Post by Noah on Sept 9, 2011 23:23:26 GMT -5
The following is an excerpt from the scholar Kenneth Howard Honea's classic treatise on Hamitic history and people, A Contribution to the History of the Hamitic Peoples of Africa. In reference to the time period prior to the recent expansion of Bantus into East Africa from their original homeland in West Africa, the book explains the ultimate Near Eastern origin and dispersal of the Paleo-Hamites and their associated Capsian culture by way of a land-bridge connecting South Arabia to the Horn. This topic is also touched upon in the Egyptians & Proto-Mediterraneans thread, where it is correlated with Caucasoid autosomal genetic components common to the Hamitic peoples of North & Northeast Africa as well as various affiliated West Eurasian populations.
Besides genetic and archaeological links pointing to the Near Eastern origin of the Paleo-Hamites and their associated Capsian culture, there are also continued morphological ties between modern Hamitic peoples in North & Northeast Africa and Bronze Age Palestinians in Jericho that further support this:
"Leakey contends that the Kenya Capsian diffused from East Africa into the Sahara and Maghreb and he supports his postulation with the chronological arguement that it appears there much later than in Kenya. The Saharan and Maghrebian Capsian is mainly Mesolithic while the analogous industry in Kenya is Upper Paleolithic -- except for Phase D which continued up into the early Mesolithic (Cole 1954:183). Caton-Thompson first thought the cultural affinities were due to convergent evolution, but later she retracted this and gave her support to Leakey's theory (Caton-Thompson 1946:32)[...]
The late appearance of backed blades and other related cultural elements in the Maghreb and Egypt can very likely be accounted for by the fact that diffusion from a tentative culture center in East Africa to the Sudan, Egypt and the Sahara, and thence to the Maghreb would take some time[...]
It has been shown that the carriers of the Kenya Capsian Culture effected a series of important changes in the cultural patterns and physical characteristics of the autochthonous population of East Africa. The extra-African origin of this culture and its bearers is certain for, as we have seen, neither has a predecessor on the African continent[...]
Leakey believes that the Kenya Capsian reached Africa from Palestine via Arabia and a land bridge over the Bab el Mandeb Strait from whence it spread into East Africa (Cole 1954:183). He holds this view because at the El Tabun Cave in Palestine, backed blades and burins were found which suggested an immediate relationship with those known from Kenya of a somewhat later date. They were found among Micoquian (Acheulio-Levalloisian) levels[...] This site gives evidence of the oldest known culture characterized by the use of backed blades and may be regarded as the true place of origin of these implements and the associated culture (Movius 1953:171, 185, 186)[...]
The recent work of Clark is extremely important here. He has found evidence along the northern shores of the Horn which indicates that there was a fall in the sea level during early Gamblian times, and he believes that land connection could have existed then with Southwest Arabia[...]
Whether implements found at the Jebel Tubaik in Jordan can be connected with a southward movement of Capsian cultural elements, is another question yet to be answered. An examination of this material made on the basis of the one existing publication revealed that this industry contained very many backed blades, burins and lunates which could represent an early stage in the evolution of Capsian tool forms since they are in some degree of more primitive character than those of Phase A Capsian in Kenya. The tools have been tentatively dated in the middle or late Paleolithic; if this date is correct, the industry is certainly not too recent to be brought into connection with analogous material in Palestine and East Africa (Rhotert 1938:97, 103, 113, 142).
These implement forms, according to Rhotert, are closely connected with similar forms associated with the cultures of the Somalilands, Upper Egypt, the Fezzan, and Palestine (Rhotert 1938:151)[...]
In summary, the evidence concerning the origin of the Capsian as exemplified in Upper Paleolithic Kenya indicates that the ultimate origin of this important culture was probably Palestine; from there it moved southward into South Arabia, perhaps influencing the culture at Jebel Tubaik in Jordan[...]
From South Arabia the industry diffused across the Bab el Mandeb Strait into the region known today as French Somaliland [Djibouti] and Northeast Ethiopia[...] Since backed blade and burin affinities are apparently absent in the known cultures of the African Horn at the time of diffusion (Upper Paleolithic), it must be assumed that the Capsian moved across Ethiopia from the northeast to the Northwest. Some cultural elements may have become settled in this section of Ethiopia, perhaps at Zergnat, but the main cultural stream moved on and, by a route which was located to the west of the Ethiopian Highlands, descended south into Kenya (Clark 1954:321-322). It is possible that in the course of this migration the Paleo-Sanites on the Blue Nile were expelled from their territory[...]
Once in Kenya the Capsian bearers settled and eventually established a center of culture. The autochthonous Paleo-Sanitic population and characteristic culture, which had been situated there from at least the Middle Paleolithic, was partly absorbed and partly displaced to regions further south.
A movement away from the culture center either during the late Upper Paleolithic or early Mesolithic periods may have been the impetus that established the directly derived Capsian cultures in the Sudan, Sahara, Egypt and the Maghreb[...]
The carriers of this culture are believed to have been the ancestors of a part of the present Hamitic population in Africa and have thus been named "Paleo-Hamites"[...]
It should also be profitable to compare the microlithic backed blade tools found in many parts of Central and South India, south of a line joining the Upper Ganges to the Ranu of Cutch, and sporadically elsewhere (e.g. Sind and Northwest Punjab) with analogous implements in Palestine (El Tabun), Jordan (Jebel Tubaik) and Africa (Kenya, etc.).
The possibility that a racial element with Paleo-Hamitic affinities could have accompanied this movement to the East (India) should not be excluded, for according to Piggot (1952:36-37), certain skeletons associated with this type lithic industry at Gujerat show definite Paleo-Hamitic characteristics."
Besides genetic and archaeological links pointing to the Near Eastern origin of the Paleo-Hamites and their associated Capsian culture, there are also continued morphological ties between modern Hamitic peoples in North & Northeast Africa and Bronze Age Palestinians in Jericho that further support this: