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71-525: The Aterian is primarily distinguished through the presence of tanged or pedunculated tools, and is named after the type site of Bir el Ater , south of Tébessa . Bifacially-worked, leaf-shaped tools are also a common artefact type in Aterian assemblages, and so are racloirs and Levallois flakes and cores. Items of personal adornment (pierced and ochred Nassarius shell beads) are known from at least one Aterian site, with an age of 82,000 years. The Aterian

142-677: A 90,000-year-old bone knife was discovered in the Dar es-Soltan I cave, which is basically made of a cattle-sized animal's rib. Due to the archaeological spread of the Aterian culture and unique linguistic spread of the Niger-Congo languages (e.g., languages of the Atlantic coast in Senegal , Kordofan in Sudan ), Fleming et al. (2013) indicates that possibly the “ Nilo-Saharan linguistic phylum

213-424: A bell-shaped head (about 70 cm high) is surmounted by a bun, tight at the base, from which a sort of tuft in the form of two small opposing horns emerges. At station XXVII a woman (135 cm high) with a cynomorphic profile is holding a smaller character who could be a child. She wears a truncated cone-shaped hat on her head, striped with parallel bands, perhaps of spartan material. The neck seems to be caught in

284-426: A distance, according to the maps published by Lhote in his work, of nearly twenty kilometers. They are located on the upper terraces of the wadi, on the vertical walls of fallen blocks, most often on the horizontal surface of rocks in place. Being placed at a height of 8 to 12 meters above the lower terrace, the flood level does not reach them. The research carried out at the foot of the engravings gave no clues as to

355-713: A frog-like position, their sex in full view" (8 copies ), women represented in the same posture "with associated phallus" (two examples), men in a similar position (three examples), "couples in coitus" (three scenes from the Bubaline period, a greater number from the Caballine period), the "scenes where the two sexes are entangled in a lustful way" as at station VIII of the Ahana rock and the "unnatural relationships" (hartebeest, explicitly, at station XXVII, giraffe at station XXX, rhinoceros, antelope at station XLIV). "André Malraux, at

426-430: A hartebeest, try to immobilize it by the horns with ties. Three other scenes, one of which is uncertain, associate men with elephants. Station LIV seems to show the capture of a baby elephant that is bending over to resist its driver, and station LXXIV shows a man leading a herd with a stick. An exceptional engraving shows a bovine mounted by a character (station LXXXIV). If the giraffe does not appear in any hunting scene in

497-471: A hundred kilometers from the Libyan border. The wadi is on average 200 meters wide, its cliffs varying from 25 to 30 meters high at the outlet, reaching 150 meters towards the palm grove of Nafeg and reducing towards its sources. It receives many tributaries, including the wadis Afar and Assahor, which provide a large volume of water at the time of rains. The two banks of the wadi are covered with engravings over

568-408: A javelin, a round shield and a dagger hanging from the arm. The fauna is composed of felines and perhaps a rhinoceros. A fourth, later group appears to be alphabetical. It is represented by "large figures with rectangular tunics". The fauna is composed of giraffes, lions, cattle, mouflons, ostriches and dogs. These later engravings, with a light, almost white patina, are clearly less numerous than in

639-542: A narrow, elongated straitjacket. On the chest three lines evoke necklaces. The breasts are elongated and pendulous, above a long dress that descends clearly below the ankles. In the engravings of Oued Djerat, sexual scenes are numerous. E.F. Gautier, one of the first to have studied them, considered in 1934 that they could not be "submitted to the French public because they would be considered pornographic". Henri Lhote distinguishes six groups: women "with legs bent and spread in

710-641: A spread position. The men's clothing can be evoked by a line at the level of the belt, a triangle whose summit, placed at the height of the belt, suggests a small cloth or skin cover (station XXI), a loincloth or a real cover whose extremities fall between the legs or on the buttocks (often mistaken for a phallus). About fifteen characters, with (station XXVII) or without a loincloth, are provided with enormous sexes. The genitals are never drawn, no phallic case having been met moreover. The Caballine period also presents numerous ithyphallic figures (notably at stations IV, VI, VII, XIII, XVIII, XXXIV, XXXIX). The clothing of

