African Archaeological Review, Vol. 15, No.

3, 1998

Barbed Bone Points: Tradition and Continuity

in Saharan and Sub-Saharan Africa
John E. Yellen1

Examination of African barbed bone points recovered from Holocene sites

provides a context to interpret three Late Pleistocene occurrences from Katanda
and Ishango, Zaire, and White Paintings Shelter, Botswana. In sites dated to
ca. 10,000 BP and younger, such artifacts are found widely distributed across
the Sahara Desert, the Sahel, the Nile, and the East African Lakes. They are
present in both ceramic and aceramic contexts, sometimes associated with
domesticates. The almost-universal presence of fish remains indicates a
subsistence adaptation which incorporates a riverine/lacustrine component.
Typologically these points exhibit sufficient similarity in form and method of
manufacture to be subsumed within a single African "tradition." They are
absent at Fayum, where a distinct Natufian form occurs. Specimens dating to
ca. 20,000 BP at Ishango, possibly a similar age at White Paintings Shelter,
and up to 90,000 BP at Katanda clearly fall within this same African tradition
and thus indicate a very long-term continuity which crosses traditionally
conceived sub-Saharan cultural boundaries.

L'etude des pointes barbelees en os del' Holocene africaine fournit un contexte

a l'interpretation de trois gisements du Pleistocene superieure, notamment,
Katanda et Ishango (en Republique Democratique du Congo, ex-Zaire), et
White Paintings Shelter au Botswana. Cettes pointes ont une distribution
etendue a travers le Sahara, le Sahel, le Nil et les grands lacs du rift d'Afrique
orientale, notamment sur certains sites datant de 10,000 ans avant notre ere.
Ces pointes sont associees avec des types d'industries ceramiques ou
aceramiques, avec ou sans squelettes de faune domestiques, mais toujours avec
des squelettes de poisson, indiquent une subsistence comportant des ressources
lacustres ou riveraines. Sur le plan typologique, cettes pointes presentent une
telle ressemblance, soit de forme, soit de manufacture, qu'elles constituent une
tradition unique africaine. Au Fayum en Egypte, les formes des pointes
1
National Science Foundation, 4201 Wilson Boulevard, Arlington, Virginia 22230.

173
0263-0338/98/0900-0173$15.00/0 C 1998 Plenum Publishing Corporation
174 Yellen

rappellent, par contre, plutot les series Natufiennes du Levant. Les pointes
barbelees d'Ishango, datant de 20,000 ans environ, celles de White Paintings
Shelter, datant probablement de la meme epoque, et celles de Katanda datant
au maximum de 90,000 ans BP, appartiennent a la meme tradition africaine,
ce qu montre ainsi l'existence d'une continuite de tres longue duree atravers
les frontieres culturelles traditionelles.
KEY WORDS: barbed bone points; Africa; Upper Pleistocene; Holocene; Katanda; Ishango.

INTRODUCTION

In two 1995 articles, Brooks et al. and Yellen et al. describe a series
of worked bone artifacts from Katanda, a series of Middle Stone Age
(MSA) sites on the current bank of the Semliki River in the Rift Valley
in eastern Zaire. Dated to ca. 90,000 years, the single-row barbed bone
points which constitute the majority of the collection are unique because
they provide the sole examples of carefully crafted complex bone artifacts
associated with the MSA. They may precede the next securely dated ex-
amples by perhaps as much as 70,000 years. Quite surprisingly, the latter
series, which dates to ca. 20,000 BP, also stands in near-chronological iso-
lation and was excavated at two sites from Ishango (de Heinzelin, 1957,
1962; Brooks and Smith, 1987) also located in the Semliki Valley, only 6-7
km upstream of Katanda. The purpose of this article is to consider these
two apparent anomalies within the context of a widespread African barbed
bone point tradition and to examine the implications for modes of social
organization and cultural transmission.

BARBED BONE POINTS IN AFRICA

On the basis of excavation at two sites near the Nile River at Khar-
toum, Arkell (1949, 1953) (Fig. 1) defined a "Khartoum Mesolithic" and
"Khartoum Neolithic," the former lacking in domesticated fauna and the
latter with goat and possibly sheep. Neither site is directly radiocarbon
dated and both contain characteristic forms of wavy line pottery widespread
in Eastern Africa and the Sahel, a microlithic stone industry, grindstones,
a wide range of nondomestic fauna including fish, crocodile, and hippo-
potamus and a series of barbed bone points. On the basis of these and a
number of subsequent finds across this broad region, Sutton (1974, 1977)
defined an "Aquatic Civilization" or "African Aqualithic" with a postulated
origin at ca. 9000 years ago and characterized by utilization of fish and
other aquatic resources, barbed bone harpoons, and the sometime presence
Barbed Bone Points 175

Fig. 1. Map showing location of sites. 1, Abu Darbein, Aneibis; 2, Amekni; 3, Araouane, Erg
Ine Sakane; 4, Bornu, Daima; 5, Catfish Cave; 6, El Damer, Shaqadud; 7, Fayum; 8, FxJj12,
GaJjll; 9, Gambles Cave; 10, Guli, Shabona, Tagra; 11, Hospital Site; 12, Shaheinab, Sararub,
Ishango, Katanda; 13, Kourinkoro-kale; 14, Lopoy, Lothagam; 15, Lowasera; 16, Meniet; 17,
Ntero; 18, Omo; 19, Taforalt; 20, White Paintings Shelter.

