Fire and grass-bedding construction 200 thousand years ago at Border Cave, South Africa

2020/08/14 by Lyn Wadley, Irene Esteban, Paloma de la Peña +8 · 71 citations
Social Sciences · Earth and Planetary Sciences · #Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology #Archaeology and Rock Art Studies #Evolution and Paleontology Studies #Cave #Bedding #Archaeology #Geology #Debris #Bed #Geography #Biology #Oceanography

paper · open access · doi:10.1126/science.abc7239

published in Science 369(6505), 863-866 (American Association for the Advancement of Science)

openalex publication_date 2020/08/14 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01

Abstract

Bedding of grass and ashes The Border Cave site in the KwaZulu-Natal region of South Africa has been a rich source of archaeological knowledge about Stone Age humans because of its well-preserved stratigraphic record. Wadley et al. now report the discovery of grass bedding in Border Cave, dated to approximately 200,000 years ago. The bedding, identified with a range of microscopic and spectroscopic techniques, was mingled with layers of ash. It also incorporated debris from lithics, burned bone, and rounded ochre grains, all of which were of clear anthropogenic origin. The authors speculate that the ash may have been deliberately used in bedding to inhibit the movement of ticks and other arthropod irritants. These discoveries extend the record of deliberate construction of plant bedding by at least 100,000 years. Science , this issue p. 863

Citations

• Stone Age hut in Israel yields world's oldest evidence of bedding
• Rapid phytolith extraction for analysis of phytolith concentrations and assemblages during an excavation: an application at Tell es-Safi/Gath, Israel
• Transformation of aragonite to calcite through heating.
• Early evidence of San material culture represented by organic artifacts from Border Cave, South Africa
• Mode of Occupation of Tabun Cave, Mt Carmel, Israel During the Mousterian Period: A Study of the Sediments and Phytoliths
• Evidence of Hominin Control of Fire at Gesher Benot Ya`aqov, Israel
• Early Neolithic household behavior at Tell Seker al-Aheimar (Upper Khabur, Syria): a comparison to ethnoarchaeological study of phytoliths and dung spherulites
• Abbreviations for names of rock-forming minerals
• Border Cave revisited: a revised ESR chronology
• Microstratigraphic evidence of in situ fire in the Acheulean strata of Wonderwerk Cave, Northern Cape province, South Africa
• Phytolith-rich layers from the Late Bronze and Iron Ages at Tel Dor (Israel): mode of formation and archaeological significance
• On the earliest evidence for habitual use of fire in Europe
• Long-distance stone transport and pigment use in the earliest Middle Stone Age

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• Timeline of prehistory [wikipedia]