781-743: A survey of a certain number of them that he sent to Maurice Reygasse, then curator of the Bardo Museum in Algiers. During the winter of 1934 the professors Émile Félix Gautier and M. Reygasse studied them and published several notes shortly afterwards. Amazed by his great naturalist engravings, he nicknamed the Oued Djerat "the Vézère of the Sahara". The same year, in November, Henri Lhote accompanied

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852-578: A very long duration of the bubaline period during which changes in lifestyle must have occurred," writes Lhote. For him, the Oxen only appeared in a second period and the "women with spread legs" in a terminal period. Since the work of Lhote, it appeared that the notion of a so-called "period" of the Bubalus, also called "Bubalin" and which would be prior to the Bovidian, does not correspond to reality, because

923-456: Is derived from the Aterian culture area.” Fertile Crescent : Europe : Africa : Siberia : Bir el Ater Bir el Ater ( Arabic : بئر العاتر ) is a city located in far eastern Algeria . It is located towards the border with Tunisia , around 87 kilometers south of Tebessa and just beyond the Sahara . The town has a population of approximately 80,000 inhabitants. Bir el Ater

994-409: Is divided into two sub-periods, one analphabetic, characterized by the chariots, the second alphabetic, with the appearance of Libyan-Berber characters. Henri Lhote distinguishes four groups from the point of view of style. The first is that of the "chariots with flying gallop" and of the "warriors carrying the Libyan feather", armed with javelins. The zoomorphic headdress of one of them recalls that of

1065-413: Is generally polished (in a lowered U-shape), but sometimes in a V-shape or simply staked, and their patina is very dark. If some subjects are depicted below their natural size, others are life-size, if not above, and it is rare that the representations measure less than one meter. Lhote cites a dozen cases in which the image was supplemented by a mediocre copy that seems to be contemporary with it. The style

1136-525: Is on the whole naturalistic but some animals (giraffes) may be schematized. In sixteen cases the diocular formula (eyes placed one above the other) is used, as in certain engravings of the South Oranese: one can suppose according to the author that they reflect "what there is of more ancient in Djerat". The varieties of styles that remain difficult to place in chronological order "seem to correspond to

1207-485: Is one of the oldest examples of regional technological diversification, evidencing significant differentiation to older stone tool industries in the area, frequently described as Mousterian . The appropriateness of the term Mousterian is contested in a North African context, however. Fleming et al. (2013) stated: But Scerri (2012) also reckoned that the (Aterian) peoples were ultimately of sub-Saharan origin, or as we have proposed, they dispersed from Ethiopia by way of

1278-557: Is only shown in one example. Its shape is similar to those found in the South Oranese, which H. Lhote considers that they are, symbolically, "votive axes". The throwing stick seems to be represented but its identification remains doubtful. The dog may have been the hunters' helper. The hunting scenes (ostrich, rhinoceros, sheep or gazelle) show that this activity remained essential for the populations of Oued Djerat. One of them, at station XLVII, shows three men who, in order to capture

1349-610: Is the type site of the Paleolithic Aterian industry. The term Aterian derives from el-Ater. This lithic culture lasted between 40000 – 20000 years BC. It is now a mining city, located 15 km south of Bir El Ater. There are deposits of Djebel Onk Phosphates , the largest in Algeria which are extracted and shipped by train to Annaba a port, 300 km north on the Mediterranean or are used locally. To

1420-400: The Sahara ). The former wealth of this area is attested by many Roman wells and a few villas. These remains are listed on the staff maps. The wells are all dried up today. A few kilometers north of Bir el-Ater are the ruins of a large Roman oil mill , preserved on two floors. The name of the village in antiquity was Vicus Aterii indicating only a small settlement, though it was