of wavy line pottery. Sutton associated this distribution with a hydrological

pattern of expanded rivers and lakes which accompanied early to mid-Holo-
cene periods of increased rainfall.
Analyses of lake levels, fluviolacustrine sediments, and diatoms permit,
in a general way, the reconstruction of late Pleistocene and Holocene in
lake levels and rainfall patterns across the Sahel, and southwards into the
East African Rift and portions of southern Africa. A period of aridity be-
ginning at ca. 20,000 BP is evident in both the Chad Basin and East Africa;
this ended ca. 13,000 years ago with the initiation of climatic oscillations
176 Yellen

which continue to the present (Brooks and Robertshaw, 1990). In the Chad
Basin both Servant and Servant-Vildary (1980) and Roset (1987) note a
first interval of increased moisture from ca. 12,000 to 10,600 BP accompa-
nied by the expansion of Lake Chad. A second and more pronounced wet
interval with major lake transgression dates to approximately 10,000 to 8000
BP and Servant notes succeeding shorter wet phases at ca. 6000 and 3500
to 3000 BP, all separated by arid periods. East African data from Lake
Turkana and smaller Rift Valley lakes indicate a similar pattern (Butzer et
al., 1972; Livingstone, 1980): late Pleistocene aridity, a pronounced wet
phase ca. 10,000 to 8000 years ago, and a second wet interval from ca.
6000 to 4000 BP. Lakes in the central Sahara to the South of Tibesti, Tassili,
and Ahaggar, in association with archaeological materials as old as the
ninth millennium BP (Camps, 1982), indicate a rainfall pattern and hydro-
logical regime significantly different from the present. The initiation of Sut-
ton's "Aquatic Civilization" in the Sahel and East Africa appears associated
with the ca. 10,000 to 8000 BP wet interval. In the summer rainfall zone
of southern Africa a different pattern applies. The northern Kalahari, which
has yielded one series of barbed bone points (Robbins et al., 1994), expe-
rienced increased precipitation between ca. 17,000 and 12,000 BP, with at
least three additional intervals between 8000 and 2000 BP (Thomas and
Shaw, 1991).
Geological context, the presence in some cases of pottery and domes-
ticates, and, in many instances, radiocarbon dates demonstrate that sites
with barbed bone points are, for the most part, post-Pleistocene and asso-
ciated with periods of increased precipitation and high water levels. How-
ever, the picture is far from complete. Many finds consist of surface
occurrences; many lack absolute dates and many are also unpublished. Vast
areas of Equatorial Africa which hold potentially relevant information re-
main archaeologically unknown. The distribution of archaeologically rele-
vant Holocene sites is limited essentially to arid and semiarid environments
which are amenable to survey and which lack significant recent deposition.
Within this far from perfect archaeological context, however, a general pat-
tern is clear.
In East Africa, northern Kenya sites associated with Lake Turkana raised
beaches provide a consistent picture. At Lowasera, located on the western side
of the lake, Phillipson (1977) excavated a stratified site associated with a
beachline 70-80 m above the current lake level. Early units, 11-7, yielded bone
apatite radiocarbon dates between 9420 and 7735 BP. In addition to barbed
bone points, the industry included microliths, fish, and riverine-related fauna
but lacked both pottery and domesticates. The upper part of the sequence,
units 5-1, yielded similar material with the addition of pottery. Barthelme
(1977, 1985) located a series of both in situ and surface occurrences on the
Barbed Bone Paints 177

northeastern Turkana shoreline. Most consist of either surface or undated ma-

terials but two sites, GaJj11 and FxJj12, have shell radiocarbon dates and are
in secure stratigraphic context. Associated with a 75- to 80-m beach and dated
to 8710 BP and 8394 BP, respectively, the sites contain barbed bone points
and a lithic industry which includes microliths but neither pottery nor domestic
fauna. GaJj11 fauna consists almost entirely of fish with small amounts of hip-
popotamus and crocodile bone, while FxJjl2 includes a wider range of land
mammals. At Lothagam, on the west side of Lake Turkana, Robbins (1974)
excavated a series of sites also associated with a raised beach. The majority of
cultural material derives from his "Middle Excavation" included within a
stratified sand unit which overlies mollusks radiocarbon dated to 7160 BP.
Based on a stratigraphic correlation with the Kibish IVB formation at Omo,
Robbins estimates an age of 7000-6000 BP. The industry includes barbed bone
points as well as other worked bone, microliths, ceramics, a fauna of over 95%
fish, only rare land mammals, and no domesticates. Taken together, the
Turkana sites indicate a microlithic tradition clearly associated with a laucus-
trine adaptation, initiated during the first Holocene wet phase, lacking in pot-
tery prior to ca. 7000 years ago and lacking domestic fauna until at least 3200
BP. It is of potential interest, and perhaps most easily explained as a sampling
artifact, that the earliest domesticated cattle, sheep, and goat from the east
side of Lake Turkana date to ca. 800 years earlier at the site of GaJi4 (Mar-
shall et al., 1984). Robbins' (1980) excavations at Lopoy, on the west side of
the lake demonstrate that bone points continue in the region for another two
millennia. Dated to 1275-870 BP, Lopoy contains points in association with
sheep/goat bones. Barbed bone points have also been found in surface con-
texts to the west of Lake Turkana (Whitworth, 1965) and to the north in the
Omo River Valley (Brown, 1975). Nelson (1991) reports on a series of barbed
bone sites from the spit at Koobi Fora. He divides these into four periods, the
first three aceramic and the fourth Iron Age with cattle and ovicaprids. How-
ever, all lack absolute dates. Suggested dates of 10,000 to 8000 BP for the
Omo finds and 9000 to 8000 BP for Gambles Cave near Lake Nakuru add to
a consistent picture.
A second series of sites lies along the Nile and White Nile from the
island of Guli, 210 km south of Khartoum, to Catfish Cave (DI-21B) be-
tween Abu Simbel and Aswan. Also associated with this geographic cluster
are additional occurrences near the junction of the White Nile and Atbara
River 350 km north of Khartoum. Cultural layers from Catfish Cave, lo-
cated in a rockshelter ca. 80 m from the current Nile, lack pottery and
contain catfish bones, microliths, and barbed bone points. An overlying
layer is radiocarbon dated to 7060 BP (Wendt, 1966). An additional eight
sites which span ca. four millennia between ca. 9300 BP and 5500 BP also
fall within the designation of "Khartoum Mesolithic." They contain pottery,
178 Yellen

