Tafonomía de carnívoros africanos y su papel en los yacimientos del lecho II de Olduvai

Abstract

Bone modifications are some of the most important classes of evidence studied by zooarchaeologists attempting to reconstruct the taphonomy of archaeological faunal assemblages (Dominguez–Rodrigo, 2002). Most of the modelling and interpretations of biotic non-human modification of bone assemblages have used carnivores namely felids (Brain, 1969, 1981; Domínguez-Rodrigo et al., 2007a, b; Gidna, at el., 2013). The interaction of carnivores and humans in the formation and modification of bone assemblages has also been experimentally replicated. The carnivore–hominid, carnivore– hominid carnivore and hominid-carnivore interactions were first experimentally modelled and then applied to African Plio-Pleistocene archaeological sites (Domínguez-Rodrigo et al., 2007a). One avenue for understanding the role of hunting and scavenging in human evolution is to uncover the carcass processing abilities of the carnivores that existed sympatrically with the hominins when they presumably made the transition to a diet that included more animal tissue, and thus to evaluate the nature and quality of animal resources available to hominins during this period. An understanding of how early humans interacted with the carnivores is of great importance to the study of the evolution of human diets. As humans made the dietary transition to greater carnivory, their relationship with members of the carnivore would have changed from one of a prey species (Brain 1981) to one of a significant competitor. The earliest archaeological evidence of hominin carnivory includes unmistakable evidence for at least a partial focus of tool-assisted consumption of wildebeest-sized mammals at 2.5-2.6 Ma (de Henzelin et al., 1999; Domínguez-Rodrigo et al., 2005). Much is known about dietary strategy through analyses of the ecology of sympatric carnivores and much has been written about hominin scavenging (Bunn 1986; Bunn and Ezzo 1993; Bunn and Kroll 1986; Dominguez-Rodrigo 1997; Shipman 1978, 1983, 1987, Selvaggio and Wilder 2001).The involvement of certain species as primary predators has also been hypothesized, and chains of succession documented (Selvaggio 1998; Selvaggio and Wilder 2001) but none of these studies showed how these scavenging opportunities could be detected in the archaeological record (Gidna et al. 2013). The present dissertation builds upon previous researches developed and formulated around four published research papers. Each of these studies focuses on a specific stage of the research with the respective outcomes.