1491-454: The Sahel and Lake Chad and the ( interglacial ) Saharan wet spots . The technological character of the Aterian has been debated for almost a century, but has until recently eluded definition. The problems defining the industry have related to its research history and the fact that a number of similarities have been observed between the Aterian and other North African stone tool industries of

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1562-609: The Tassili n'Ajjer , Algeria , and dated to the Neolithic period , have many affinities with those of the South Oranese (Algeria) and the Fezzan (Libya). According to Henri Lhote , they date back more than 7000 years. It seems, writes Henri Lhote, that the engravings of Oued Djerat "have been known for a long time and have been reported to the explorer F. Foureau, during his expedition of 1892–1893 ". In 1932, Lieutenant Brenans made

1633-475: The palaeohydrology of a Green Sahara . Assemblages with tanged tools may therefore reflect particular activities involving the use of such tool types, and may not necessarily reflect a substantively different archaeological culture to others from the same period in North Africa. The findings are significant because they suggest that current archaeological nomenclatures do not reflect the true variability of

1704-594: The seat of an ancient Christian bishopric in the Roman province of Byzacena . The ancient Bishopric survives today as a titular see of the Roman Catholic Church called Vicus Aterii . and the bishop until his death was Franz Vorrath of Germany . 34°44′59″N 8°03′28″E  /  34.74972°N 8.05778°E  / 34.74972; 8.05778 Rock engravings of Oued Djerat The rock engravings of Oued Djerat , located in

1775-458: The vegetation becomes increasingly rare and the ground is made of white clay and pebbles . Early hominoid fossils have been found here. Further, Bir El Ater is the archaeological site which gave its name to the Aterian culture of North Africa which corresponds roughly to the late Middle Paleolithic and early Upper Paleolithic (40 000 30 000 years BC , even up to 20 000 years BP in

1846-669: The "round head" period remained, which shows a fauna identical to that of the Hartebeest period, including this one, has however provided a dating of 5450 years B.C. In the South Oranese, the lithic industry deposit of the "Méandre", near Brezina, has been dated to 3900 years B.C., without it being possible to relate it to one of the categories of engravings on the wall, some of which are certainly more recent, while others may be older. The figure of 4000 years BC indicated by Vaufrey would thus be insufficient and should "be postponed by at least one millennium". Raymond Vaufrey had issued in 1955

1917-489: The Aterian lithic industry had long ceased to exist in the rest of North Africa due to the onset of the Ice Age , which in North Africa, resulted in hyperarid conditions. Assemblages with tanged tools, 'the Aterian', therefore have a significant temporal and spatial range. However, the exact geographical distribution of this lithic industry is uncertain. The Aterian's spatial range is thought to have existed in North Africa up to

1988-410: The Bubaline period, hunting scenes are rare. Five figurations show, contrary to what the first authors of the classifications thought, that the men of this period used the bow (stations XX, XXVII, XXXII), just like in the South Oranese or Fezzan. The position of the hunters' arms shows that they used a short bow, of the simple type, holding it in front of their bodies, without using the eye to aim. The axe

2059-421: The Bubaline period, it is represented held on a leash in the Caballine period. No engraving evokes a trap. Figurations of fish may also suggest the practice of fishing. Although the ancient Neolithic populations of the central Sahara, in all likelihood, did not know agriculture per se, it is permissible, according to the author, to assume, from engravings located in other stations, that the harvesting of wild grasses

2130-414: The Bubalus is one of the styles of engravings of the Bovidian, as demonstrated by Alfred Muzzolini in the early 1980s, in work that has been amply confirmed since. The 300 engravings, generally of more modest dimensions and of a more careless style, that Lhote attributes to him have, on the whole, more figurations with pitted than polished outlines. Their dark patina, most often grayish, no longer reaches

2201-599: The Capsian origin of the Neolithic art of the South Oranais and the Sahara can not be validly retained," he summarizes. In the last pages of his study, Henri Lhote returns to the separation made by several prehistorians between the engravings of the southern Oranese and those of the central Sahara and Tassili, supposed to derive from another center of civilization, some attached to the Neolithic of Capsian tradition,

