Bioarchaeologists link climate instability to human mobility in ancient Sahara

Over millennia, the Sahara has gone through cycles of greening and aridity. During times when this region was lush and covered with bodies of water, it supported a wide variety of life, including human.

Arizona State University bioarchaeologists Christopher Stojanowski and Kelly Knudson are studying the remains of some of these ancient humans to understand how their changing climate affected their ability and need to move across the landscape.

Stojanowski and Knudson’s research site is located in central Niger. Known as Gobero, it was home to a large lake during the middle Holocene, roughly five- to seven-thousand years ago. The humans who made their homes around the lake at this time depended on hunting, gathering and fishing, and some kept cattle.

Along with collaborators at the University of Chicago, Stojanowski directed excavations at the Gobero site, which offers a rich mortuary record.

Back at ASU, in the Archaeological Chemistry Laboratory, Knudson sampled bone and teeth enamel, and used their chemical signatures to determine individuals’ origins, as well as where they resided during the course of their lives. [...] clas.asu.edu/ / Link 2

Link 3: Changing patterns of mobility as a response to climatic deterioration and aridification in the middle Holocene southern Sahara