T63 Advances in Geoarchaeology (Posters)

Sunday, 22 October 2017
9:00 AM - 5:30 PM
Halls 4EF

ONGOING TOPPP GEOARCHAEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS AT OLDUVAI GORGE, TANZANIA

Paper number: T63-1
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 9:00 AM – 5:30 PM

Authors

Abstract

We have three concurrent lines of inquiry as part of The Olduvai Paleoanthropology and Paleoecology Project (TOPPP). Firstly, we are mapping the Bell’s Korongo East site area with DGPS. The site, located in the south side of the side gorge, is relatively small compared to other Olduvai fossil localities and hosts complicated deposits with easily eroded fluvial sands. The resulting interpolation will provide a detailed base map for the site and enable hydrologic modelling for the modern landforms, including the surface and groundwater flow that continues to alter the site deposits. Second, we are mapping landscape features in association with a taphonomic study near the Shifting Sand dune. The resulting map will allow detailed spatial analysis of bone distribution and weathering with respect to landscape features like tree canopy cover, eroded soil, exposed bedrock, abandoned bomas (human settlement areas), and planted cultivars. Third, we continue to sample potential quartz toolstone localities throughout the Olduvai Gorge region and analyze them with pXRF. By cataloguing the chemistry of the local inselbergs of the Tanzanian Craton, we aim to show whether there is significant chemical diversity to distinguish individual outcrops, and therefore, whether archaeological quartz debitage and tool assemblages may be sourced to them. These varied investigations inform archaeological work at the gorge on many scales, broadening the scope of behavioral and site formation hypotheses that can be tested.

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol. 49, No. 6

doi: 10.1130/abs/2017AM-305321

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