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2272-511: The Capsian tradition but to a Mediterranean facies. According to Lhote, "the engraving stations located between those of the South Oranais and the South Constantinois, far from marking milestones between a center of origin, hypothetically in the region of Tebessa", reflect "on the contrary a late and decadent character, highlighted by several superimpositions, thus a movement of migration in the opposite direction". "The hypothesis of

2343-582: The Jebel Irhoud specimens are similar to them in some respects but differ in that the Jebel Irhoud specimens have a continuous supraorbital torus while the Aterian and Iberomaurasian specimens have a discontinuous supraorbital torus or in some cases, none at all, and from this, it was concluded that the Jebel Irhoud specimens represent archaic Homo sapiens while the Aterian and Iberomaurusian specimens represent anatomically modern Homo sapiens . The 'Aterian' fossils also display morphological similarities with

2414-677: The Nile Valley Possible Aterian lithic tools have also been discovered in Middle Paleolithic deposits in Oman and the Thar Desert . Most engraved Bubaline rock art appear in the northern region of Tassili, at Wadi Djerat . Levallois instruments in the area may indicate that Bubaline rock art was developed by Aterians. In the Sahara , Aterians camped near lakes, rivers, and springs, and engaged in

2485-546: The Sahara and the Sahel , Aterians may have migrated southward into West Africa (e.g., Baie du Levrier , Mauritania ; Tiemassas, Senegal ; Lower Senegal River Valley). The Aterian is associated with early Homo sapiens at a number of sites in Morocco. While the Jebel Irhoud specimens were originally noted to have been similar to later Aterian and some Iberomaurusian specimens, further examinations revealed that

2556-536: The Shardanes of the Sea Peoples. The second, particular to the Djerat wadi, would be composed of slender human figurations, mainly masculine ithyphallic, with a European profile, wearing feathers and a pointed beard. "Several of them are busy practicing the sexual act," notes Lhote. Several archers "shoot each other" or chase the mouflon. A third group presents (station I) small figures, several of which carry

2627-474: The South Oranese, the author reaches the same conclusions, the absence of the hippopotamus and the giraffe among the figurations of the Saharan Atlas being able to be explained by hydrographic and geographical causes. The abundance of the ram in the bestiary South Oranese should, according to him, be put "in relation to the religious role" that he played essentially in the region. Other differences would be

2698-685: The South, that is to say in the mounts of Ksour and the Djebel Amour": "of there, it gained the North, those of the region of Tiaret being the most septentrional" and "it is thus not in Constantinois that it is necessary to seek the origin of it". At Safiet Bou Rhénane, in the Djelfa region, the dates obtained are 5020 and 5270 years B.C., for an industry that does not correspond to the Neolithic of

2769-737: The South-Oranese by introducing complementary sub-stages, then extended to those of the Moroccan South and of the Rio de Oro, to the engravings of the South-Algerian and the South-Constantinois, as to those of Fezzan. Lhote thus distinguishes four periods for the engravings of the oued Djerat. According to Lhote, 1060 engravings can be related to the period of Bubalus antiquus, most often of large size. Their outline

2840-413: The absence of zoomorphic figures and scenes of coitus. In the decadent phase it is male crouching figures that we meet in the South Oranese, in Oued Djerat or Fezzan it is women, while in Constantinois both sexes are represented in this posture. The three regions thus reveal "common attitudes that cannot be fortuitous", so that "it is not possible to doubt a certain unity between the three major centers of

2911-513: The activity of hunting (e.g., antelope, buffalo, elephant, rhinoceros) and some gathering. As a result of a hyper-aridification event of Saharan Africa , which occurred around the time of Europe 's Würm glaciation event, Aterian hunter-gatherers may have migrated into areas of tropical Africa and coastal Africa . More specifically, amid aridification in MIS 5 and regional change of climate in MIS 4 , in

