点放在Tsidilo山的遗址上，这是一块岩石露头，数万年来断断续续有人居住。在最近的工作中，调查人员在这些山上发现了13个史前矿山。初步证据表明，这些可能至少有1000年的历史，并获得了一些矿物，如云母片岩和着色剂。在这个多学科项目中，该队将绘制所有矿山的地图和照片。他们将在富含木炭的矿层中挖掘一系列一米见方的地方，以回收年代测定样本和文物，他们还将挖掘矿山尾矿。试验挖掘将在位于其中一个矿山旁边的一个大型彩绘洞穴中进行。该项目的第二阶段包括一个古环境研究项目，该项目将允许重建矿山运行期间的气候和气候变化。有了这些数据，就有可能研究人类与环境的相互作用，并检查采矿活动受气候变化影响的程度。将在该地区收集原位沉积物样本，并确定沉积物的质地和化学成分。将进行桶状占卜，以恢复邻近山谷的沉积物样本和从石笋中收集的薄片，以测量年层数。这意味着应该有可能获得2000年的地层厚度记录，这是降雨量的代表。这些数据将为南部非洲提供最长的高分辨率降雨代用记录，并应允许重建研究期间气候的时间变化。这项研究之所以有趣，有几个原因。在过去的2000年里，猎人和采集者以及农牧民都居住在卡拉哈里。人类学家一直对这些群体之间的长期关系非常感兴趣，并希望知道被许多研究人员称为“纯粹的狩猎采集者”的布须曼人是否真的以这种方式生活。对采矿的研究将为研究相互作用和贸易提供一个基础。特别是应当能够确定哪一组实际上与采矿活动有关。环境研究将为在自然环境中考察人类行为提供良好的基础。许多人类学家假设，贸易网络的范围和强度的变化有助于缓冲环境变化和不可预测性。

Brook In collaboration with Dr. Lawrence Robbins, Dr. George Brook will conduct archaeological and paleoenvironmental research in the Kalahari Desert of Botswana. They will focus their work at the site of Tsidilo Hills, a rocky outcrop which has been inhabited intermittently for tens of millennia. In recent work, the investigators have discovered 13 prehistoric mines which are cut into these hills. Preliminary evidence indicates that these may be at least 1,000 years in age and that a number of minerals such as mica schist and coloring agents were obtained. In this multidisciplinary project the team will map and photograph all of the mines. They will excavate a series of one meter squares into the charcoal rich mine floors to recover dating samples and artifacts and they will also dig in mine tailings. Test excavations will be conducted in a large painted cave that is located next to one of the mines. A second phase of the project involves a program of paleoenvironmental study which will permit reconstruction of climate and climate change during the period that the mines were in operation. With this data it will be possible to study human-environmental interaction and examine the extent to which mining activities were influenced by climatic change. In situ sediment samples will be collected in the region and sediment texture and chemistry will be determined. Bucket auguring will be conducted to recover sediment samples in adjacent valleys and thin sections collected from stalagmites to measure annual layers. My this means it should be possible to obtain a 2,000 year record of layer thickness, a proxy of rainfall. This data will provide the longest high-resolution proxy record of rainfall for southern Africa and should allow the reconstruction of temporal variation in climate during the period under study. This research is interesting for several reasons. For the last 2,000 years both hunters and gatherers and agriculturalist- pastoralist have inhabited the Ka lahari. Anthropologists have been very interested in the long term relationships between these groups and wish to know whether the Bushman peoples - claimed by many researchers to be "pure hunter gatherers" - did in fact function this way. The study of mining will provide a basis for looking at interaction and trade. In particular it should be possible to determine which group in fact was associated with the mining activities. The environmental research will provide an excellent basis for examining human behavior in a natural context. Many anthropologists have postulated that changes in the extent and intensity of trade networks served to buffer environmental change and unpredictability.