The Origins and Significance of Coastal Resource Use in Human Evolution

Abstract

Abstract Coastal resource use has gone from a neglected topic prior to the year 2001 to a key research question in human evolution today. Over that time several hypotheses and theories have developed to explain the late appearance of coastal foraging in human evolution and how it impacted the diet, behavior, culture, and sociality of humans. The lunar schedule theory states that exploiting the intertidal zone effectively requires an understanding of the relationship between lunar phases and tides and foraging returns. This required complex cognition, language, and culture, so coastal adaptations were not possible until the evolution of these traits. The aquatic nutrition theory argues that aquatic foods contain crucial nutrients that are rare in terrestrial food webs. It has been suggested that their use may have stimulated complex cognition in human evolution. The aquatic sociality theory, developed from comparative hunter–gatherer ethnography and human ecology, posits that coastal hunter–gatherers generally have greater complexity in material culture, economy, and sociality, with higher levels of intergroup conflict, than typical terrestrial hunter–gatherers. This theory proposes that the transition to a coastal adaptation was transformative on human evolution and created a new selection regime that may have driven the evolution of modern humans. A review of the evidence is consistent with the evolution of a coastal adaptation by 120–110 ka in South Africa, while early modern humans in North Africa and Neanderthals in Europe developed less intensive use of coastal resources by that time.