The archaeology of language origins–a review

1991/03/01 by Iain Davidson · 105 citations
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Animal Vocal Communication and Behavior #Archaeology #Categorization, perception, and language #Character (mathematics) #Feature (linguistics) #History #Language and cultural evolution #Linguistics #Philosophy #Pleistocene

paper · doi:10.1017/s0003598x0007928x

published in Antiquity 65(246), 39-48 (Cambridge University Press)

openalex publication_date 1991/03/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30

Abstract

Language is a feature to distinguish the ‘human’ from the ‘animal’ that has seemed a more enduring diagnostic character than some. But how is the breath of words to be made visible in the stony traces of the Pleistocene?

Cited by

• Technology and Society during the Middle Pleistocene: Hominid Group Size, Social Learning and Industrial Variability
• A Middle Palaeolithic origin of music? Using cave-bear bone accumulations to assess the Divje Babe I bone ‘flute’

Related

• Language evolution and human history: what a difference a date makes
• The Emergence of Language
• Ultraconserved words point to deep language ancestry across Eurasia
• The Consequences of Literacy
• Linguistic capacity was present in the Homo sapiens population 135 thousand years ago