most often with wavy line and/or dotted wavy line decoration, barbed bone
points, an aquatic focus as reflected in abundant fish remains, and a variety
of mammalian fauna. Domestic plants and animals are lacking. Pottery at
Sararub ca, 30 km north of Khartoum (Khabir, 1987), dates to ca. 9300
BP and predates by several millennia its first appearance in the East Af-
rican barbed bone point sites. Adamson et al (1974) and Clark (1989) report
on three sites located along the White Nile: Tagra, 8130 BP; Shabona, with
dates of 7470 and 7050 BP; and Guli, 5500 BP. The Hospital Site at Khar-
toum was excavated by Arkell (1949) and provides the type site for the
Khartoum Mesolithic but lacks radiocarbon dates. Three Atbara sites, El
Damer, Abu Darbein, and Aneibis (Haaland, 1995), are dated by a suite
of radiocarbon determinations which range from 8640 to 6820 BP and to-
gether provide the most complete picture of this adaptation. They are large,
up to 7000 m2, with an estimated original thickness of up to 1.5 m of cul-
tural debris. As many as 30 species of fish, including floodplain and open-
water forms, and 3 species of mollusks were exploited. Mammalian fauna
range from elephant and giraffe through buffalo and smaller bovids to small
mammals such as mongoose. Plant remains including tree fruits and grass
seeds occur both directly and as pottery imprints. The lithic industry is mi-
crolithic and sites contain barbed bone points. Pottery is abundant, al-
though wavy line designs are rare and it is uncertain whether shells and a
gazelles skull recovered in human graves represent burial offerings. At Sha-
heinab, the "Khartoum Neolithic" type site located 30 km north of Khar-
toum, Arkell (1953) recovered goat/sheep remains in addition to barbed
bone points, microliths, wavy line pottery, and a wide range of mammals
and fish. Radiocarbon dates range from 5060 to 5455 BP (Hassan, 1986)
and it appears that domestic animals appear first in Nile sites and only
later in East Africa.
Monod and Mauny (1957) summarize a series of sites with barbed
bone points which lie today within the southwestern Sahara and extend in
a broad arc across Chad, Mali, and Niger. Most are surface occurrences
associated with fossil lake shores although one, Kourinkoro-Kale, near
Bamako, is located in a rock shelter. While many consist of undated surface
finds in possibly mixed contexts, excavations by Gallay (1966) and Petit-
Maire et al. (1983) in a number of locales in the Araouane region of Mali
have provided a series of radiocarbon dates and a general overview of sub-
sistence and material culture. Fish bone at Hassi el Abiod yielded an age
of 6970 BP and a series of dates from Erg Ine Sakane on charcoal, bovid,
and fish bone gave a range from 6590 to 3750 BP. Petit-Marie et al. (1983)
place these within two distinct Saharan wet phases. It is clear that these
southwestern Sahara occurrences postdate their earliest East African and
Nile counterparts. The sites themselves offer a consistent picture. All con-
Barbed Bone Points 179

tain pottery, some in wavy line tradition. Lithics include microliths and pol-
ished stone tools, and barbed bone points and bone fish hooks are also
present. All sites lack domesticates, and in addition to fish, faunas typically
include crocodile, hippopotamus, and a wide range of other species. Petit-
Marie et al. (1983) note an extreme density of material at some sites and
the presence of large jars. Burials also occur, and as at Atbara, this implies
more than ephemeral settlement. In common with Lopoy in East Africa,
and Shaheinab in the Sahel, barbed bone points persist in different con-
texts. At Ntereso, a fourth millennium BP site (1440-1910 Cal BC) on the
White Volta in Ghana (Davies, 1973), they are associated with goats as
well as fish and other nondomestic fauna. They are also found at the eighth
century BC site of Bornu in Northeast Nigeria and at the nearby site of
Daima occur in association with cattle, goats and sorghum from the sixth
century BC into the midfirst millennium AD. Phillipson (1982) notes that
their use is abandoned soon after the appearance of iron. Iron points them-
selves have a long history in sub-Saharan Africa and continue in use today
on Lake Rutingaze and in the Sudan.
Within Africa, barbed bone points have been recovered as far north
as Morocco and South to the Kalahari. Camps (1982) describes central
Saharan sites ascribed to the Saharan Sudanese Neolithic associated with
now dried lakes and wadis south of Tibesti, Tassili, and Ahaggar. They con-
tain microliths, pottery, a mix of laucustrine and nonlaucustrine faunal re-
sources, and possibly cultivated millet. Amekni has a radiocarbon date of
8050 BP and Meniet, ca. 300 km to the north, a date of ca. 5400 BP, both
within the time span of the more southerly Saharan sites. At Taforalt, Mo-
rocco, ca. 175 km southwest of Oran, a single fragmentary barbed bone
point (Fig. 2, 33) is associated with an Iberomaurusien industry in a level
bracketed by radiocarbon dates of 10,800 and 12,070 BP (Camps, 1974).
In the Fayum depression, Caton-Thompson and Gardner (1934) collected
a series of barbed bone points, all surface finds (Fig. 2, 32), which they
associated with a "Fayum B" industry which is dated from the mid seventh
to eighth millennium (Adamson et al., 1974). This industry corresponds to
Wendorf and Schild's (1976) Qarunian, which contains similar points as
well as a small point crafted from a catfish spine (Fig. 2, 47).
The southernmost African barbed bone points were excavated by Rob-
bins and colleagues at White Paintings Shelter in the Tsodilo Hills of north-
ern Botswana (Robbins et al., 1994) in a Late Stone Age context. Most
specimens occur in a unit with an estimated age of ca. 4000 to 5000 BP.
The youngest overlies a 2260 BP charcoal sample and is associated with
pottery, while the oldest may be late Pleistocene in age (Fig. 2, 48). The
points occur with large numbers of fish remains, likely derived from the
adjacent extinct Lake Tsodilo, and wetland mammals such as reedbuck and
180 Yellen

