Landscapes of Human Evolution

Landscapes of Human Evolution is an edited volume in honour of John Gowlett. John has a wide range of research interests primarily focused on the human genus Homo, and is a world leader in understanding the cognitive and behavioural preconditions necessary for the emergence of complex behaviours such as language and art. John is also a leader in investigating the early history of fire use and control in relation to social action and hominin communication. Landscapes of Human Evolution seeks to mirror John’s research profile and explores some of the most recent thinking regarding human evolution from the biological and cognitive development of our human ancestors, to the behavioural adaptations necessary to survive changing Pleistocene landscapes and environments. Specifically, Landscapes of Human Evolution focuses on the development of large hominin brains and bipedal locomotion; hominin interactions with landscape; and the amplification of complex hominin behaviours and social structures from the control of fire through to changing lithic technologies. Such an overview of the development of human ancestral species from a biological, cognitive, social, and behavioural perspective is particularly timely given the many recent advances in our understanding of the complexities of human evolution.

Table of Contents

Foreword - James Cole, John McNabb, Matt Grove and Rob Hosfield

A Good Man in Africa: John Gowlett’s Writings on Africa and its Hominin Archaeology from the late 1970s to the early 2000s - John McNabb

Brain Size Evolution in the Hominin Clade - Andrew Du and Bernard Wood

Australopithecus or Homo? The postcranial evidence - Robin H. Crompton

Evolutionary Diversity and Adaptation in Early Homo - Alan Bilsborough and Bernard Wood

Rift Dynamics and Archaeological Sites: Acheulean Land Use in Geologically Unstable Settings - Simon Kübler, Geoff Bailey, Stephen Rucina, Maud Devès and Geoffrey C.P. King

How many handaxes make an Acheulean? A case study from the SHK-Annexe site, Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania - Ignacio de la Torre and Rafael Mora

An Acheulian Balancing Act: A Multivariate Examination of Size and Shape in Handaxes from Amanzi Springs, Eastern Cape, South Africa - Matthew V. Caruana and Andy I. R. Herries

Reflections on Possible Zoomorphic Acheulean bifaces from Southwestern Algeria - Thomas Wynn, Mohamed Sahnouni, Tony Berlant and Claude Douce

Variable cognition in the evolution of Homo: biology and behaviour in the African Middle Stone Age - Robert A. Foley and Marta Mirazón Lahr

Initial source evaluation of archaeological obsidian from Middle Stone Age site Kilombe GqJ h3 West 200, Kenya, East Africa - Sally Hoare, Stephen Rucina and John A.J. Gowlett

The eternal triangle of human evolution - Clive Gamble

Climate, Fire and the Biogeography of Palaeohominins - Robin I.M. Dunbar

Fire, the Hearth (ocak) and Social Life: examples from an Alevi community in Anatolia - David Shankland

From Specialty to Specialist: a citation analysis of Evolutionary Anthropology, Palaeolithic Archaeology and the work of John Gowlett 1970-2018 - Anthony Sinclair

James Cole is Principal Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of Brighton. He has undertaken Palaeolithic fieldwork in the UK, Albania, Greece, Kenya and Tanzania; and his research focuses on the Lower and early Middle Palaeolithic (Europe) and Early and Middle Stone Age (Africa). He is particularly interested in interpreting hominin behaviours from the material culture record in regards to understanding cognitive ability and potential.



Matt Grove is Reader in Evolutionary Anthropology in the Department of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology at the University of Liverpool. His research examines the impact of climatic change and variability on human evolution, with a particular focus on the manifestations of behavioural plasticity in the archaeological record of Homo sapiens in eastern Africa.

Rob Hosfield is Associate Professor in Palaeolithic Archaeology at the University of Reading. He has undertaken Palaeolithic fieldwork in the UK and Africa (Sudan), and his research has focused on Lower and early Middle Palaeolithic hominin settlement histories, survival strategies and material culture.