final exam Flashcards
Stratigraphy
- The study of the sequential laying of deposits
Taphonomy
- The study of how mines and other materials came to be buried in the earth and preserved as fossils
Taphonomist
- Studies the processes of sedimentation, the action of streams, preservation properties of bone, and carnivore disturbance factors
Features
- Products of human activity that cannot be removed from the archaeological record as a single items
- Pits
- Post-molds
- Hearths
- House floors
Artifacts
- Are tangible objects; anything made or modified by people in the past
Eco-facts
- Natural materials used to reconstruct the local environment of a site
Ethnoarchaeology
- An approach used by archaeologist to gain insight into the past by studying contemporary people
Experimental Archaeology
- Research that attempts to replicate ancient technologies and construction procedures to test hypothesis about past activities
Cultural Resource Management (CRM)
- Part of legally mandated efforts to conserve the records of the past for future generations under the threat of encroaching development and construction
Sahelanthropus
- Small brain-case, vertical face, huge brow ridge, hominin status questioned
Ardipithecus
- Pelvis shows derived characteristics, divergent big toe, woodland environment
Australopithecus Afrarensis
- Come from sites in Hadar (in Ethiopia) and Laetole (in tanzania)
- More primitive (less evolved) than any other later australopith
- Share more primitive features with late Miocene apes
- Earliest well-documented biped; possible ancestor of
all later hominins - 3.6 -3.0 mya
Australopithecus Africanus
- Small-brained, with an adult cranial capacity of about 440 cm cubed
- Well adapted bipeds
- Lived approx. between 3 and 2 mya
- Quite derived; likely evolutionary dead end
Homo habilis
- Significantly larger brain than in australopiths,
- Estimated average cranial capacity 631 cm cubed (increased cranial size of 20% over australopiths)
- Also called “early homo”
- Had different cranial shape and tooth proportions from austrolpiths
Homo Erectus
- The first hominin to expand into new regions of the old world
- As a species, H. Erectus existed over 1 million years
- We can understand its success as a hominid species based on behavioral capacities (i.e more elaborate tool use) and physical changes (i.e larger)
- Discoveries from East Africa have established Homo Erectus by 1.7 mya
- Some researchers see anatomical differences between the African and Asian discoveries
= They place African fossils into the /Homo dragster/ represents closely related species and possibly geographical varieties of a single species
Homo Heidelbergensis
- Paleospecies name for group that likely gave rise to Homo sapiens and Neanderthals
Homo Sapiens Idaltu
- Near modern homo sapiens, on the verge of modernity but not quite there
- Idaltu means elder
Bipedal Locomotion
- Walking on two feet. Walking on two legs is the single most distinctive feature of the hominins
Mosaic Evolution
- A pattern of evolution in which the rate of evolution in one functional system varies from that in other systems
Difference between Neanderthals and Homo Sapiens
Neanderthals:
• Flake told not specialized
• No distance hunting weapons
• Use of non-stone tool
• Stone materials transported over relatively short distances
• Artwork uncommon
• Deliberate burial is seen but with few artifacts
Homo Sapiens:
• More varieties of stone tools
• use of spear-thrower and bow and arrow
• use of bone, antler, ivory and more specialized tools
• stone materials transported over longer distance
• artwork much more common, including transportable items
• burials more complex, including tools and animal remains
Glaciations
- Climatic intervals when continental ice sheets cover much of the northern continents
- Glaciations are associated with colder temperatures in norther latitudes and more arid conditions in southern latitudes, most notably in Africa
Interglacials
- Climatic intervals when continental ice sheets are retreating, eventually becoming much reduced in size
- Interglacials in northern latitudes are associated with warmer temperatures, while in southern latitudes the climate became wetter
Upper Paleolithic
- A cultural period usually associates with modern humans, but also found with some Neanderthals, and distinguished by technological innovation in various stone tool industries
- Best know from Western Europe, similar industries are also known from central and Eastern Europe and Africa
Models of Human Origins
- Regional Continuity: Multiregional Evolution
- Replacement
= Complete
= Partial
Regional Continuity
- Associated with paleoanthropologist Milford Wolpoff of the University of Michigan
- Populations, connected by gene flow, in Europe, Asia, and Africa continued evolutionary development from archaic H. Sapiens to anatomically modern humans