lechwe are present. Although Stow (1905) reports on San ethnographic use
of such points, it is interesting to note that none occur in any of the nu-
merous Late Stone Age sites in Zimbabwe or South Africa. Over their
entire range, the primarily post-Pleistocene barbed bone point industries
share a number of commonalties. They are associated with periods of in-
creased precipitation, are usually located on fossil shorelines, and reflect a
subsistence adaptation which emphasizes laucustrine and riverine resources.
In some areas barbed bone points predate pottery, while in others the ap-
pearance of the two coincide. In all regions of Africa they are present be-
fore domestic livestock and in eastern and western regions as well as the
Sudan they continue after the introduction of goat and sheep. Given their
enormous geographical extentfrom Morocco to Botswanaand the dif-
ferent pottery traditions with which they occur, it is also clear that they
are not associated with one single, tightly defined ethnic or cultural group.

BARBED BONE POINTS: A BROADER

ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND ETHNOGRAPHIC
PERSPECTIVE

Archaeologically, barbed bone points are almost worldwide in distri-

bution and have been found in all major regions of the Old World with
the exception of Australia and South Africa. Likewise they occur widely in
the New World, absent only in Middle America and the northwestern por-
tion of South America. (Troeng, 1993, p. 93). The earliest well-dated non-
African specimens are associated with the 14,000 BP Magdalenian levels
at Tito Bustillo cave in northern Spain. Barbed bone points are rare in the
Natufian; the largest sample, seven specimens, from Kebara Cave, Israel,
is dated to ca. 11,000 BP. New World data are particularly interesting be-
cause, in addition to numerous sites with series of barbed bone pointses-
pecially in the Arctic and Northwest Coast of the United States and
Canadaa wealth of ethnographic data is available. For example, Mason
(1900) provides a monographic description.
Points may be classified either as "fixed," when permanently attached
to a spear or arrow shaft, or as "harpoons," when they separate from a
shaft on impact and remain attached to it by line. Two characteristics of
harpoons provide advantages over fixed barbed points in certain situations.
First, toggling harpoons, which are asymmetric, "toggle" or turn at an angle
after penetration and this deviation of the long axis of the point from the
axis of the entrance wound provides increased holding power. Second, fixed
hafts of necessity are designed to hold a point firmly during penetration
and they are susceptible to breakage from lateral forces which can be cre-
Barbed Bone Points 181

ated as prey struggle. A harpoon point after detachment is not subject to

this same limitation. Harpoons may be attached to floats or to a boat itself
to impede movement and to tire the prey. In ethnographic examples har-
poons normally have either a perforation near the base to hold a line or
a constriction or throat which limits slippage of the line in either direction.
The presence of such clearly defined throats from the tip of South America
through the Arctic suggests a significant functional role. In contrast, Mason
(1900, p. 213) illustrates a single fixed point in a mount collected in eth-
nographic context from the Straits of Magellan; it has a series of small
notches on the butt and is set into a split shaft with line wrapped around
it to squeeze the sides tightly against the point. The notches serve to catch
the binding and thus hold the point more firmly in place. The piece is
interesting because many African specimens exhibit similar butt notching.
Ethnographic data indicate that barbed bone points were used to pur-
sue multiple types of prey. These included fish of many sizes and sea mam-
mals as well as land mammals such as caribou and humans (Aigner, 1966).
They have been attached to spears, lances, and arrows. In his summary of
the ethnographic literature, Simek (1983) notes that barbed points can be
both functionally specific and typologically diverse. The Ingalik Eskimo, for
example, had five distinct forms of point each with a particular function:
one for large land mammals, another for large fish, etc. Morphological fea-
tures such as tip length and number of barbs varied accordingly.

Typological Analysis

As a plastic medium, bone lies between grasslike substances such as

chert and obsidian, which are limited by properties of conchoidal fracture,
and clay, which is equally and easily malleable in three dimensions. While
free-standing so-called Venus figurines and other classes of the European
Upper Paleolithic artifacts demonstrate that careful shaping of bone is pos-
sible with a lithic technology, two practical constraints limit variability in
finished artifact form. For a tool such as a barbed bone point which must
resist breakage from impact and other forces associated with its use, inter-
nal structure imposes the first limitation. Bone consists of collagen, a fi-
brous protein, stiffened by hydroxyapatite (Knecht, 1994a, b), and its
mechanical characteristics are dependent on fiber alignment. Compact
bone, which forms the walls of mammalian longbone, is most resistant to
fracture and thus most suitable for point manufacture. However, in contrast
to both stone and clay, bone has a directional "grain" and its resistance to
stress varies with the direction from which force is applied. Size imposes
a second limitation. While the many mammalian longbones are long
enough to impose no practical constraints in this dimension, width is limited
182 Yellen

