MIT senior and EAPS major Aviva Intveld uses fossils and geology to reconstruct ancient climates. She works at the List Visual Arts Center and is committed to diversity and inclusion in STEM.
Southern African research into the behavioural evolution of Late Pleistocene human adaptability, flexibility, and innovation is typically pursued through the lens of rock shelter deposits. However, rock shelters only cover a very small, geographically specific area of the subcontinent, distorting our understanding of change in human-environment interaction and demography. While still under-represented and under-explored in regional syntheses, more studies are looking to open-air archaeology to fill this geographic void in Late Pleistocene research. These studies either pursue a landscape approach that prioritises spatial coverage, or site-bound excavation to maximise temporal control. However, few investigate the depositional and erosional phenomena involved in the formation of surface archaeology and its surrounding landscape. To rectify this disparity, this thesis explores the complex spatio-temporal relationship between surface archaeology and the formation history of Uitspankraal (
Here we present an optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) age estimate of 64 ± 5 ka for an offshore aeolianite and draw regional correlations (within 45 km) between the Pleistocene geological sequence offshore of the Durban Bluff, and contemporary palaeoenvironmental records from Sibudu on the South African sub-tropical east coast. Considering this age estimate within the context of high-resolution hydroacoustic data and, in particular, sub-bottom profiles, we tentatively suggest phases of dune building during marine isotope stage (MIS) 4 along the east coast of South Africa. The age and depositional characteristics of the composite Bluff-Blood Reef aeolianites suggest that dune-building events were linked to sea-level stillstands during both highstands (with deposits now preserved above water from MIS 7 and 5e) and lowstands (preserved below water, specifically, MIS 4). Aeolianite remnants of late MIS 4 age show that the wind regime during this mild glacial was dominated by winds ty
The Pleistocene archaeological record of mainland Southeast Asia (MSEA) is difficult to interpret, due to a sparsity of dated sites and a lithic record that is ill-suited to typological analysis. These challenges are compounded by the poorly constrained effects of tropical environments upon the deposition, preservation and degradation of archaeological cave sediments. These uncertainties restrict the interpretative potential of archaeological investigations, but the development of a rigorous, geoarchaeological framework of interpretation that is tailored to tropical cave sites offers an opportunity to improve research outcomes in MSEA and in tropical zones worldwide.
Con Moong Cave (henceforth CMC), a Pleistocene archaeological site in North Vietnam, provided a small-scale example with which to explore the effects of tropical conditions upon archaeological site formation processes, and the potential of micro-geoarchaeological methods to overcome the difficulties of site interpretation
North Vietnam is situated on a major route of Pleistocene hominin dispersal in East Asia, and the area's karstic caves preserve many prehistoric shell middens. Fossil and genomic evidence suggest a complex human history in this region and more widely across Southeast Asia and southern China, but related archaeological investigations are hampered by challenging site stratigraphies. Recent investigations of shell middens in other geographical settings have revealed the microstratigraphic complexity of these anthropogenic deposits. But caves promote distinctive site formation processes, while tropical climates may catalyse geomorphic and diagenetic changes. These environmental factors complicate the interpretation of North Vietnam's shell middens and constraining their effects upon the formation, preservation and destruction of these sites is critical to understanding the archaeology of this region. We examine two archaeological cave sites, dated to the Late Pleistocene and loca