The Haua Fteah, Cyrenaica (Northeast Libya): renewed investigations of the cave and its landscape, 2007

Abstract

AbstractThe 1950s excavations by Charles McBurney in the great Haua Fteah cave in northeast Libya revealed a deep (14 m) sequence of human occupation going back at least 100,000 years, with evidence for the presence of both Neanderthals and Modern Humans in the Pleistocene, and for Neolithic farmers in the Holocene. In 2007 a renewed programme of archaeological and geomorphological investigation began with the objective of improving understanding of the cave's occupation sequence and, combined with fieldwork in the landscape, of the history of landscape change and human responses to it. The initial season of fieldwork removed the upper c. 4.5 m of backfill in the McBurney trench; established the robustness of the original faces and their suitability for analytical interventions; recorded detailed running sections spanning from the present day to (at least) the Last Glacial Maximum c. 20,000 years ago; and indicated the potential of the surviving archaeology to reveal not just sequence but also activities or ‘taskscapes’ at the site. The geomorphological fieldwork identified rich sequences of later Quaternary deposits (marine, colluvial, alluvial, aeolian) with the potential to provide significant results regarding the history of climate and environment in the region. Archaeological survey around the cave indicates that the variability of the surface lithic evidence appears to reflect real differences in past human behaviour and use of the landscape and not just post-depositional taphonomic processes. Fifty years after the extraordinary pioneering work of McBurney and his colleagues, the new work demonstrates the continued potential of the Haua Fteah's unique occupation sequence and the multi-period ‘human landscapes’ around it to transform understanding of early human societies in North Africa.