by the diameter and degree of bone curvature. Likewise, the maximum

point thickness is determined by the thickness of the compact bone wall.
The first studies of barbed bone point typology focused on European
Magdalenian material; Breuil (1903) and Deffarge et al. (1974) developed
an extensive set of attributes to examine chronologically related change in
form. Perhaps because artifacts themselves are so scattered and so many
of them unpublished and undated, no comprehensive system has been de-
signed for the typologically distinct African material and analyses have been
conducted on an ad hoc basis. Camps-Fabrer (1968) published a typology
based on West African materials and this distinguishes point types on the
basis of butt form. She later (1983) adopted an attribute approach, devel-
oped by Gallay (1966), which was also derived from West African points.
However, the system has not enjoyed wide use and is not employed in the
discussion which follows, in part because a study based largely on photo-
graphs precludes such a level of detail.
The typological analysis presented in this article is directed toward two
questions. First, do the Holocene African barbed bone points share enough
in common to constitute an African tradition? The issue is important be-
cause, if the answer is "yes," these then provide a base to which earlier
Ishango, Katanda, and perhaps White Paintings Shelter materials can be
compared. Second, within the Holocene material can regional and/or tem-
poral patterns be discerned? A database which consists of published illus-
trated pieces, often without scale and often shown in single view only, limits
the range of typological issues addressed and analyses performed. Within
this constrained context the following attributes have proven most useful:
(1) number of barb rows (uniserial, biserial, triserial);
(2) number of barbs;
(3) relative barb size and placement in relation to each other and to
the tip and butt of the piece;
(4) barb shape (straight, curved, hooked, sawtooth, Roman nose);
(5) shape of the back, or side opposite barbs on uniserial pieces
(straight, convex);
(6) butt shape (pointed, rounded, bulbous);
(7) butt treatment (unmodified, notched, grooved, perforated); and
(8) presence or absence of a flange or throat.
Less useful characteristicsbecause they were more difficult to obtainin-
cluded absolute dimensions, cross section, and method of manufacture.
The first conclusion one can draw about the Holocene African sample
derives not from typology but from association. While counterparts in other
regions of the world may have served multiple purposes, the primary, if
not sole, prey in Africa was fish. At all the West African, Nile, and East
Barbed Bone Points 183

African and the sole southern African site where barbed bone points are
found, fish bone is always abundant when fauna is present. Of particular
interest in this context are excavations at Shaqadud, a Khartoum Neolithic
site located in Butana region of the Sudan, ca. 75 km east of the Nile
(Marks and Mohammed-Ali, 1991). This site is contemporary with the At-
bara barbed bone point sites and a similar range of pottery indicates close
cultural affiliation. Not surprisingly, given its inland location, fish bone was
lacking, as were barbed bone points, although other forms of worked bone
did occur. The second conclusion one may draw is that it is highly likely
that functionally significant variation is also present within the overall
barbed bone category. Within single assemblages, for example, size vari-
ation is often quite large. At Lothagam maximum lengths range from 47
to 168 mm. Given the number of fish species recovered at barbed bone
sites and their enormous size differences, it is most reasonable to view these
two variables as causally related.
If one focuses, for the moment, on the East African, West African,
and Nilotic core of the barbed bone point tradition, as Fig, 2 indicates, a
significant range of typological variation is evident. Although the vast ma-
jority of Holocene points are uniserial, in the Northeast Turkana sites single
(Fig. 2, 7), biserial (Fig. 2, 2) and triserial (Fig. 2, 1) points are all repre-
sented. Both within and between sites, the proximalmost barbs may either
be set back (Fig. 2, 23) or form part of the tip and barbs themselves may
vary in conformation from straight-sided (Fig. 2, 7) to hooked (Fig. 2, 23).
The distalmost barb may be located either close to the butt (Fig. 2, 6) or
significantly separated from it (Fig. 2, 12). Butts themselves may have
notches (Fig. 2, 2 and 2, 2 and 7) grooves (Fig. 2, 9) or perforations (Fig.
2, 11 and 25) or be unmodified (Fig. 2, 16). They may be pointed (Fig. 2,
7), rounded (Fig. 2, 15), or flat (Fig. 2, 25). In rare instances flanges (Fig.
2, 16), throats (Fig. 2, 17), or other indentations (Fig. 2, 18) may be present.
However, in a broader context the similarities among these African
specimens are great enough to justify incorporation within a single tradi-
tion. This becomes evident when Natufian (Fig. 2, 26 and 27), Magdalenian
(Fig. 2, 28 and 2, 29), or Ontario, Canada (Fig. 2, 30 and 31), examples
are used as outgroups for comparison. Drucker (1943, p. 36), in an analysis
of U.S. Northwest Coast barbed points, draws a distinction between "en-
closed" and "isolated" barb types: "the critical feature is whether or not
the barbs are enclosed within the silhouette of the specimen or stand out
detached from the shaft. This actually depends on the relative areas of the
barbs compared with the spaces between them. If the barbs are larger than
the intervening spaces, the silhouette will be of the enclosed type." With
very few exceptions, the African specimens fall within the enclosed cate-
gory. Second, almost invariably, the barbs themselves, whether straight or
184 Yellen

Fig. 2. Barbed bone points. 1, GaJj11 (Lake Turkana, Kenya); 2, GaJj11; 3, Lowasera (Lake
Turkana, Kenya); 4, Araouane (Mali); 5 and 6, Atabara region (Sudan); 7, GaJj11; 8, Lotha-
gam (Lake Turkana, Kenya); 9, Lowasera; 10, Catfish Cave (Egypt); 11, Araouane; 12, Catfish
Barbed Bone Points 185

Cave; 13, Lowasera; 14, Araouane; 15, Lowasera; 16, Shaheinab (Khartoum Sudan); 17,
Tamaya Mellet (Niger); 18, Hospital Site (Khartoum, Sudan); 19 and 20, Hospital Site; 21
and 22, Shaheinab; 23, Araouane; 24, Lowasera; 25, Araouane; 26 and 27, Kebara (Israel);
28 and 29, Abri Morin (France); 30 and 31, Ontario (Canada); 32, Fayum (Egypt); 33, Taforalt
(Morocco); 34-40, Ishango (Zaire); 41-46, Katanda (Zaire); 47, Fayum; 48, White Paintings
Shelter (Botswana).
186 Yellen

Fig. 2. Continued.

