The Middle Palaeolithic of the Nejd, Saudi Arabia

Abstract

The Pleistocene archaeological record of the Arabian Peninsula is increasingly recognized as being of great importance for resolving some of the major debates in hominin evolutionary studies. Though there has been an acceleration in the rate of fieldwork and discovery of archaeological sites in recent years, little is known about hominin occupations in the Pleistocene over vast areas of Arabia. Here we report on the identification of five new Middle Palaeolithic sites from the Nejd of central Arabia and the southern margins of the Nefud Desert to the north. The importance of these sites centers on their diversity in terms of landscape positions, raw materials used for lithic manufacture, and core reduction methods. Our findings indicate multiple hominin dispersals into Arabia and complex subsequent patterns of behavior and demography.

Keywords:

• Saudi Arabia
• Middle Palaeolithic
• lithics
• Levallois
• survey

Acknowledgments

We thank HRH Prince Sultan bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, President of the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities (SCTA), and Professor Ali Ghabban, Vice President of the SCTA for permission to carry out this study. The research was funded by the European Research Council (no. 295719, to MDP). Breeze was funded by NERC studentship NE/J500306/1.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Huw S. Groucutt

Huw S. Groucutt (Ph.D. 2013, University of Oxford) is a British Academy postdoctoral research fellow at the School of Archaeology, University of Oxford with a research interest in the Middle Palaeolithic of the Saharo-Arabian area and its implications for hominin dispersal and adaptation.

Paul Breeze

Paul Breeze (M.A. 2007, University of Birmingham) is a Ph.D. student in the department of Geography at King's College London, with research interests in using GIS and remotely sensed data to identify and characterize archaeological sites, and to examine potential relationships between Arabian palaeohydrology and hominin dispersals.

Nick A. Drake

Nick A. Drake (Ph.D. 1992, University of Reading) is a professor in Physical Geography at the Department of Geography, King's College, London with research interests in the palaeoclimate and geoarchaeology of semi-arid and arid regions and the role of the Sahara-Arabian deserts in human evolution and “out of Africa” dispersals.

Richard Jennings

Richard Jennings (Ph.D. 2007, University of Oxford) is a postdoctoral researcher specializing in archaeological surveying, mapping and excavation of Palaeolithic archaeological sites in the Arabian Peninsula and the western Mediterranean.

Ash Parton

Ash Parton (Ph.D. 2013, Oxford Brookes University) is a lecturer at the University of Oxford and Oxford Brookes University addressing palaeoclimatic and palaeoenvironmental changes in Arabia throughout the Late Quaternary.

Tom White

Tom S. White (Ph.D. 2012, University of Cambridge) is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oxford with a research interest in Quaternary paleaoecology, particularly non-marine molluscs and ostracods, and their application to reconstructions of past climates and environments.

Ceri Shipton

Ceri Shipton (Ph.D. 2008, University of Cambridge) is a postdoctoral research fellow in the McDonald Institute, University of Cambridge. His research interests include the dispersal of Homo sapiens, lithic technology, the prehistory of Arabia, and the fate of the Neanderthals.

Laine Clark-Balzan

Laine Clark-Balzan (Ph.D. 2013, University of Oxford) is a postdoctoral researcher at the University Freiberg, whose interests focus on conducting applied and experimental research in OSL dating.

Abdulaziz Al-Omari

Abdulaziz al-Omari (B.A. 1985, King Saud University) works at the Saudi Commission for Tourism and National Heritage in Riyadh and works on a variety of survey and excavation projects in Saudi Arabia.

Patrick Cuthbertson

Patrick Cuthbertson (MSt. 2013, University of Oxford) is a graduate reading for the Ph.D. in archaeology at the University of Oxford. His research interests focus on lithic analysis and hominin adaptation in the landscape.

Oshan M. C. Wedage

Oshan Manjula Chanaka Wedage (M.A. 2011, Deccan College, India) is a researcher at the Department of Archaeological Survey of Sri Lanka and is currently the Project Officer for excavations at the Pahiyangal Cave in Sri Lanka.

Marco A. Bernal

Marco A. Bernal (M.A. 2012, University Rovira i Virgili [Tarragona, Spain] and the National Museum of Natural History [Paris, France]) is currently a Talentia Scholarship Ph.D. candidate at the University of Oxford with a research interest in the Middle Palaeolithic of Eurasia and its implications for hominin dispersal and adaptive cultural behavior.

Abdullah Alsharekh

Abdullah Alsharekh (Ph.D. 1996, University of Cambridge) is an associate professor at King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. His work focuses on the prehistoric archaeology of Saudi Arabia.

Michael D. Petraglia

Michael D. Petraglia (Ph.D. 1987, University of New Mexico) is Professor of Human Evolution and Prehistory, Senior Research Fellow and the Co-Director of the Centre for Asian Archaeology, Art and Culture at the School of Archaeology, University of Oxford. He is also a Senior Research Fellow, Linacre College (Oxford) and a member of the Human Origins Program, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.