Narabeb: Examining the Middle Stone Age of the Namib Sand Sea

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The Namib Sand Sea (NSS) in Namibia is known to preserve a wide variety of Pleistocene-age archaeological sites. However, few Middle Stone Age (MSA) sites in this region have been systematically investigated and basic questions around chronology and technological organization remain open. Here we examine Narabeb Pan, an open air MSA surface site deep in the NSS first documented in the 1970s, and then re-examined in 2021 and 2022. Lithic technological analysis combined with geomorphological and optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dates from Narabeb provide some of the first understandings of human-environmental interactions and preliminary estimates of chronology from the Late Pleistocene of the NSS. These data provide the foundation for larger, regional-scale analyses of early human adaptive strategies in this unique environment of Southern Africa.

Cite this Record

Narabeb: Examining the Middle Stone Age of the Namib Sand Sea. Theodore Marks, George Leader, Abi Stone, Kaarina Efraim, Rachel Bynoe. Presented at The 89th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. 2024 ( tDAR id: 499884)

Spatial Coverage

min long: -18.721; min lat: -35.174 ; max long: 61.699; max lat: 27.059 ;

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 39442.0