curved, are "sawtooth" in form and are created by the intersection of two
edges (the middle barb in Fig. 2, 22, is formed by three distinct edges and,
in contrast to the barbs on either side, is not sawtooth in configuration).
Third, one can define specific subtypes which occur at multiple sites both
Barbed Bone Points 187

Fig. 2. Continued.

within and between geographic areas. "Humped back" pieces, defined by

a characteristic convex curved "back"the edge opposite the barbs (Fig.
2, 5-9)are present at the three Turkana sites as well as on the Atbara.
A slightly elongated version occurs at Catfish Cave. A small, distinctive
two-barb variant of the humpback (Fig. 2, 11-15) is found at Lowasera,
Catfish Cave, and Araouan in Mali. Finally, in those cases where published
188 Yellen

Fig. 2. Continued.

information is provided on method of manufacture, fine parallel striations

indicate that African specimens are shaped by grinding before barbs are
cut into the edge. In an analysis of Natufian bone tools, Newcomer (1974)
notes the presence of "chattermarks," which experiments indicate are pro-
Barbed Bone Points 189

Fig. 2. Continued.
190 Yellen

duced by carving with flaked stone. These are distinct from the African
grinding striations.
Because so many African specimens lack tight temporal control, it is
difficult to examine either directional typological change over time or re-
gional differentiation since lack of similarity between areas may in fact re-
sult from a chronological cause. However, several conclusions are possible.
First, regional variation does occur. The two Khartoum sites share common
forms which are lacking elsewhere. Pieces (Fig. 2, 18-20, from the Meso-
lithic Hospital site and Fig. 2, 21 and 22, from Neolithic Shaeinab) exhibit
distinctive large, curving, widely spaced nonenclosed barbs and wide bodies
which are absent at other Nile sites and have only very rare counterparts
elsewhere. Within a diverse Arauon assemblage, the pieces shown in Fig.
2, 23 and 25, for example, share a curved back and narrow, curved, and
widely spaced barbsa form which does not occur outside the West African
region. Second, some chronological trends are also evident. At Lowasera,
which provides the best chronological sequence, the lowest unit contains
only notched-based pieces and the upper unit only grooved bases, suggest-
ing a temporal distinction. At Khartoum, Mesolithic bases lack notches.
Most are grooved and rare perforations are present. Khartoum Neolithic
barbed bone points exhibit perforated bases. If this developmental se-
quence is in fact correct, quite possibly the earliest barbed bone points
functioned as spear points and the transition to harpoons occurred later.
While the Fayum sites appear to share a subsistence adaptation con-
sistent with predomestication sites to the South, it is questionable whether,
from a typological point of view, they should be included with this group
since the barbed bone points conform more nearly to Natufian counterparts
from the Near East. Such points are extremely rare in the Natufian and
Kebara has yielded the largest series of seven specimens. As Fig. 2, 26 and
27, indicate, these pieces are extremely thin, with small very widely spaced
barbs. The tip has a "crochet hook" appearance because the first barb is
very small and set close to the tip. The most distal barb is far from the
butt, which is pointed and lacks notches, grooves, or perforations. Although
the Fayum B materials are variable, as Fig. 2, 32 indicates, on the basis of
relative dimensions and point and butt treatment, they are most comfort-
ably classified with the Natufian. The single Iberomarusian fragment from
Taforalt in Morocco (Fig. 2, 33) is typologically unique. Based on a single
illustration, its very small closely spaced barbs appear to protrude from a
rounded body and it is difficult to determine how to class this enigmatic
piece. The Botswana White Paintings Cave specimens mark the southern
limits of African barbed bone points and all, unfortunately, are highly frag-
mented (Fig. 2, 48). Robbins et al. (1994) describes the pieces as uniserially,
biserially, and possibly triserially barbed. The base fragments are grooved
Barbed Bone Points 191

in a manner similar to Lothagam. The pieces have been shaped by grinding,

and the sole illustrated example with more than a single barb indicates an
enclosed form. It thus conforms to an African pattern. Therefore, in sum-
mary, on typological grounds one can identify a Holocene African barbed
bone point tradition which extends from the northern Kalahari to approxi-
mately Catfish and the Central Sahara. The southern boundary is cotermi-
nous with southernmost presence of barbed bone points, while in Northeast
Africa, somewhere between Catfish Cave and the Fayum, it is replaced by
the Natufian tradition.

Ishango

Located at the junction of Lake Rutingaze (ex-Lake Edward) and its

Semliki River outlet in eastern Zaire, the site of Ishango 11 was discovered
by Damas in 1935, excavated by de Heinzelin (1957, 1962), and later reex-
cavated by Brooks and colleagues (1990; Brooks and Smith, 1987; de He-
inzelin and Verniers, 1996). In 1986, Yellen conducted a limited test
excavation at a second site, Ishango 14, located ca. 1 km downstream. At
Ishango 11 a series of six stratigraphic units ca. 12 m above the present
lake level yielded barbed bone points in association with lithic, faunal, and
human remains. A radiocarbon determination on shell at the time of origi-
nal excavation indicated an age of 21,000 BP but this was disregarded be-
cause of supposed contamination with older carbon. Modern shell from an
adjacent beach gives a radiocarbon age of 3000 BP. Subsequent determi-
nations have produced shell dates which range from ca. 20,000 to 24,000
years BP, and if 3000 years are subtracted for contamination, this gives true
ages of 17,000 to 21,000 years (Brooks and Smith, 1987, p. 68; Brooks et
al., 1995, p. 549). Additional radiocarbon dates on ostrich eggshell and crab
shell, amino acid racemization analysis of mollusk and ostrich eggshell from
the Ishangan layers, and charcoal radiocarbon dates from overlying layers
all support a late Pleistocene age. The Ishango sites are therefore of par-
ticular interest because of their separation from most other African sites
by ca. 10,000 years. In this context, White Paintings Shelter is significant
because the stratigraphically deepest barbed point fragments may also be
of similar antiquity. While Robbins et al. (1994, p. 260) suggest that such
may be the case, they also state that "specific dating of these levels has
not been resolved."
The Ishango barbed bone point levels are aceramic and Ishango 11
and the lower levels of 14 are characterized by what de Heinzelin (1962,
p. 106) terms an "extremely crude" quartz industry. However, analysis of
screen material reveals the presence of rare microliths and microcores
which justify placement within a Late Stone Age tradition. At Ishango 14,
192 Yellen