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2982-744: The archaeological record of North Africa during the Middle Stone Age from the Last Interglacial, and hints at how early modern humans dispersed into previously uninhabitable environments. This notwithstanding, the term still usefully denotes the presence of tanged tools in North African Middle Stone Age assemblages. Tanged tools persisted in North Africa until around 20,000 years ago, with the youngest sites located in Northwest Africa. By this time,

3053-553: The bovidian period, if not that they were able to see the domestication of the Ox", "it is impossible to go to look for their origin towards the East", the big naturalistic engravings representing the big wild fauna existing neither in the valley of the Nile nor in the neighbouring regions to the East or to the South of the river. It is therefore not towards Egypt that we must look for the origin of

3124-504: The degree tool resharpening. More recently, a large-scale study of North African stone tool assemblages, including Aterian assemblages, indicated that the traditional concept of stone tool industries is problematic in the North African Middle Stone Age. Although the term Aterian defines Middle Stone Age assemblages from North Africa with tanged tools, the concept of an Aterian industry obfuscates other similarities between tanged tool assemblages and other non-Aterian North African assemblages of

3195-478: The documents concerning the Bubaline period, in the South Oranese, Oued Djerat and Fezzan, are the oldest of the cave art of North Africa and the Sahara. The relationships between the bubaline engravings of Wadi Djerat and those of Fezzan are obvious to the author. The style, the dimensional order of the subjects, the patina, the fauna represented are similar, although the species are more numerous in Djerat. The human representations show in both regions an identity for

3266-531: The early out of Africa modern humans found at Skhul and Qafzeh in the Levant, and they are broadly contemporary to them. Apart from producing a highly distinctive and sophisticated stone tool technology, these early North African populations also seem to have engaged with symbolically constituted material culture , creating what are amongst the earliest African examples of personal ornamentation. Such examples of shell 'beads' have been found far inland, suggesting

3337-448: The engravings of Oued Djerat (which he will see again in 1969 and 1970). Not only did he make surveys and photographs of them, but he also made about sixty casts (liquid latex and siccative). The repertory that he published in 1976 describes 73 stations (numbered by going down the wadi) and includes 2605 figures from different periods. The author, specifying that there are several missing panels that were not numbered, estimates that in total

3408-472: The existence of poorly skilled engravers, others, true figurations of imaginary beasts with a composite structure, seem to be pure fantasy. The human figurations of the Bubaline period, numbering 63, can be classified into three groups: natural profiles, complex profiles with hairstyles and zoomorphic heads. The natural profiles, of men and women, with medium and pointed noses, thin lips and slightly protruding chins, are for 24 of them, clearly europoid. Some of

3479-419: The figures have a high cap in the shape of a rectangle, diamond or oval. One woman wears a semi-spherical headdress. The zoomorphic profiles, more or less identifiable, generally seem to be linked to sexual scenes. Several are cynocephalic, others have horns (station XVII), long hare ears (stations XXV and XXVI) or evoke felines (station XVII). One woman has a frog's head, another has ears as a head, both appear in

3550-481: The geographer R. Perret. During the winter 1935 M. Reygasse returned to Oued Djerat, accompanied by the painter Rigal who executed some engravings and paintings. After having raised the paintings of Tassili in 1956–1957, Henri Lhote, encouraged by the General de Gaulle and several ministers, undertakes in 1959, at the head of a team of five people to which several Tuareg collaborators are added, to make an inventory of

3621-501: The hypothesis that the bubaline engravings of Tassili, South Oranese and Fezzan were related to the Neolithic of Capsian tradition whose origin is located in the region of Tebessa-Gafsa. From many arguments Henri Lhote considers that this hypothesis is to be rejected. For F. E. Roubet, summarizes Lhote "the study of the engravings of the Oranese South and the region of Tiaret highlights that the center of this art must be located in