which, on typological grounds, overlaps the top end of the Ishango 11 se-
quence and extends onward in time, the upper units, which also contain
barbed bone points, are more microlithic in general appearance. The
Ishango 11 industry contains both grinding and pounding stones. Fragmen-
tary human skeletal remains most closely resemble present day Nilotes. Lo-
cated on fossil shorelines, the sites yielded abundant fish remains as well
as hippopotamus and a variety of bovids and suids. Thus, in terms of both
environmental context and subsistence adaptation, the Ishango sites are
closely allied with their more recent counterparts (Twiesselman, 1958; Boaz
et al., 1990).
At Ishango 11, the two lowest stratigraphic units with cultural material
contain only biserial barbed bone points, while the upper four have unis-
erial points only. At Ishango 14, uniserial points alone are present. Many
of the biserial points are complete, an indication that they were not dis-
carded because of breakage, and many are made of ivory rather than bone.
Biserial specimens (Fig. 2, 34 and 35) are indistinguishable by stratigraphic
unit. While pieces vary significantly in maximum length, number of barbs,
and cross section, they share a number of common features. The points
are long and narrow in conformation and exhibit a bilateral symmetry. In
addition the straight-sided sawtooth barbs are placed directly opposite each
other. The most proximal pair of barbs is located very close to the tip and
the relative distance between the most distal barb and the butt is fairly
constant. All bases are pointed and most often one pair of symmetrical
notches is cut into the butt. Rarely is more than one set present. Grooves
and perforations are absent. The rarity of biserial pieces in Holocene as-
semblages and the fragmentary nature of illustrated specimens precludes
detailed comparison between this Ishangan and later material. However,
comparison with biserial pieces from Turkana (Fig. 2, 2 and 3) and Araouan
(Fig. 2, 4) indicates sufficient similarity in barb placement and configuration
to justify placement within a single tradition. The contrast with Mag-
dalenian biserial points (Fig. 2, 28 and 29) strengthens this conclusion.
The uniserial pieces in the upper Ishango levels have significantly
larger barbs than their biserial counterparts and a single specimen at the
stratigraphic boundary between the two exhibits "biserial type" barbs on
one side and "uniserial" barbs on the other, thus suggesting an in situ tran-
sition. While the uniserial Ishango points vary in size, cross-section, and
number of barbs, they all fall clearly in the African tradition. They are
enclosed in outline and have straight-sided sawtooth barbs. Bases are
notched and lack grooves or perforations. All show evidence of shaping by
grinding. The sample is large enough and variation discontinuous enough
to suggest that three types with possible chronological significance are pre-
sent. The term "snaggletooth" (Fig. 2, 36 and 37) is used to describe a
Barbed Bone Points 193

series of pieces low in the stratigraphic sequence which have barbs of un-
even size, the smallest closest to the tip. Humpbacked pieces, (Fig. 2, 38
and 39) identical in essential respects to their Holocene counterparts at
other sites occur throughout the sequence. An "Angulated" type (Fig. 2,
40) with a straight or slightly curved back, shallow grooves on the non-
backed side, and an angulated rather than smooth curving transition from
back to sides appears late in the sequence. All three types are comfortably
subsumed within the African tradition.

Katanda

Three sealed Middle Stone Age (MSA) sites were excavated at

Katanda, 7 km downstream from Ishango (Brooks et al., 1995; Yellen et
al., 1995; Yellen, 1998). Katanda 2 (KT2) yielded an unbarbed bone point,
KT9 yielded portions of seven barbed bone points in addition to other
worked bone, and KT16 yielded a single barbed bone point. The sites are
unique because of the presence of carefully worked bone in a MSA context
and because of their age. Dating of overlying sands by thermolumenescence
and electron spin resonance and uranium series analysis of associated teeth
suggests an age of ca. 90,000 years, over four times older than the Ishango
specimens. Sands yielded a thermolumenescence date of 82,000 BP 8000
years; electron spin resonance dates on tooth enamel gave ages of 89,000
BP 22,000 years and 155,000 BP 38,000 years based on early and late
uptake models, respectively. Mass spectroscopic uranium-series ages on two
different teeth gave dates of 139,700 BP 4,110 years and 173,810 BP
800 years. The sites are incorporated within colluvial sand and associated
with proto-Semliki river deposits. Geological and chronometric details are
provided by Brooks et al. (1995). The vertically compact "pavement" at
KT9, the richest of the three sites, contained over 8000 lithics and 7000
mammal and fish remains in an area of ca. 35 m2. The lithic industry, pri-
marily on quartz and quartzite, lacks handaxes, blades, and microliths and
contains distinctive discoidal cores as well as grindstones. Formal stone
tools are rare. Faunal evidence suggests a subsistence adaptation essentially
indistinguishable from later Ishango and Mesolithic counterparts. Fish are
abundant and the most common species are large, slow-moving, bottom-
dwelling catfish which enter shallow water to spawn. Stewart (Brooks et
al., 1995) suggests that they were captured at this time when they are most
vulnerable. Associated mammalian fauna include both savanna species,
such as zebra and blue wildebeest, and water-associated forms, such as hip-
popotamus and the reed-dwelling sitatunga antelope.
The Katanda barbed bone points (Fig. 2, 41-2.45) share enough at-
tributes in common with their Ishangan and Holocene counterparts to be
194 Yellen

comfortably encompassed within the same African tradition. All are unis-
erial and enclosed. The spacing of the barbs, their relative size and their
placement in relation to both the tip and the butt conform closely to later
examples. Fine striations reveal shaping through grinding and the one al-
most-complete specimen (Fig. 2, 41) falls, in general outline, within the
humpbacked category. However, in several details these Katanda points are
distinct. They tend to be large (the one almost-complete piece is 147 mm
in length), wide, and thick. The barbs are unique because they lack saw-
tooth edges and all exhibit a Roman nose configuration. Three of the five
butts represented have a series of distinctive opposing sets of notches
(three, seven, and nine, respectively) on the barbed and nonbarbed sides.
These extend only slightly onto the sides of the piece. Based on illustrated
materials, two possible counterparts are present at Ishango but these are
lacking at all other African sites. The remaining two butts have closely
spaced adjacent multiple rings (two and three, respectively) which are care-
fully incised around the entire circumference of the pieces. Similar ringed-
butt pieces are absent at Ishango but they do occur rarely in Holocene
assemblages. Based on ethnographic comparison, multiple notched butts
likely indicate a spear point fixed permanently to a shaft. However, quite
surprisingly, the two pieces with ringed butts are most easily explained as
harpoons since it is difficult to understand why, if they were permanently
hafted, grooves were carefully incised into sides of the points, which would
come into direct and tight contact with the shaft and be covered by it. The
Katanda barbed bone points are clearly "African" and they also belie the
presence of any straightforward developmental scheme. Single notched
butts seem earliest at the Turkana sites and their almost-exclusive presence
at Ishango would support a progression of notched, grooved, and, finally,
perforated. However, such notches are absent at Katanda. A progression
from a more simple fixed point to the more complex harpoon is intuitively
appealing and data from Turkana and Khartoum, while not conclusive, can
be used to support such a sequence. However, possible harpoons at
Katanda seriously undermine such an argument.

CONCLUSION

Analysis has demonstrated the presence of a barbed bone point tra-

dition in Africa with a geographic range from the northern Kalahari Desert
to the central Sahara and a chronological span from perhaps 90,000 years
ago into the first millennium AD. This "tradition" includes not only a set
of typological rules which govern point form, but also a set of manufac-
turing techniques, including grinding to produce overall shape and a sub-
Barbed Bone Points 195

sistence adaptation with central but not exclusive dependence on fish and
often other aquatic resources. With the exception of lithics, no other hu-
manly produced objects cover such a long time span and barbed bone
points can offer insights into continuity questions which stone tools cannot
provide. Several basic innovationsthe development of blade and sub-
sequent appearance of microlithic technologiesconstitute in effect ar-
chaeological chasms and their effect on artifact form and production
process is so great that it becomes almost impossible to trace continuities
across them. This is particularly true when one crosses the boundary be-
tween the Middle and the Late Stone Ages, which is defined by differences
in assemblages of lithic artifacts. The situation is in some ways analogous
to a shift from the abacus to the electronic calculator where intermediate
forms, half-bead, half microchip, do not exist.
Examination of barbed bone points in the broadest perspective permits
several conclusions and speculations. First, the data clearly show that this
tradition does not map on to any tightly defined linguistic or biological
group and does not serve as a marker for any "cultural" entity as defined
by common anthropological usage of the term. The northern Kalahari
points are definitely associated with Khoisan peoples, the Ishangan with
Nilotes or Nilote predecessors, and it is difficult to imagine a "culture"
which extends from the central Sahara through the East African Lakes.
Second, the tradition has a clear southern boundary which cannot be ex-
plained by lack of archaeological data. Numerous Late Stone Age sites with
worked bone have been excavated in Zimbabwe and South Africa, yet none
contain such objects. While it may be difficult to understand why the north-
ern boundary is located where it is, the existence of a terminus per se is
not surprising because the Natufian point type exists to the north. In the
south, a similar explanation does not hold.
A final issue concerns the remarkable disjunction in time both between
the oldest Middle Stone Age specimens at Katanda and the next oldest coun-
terparts at Ishango, tens of millennia later, and between the ca. 20,000-year-
old Ishango specimens and the widespread Holocene appearances ca. 10,000
years ago. Katanda is unique and its age and cultural affiliation have been
questioned. Although multiple independent dating techniques provide a mu-
tually supporting result, all are still experimental in nature. Clearly, addi-
tional cases which would establish a robust pattern are desirable. Although
a degree of skepticism is therefore not unreasonable, the data cannot be ig-
nored. Assuming that the dates and MSA association are correct, one may
invoke several factors to explain this unusual temporal pattern. The first in-
volves uneven coverage, and vast areas of tropical central Africa are, in effect,
archaeological unknowns. In this context archaeological visibility also comes
into play. Almost all the East African, Nile, and West African sites were dis-
196 Yellen

covered on the basis of surface remains. They are located in arid or semiarid
environments with minimal covering vegetation and are associated with ex-
posed high water lines. Very few sites are associated with rock shelters, which
constitute natural magnets to archaeologists. Buried open-air late Pleistocene
occurrences, especially in heavily vegetated environments where erosion is
slight, are very difficult to locate. It is quite possible that the Semliki and
Tsodilo Hills material mark the eastern and southern boundaries of an early
phase of this tradition which centers on the tropical equatorial region. Fi-
nally, one must consider the possibility that Late Pleistocene Middle Stone
Age hominids in Africa, although anatomically modern, exhibited at least
some behaviors fundamentally different from their present-day counterparts'
and were characterized by a more closed form of social organization which
inhibited the spread of ideas. It is worthy of note that Ishango and Katanda
are in close spatial proximity and that the underlying concept that bone could
be fashioned to achieve functional goals did not disseminate widely within
the Middle Stone Age.

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