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3692-411: The intensity of brilliant black. Most of them feature bovids with stenciled outlines, of a lower quality than the previous works, but also some giraffes, elephants, ostriches, and rare rhinoceroses. "The bovid engravers seem to have made only brief intrusions into Wadi Djerat, whose torrential nature was not conducive to the stay of cattle," concludes the author. The Caballine populations, who frequented

3763-530: The north of Bir el-Ater is a plain. Agriculture was flourishing at the time of the Romans. Nowadays, the soil is dry and not very fertile. Vegetation consists essentially of tufts of alfa. To the south lies the Jebel Onk , north-east south-west, it is home to phosphates mines. The landscape becomes more rugged with few peaks and wadis including many canyons in the yellow ocher. Continuing towards Negrine ,

3834-459: The number of engravings "certainly exceeds 4000". "This figure, exceptional for a single valley and over such a short distance, shows the remarkable character of the wadi Djerat," he concludes. The Lhote expedition was exceptional by the information it was able to provide, by the endurance of its members in the face of difficult living conditions in the Tassili. However, the brutal methods used at

3905-408: The origin of the most beautiful legends, illustrated today by the use of masks in non-Islamic black societies living south of the Sahara?". If no sexual scene appears in the engravings of the Bovidian period, whereas there are some in the paintings of Tassili, quite numerous are those which date from the Caballine period, the couplings remaining rare there. War scenes are absent from the engravings of

3976-409: The others to a Neolithic of Sudanese tradition. "If it is true that the paintings of Tassili, Hoggar, Tibesti, Ennedi, are of an essence and another origin than the engravings of the Bubaline period, it is clear that we do not see on what criterion one would ecologically separate the three groups of archaic engravings, "he writes. For the populations of this bubaline period, "without report with those of

4047-483: The people making the Aterian exploited coastal resources as well as engaging in hunting. As the points are small and lightweight, it is likely that they were not hand-delivered but instead thrown. There is no evidence that a spear thrower was used, but the points have characteristics similar to atlatl dart points. It has so far been difficult to estimate whether Aterian populations further inland were exploiting freshwater resources as well. Studies have suggested that hafting

4118-469: The period of Bubalus antiquus", concludes Lhote, specifying that "the great naturalistic engravings of the Hoggar, Kaouar, Tibesti, that we tend to assimilate to the Bubaline period, are later although arising from the same artistic school. Henri Lhote recalls that no hearth allowing a radiometric measurement could be obtained in Oued Djerat. In Tassili, the hearth of a shelter where vestiges of painting from

4189-561: The period of the Bubal (...) both by their quantity and their quality and the problems they raise". It has about thirty species that show the presence of very abundant vegetation and water bodies of some permanence. The species identified on the engravings are : Several species are represented: A certain number of animal representations of Oued Djerat remain unidentifiable. Lhote mentions about fifteen cases. If some of them appear unfinished or in their "failed" malformations, testifying to

4260-412: The polishing process and the tools used, which, given the diversity of the widths and depths of the gutters, must not have been of a single type. These engravings belong to several periods. Lhote, relying on the differences in the patinas and the techniques of the line, resumes his classification in four periods elaborated from the documents studied in the central Sahara, applied to the rock engravings of

4331-495: The presence of long distance social networks. Studies of the variation and distribution of the Aterian have also now suggested that associated populations lived in subdivided populations, perhaps living most of their lives in relative isolation and aggregating at particular times to reinforce social ties. Such a subdivided population structure has also been inferred from the pattern of variation observed in early African fossils of Homo sapiens . Associated faunal studies suggest that

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4402-413: The previous period. Made by direct percussion, without the use of an intermediate tool, their contours are very irregular and the subjects (characters, camels, ostriches, horses, oxen) are small. Alphabetical inscriptions appear on them. The first two periods are prehistoric, the next two historical. According to Lhote "the interest of the rock paintings of Wadi Djerat lies especially in the engravings of

4473-408: The region much more than the cattle herders, left more traces of their passage, at least 420 engravings (as well as paintings) of small dimensions. Their staking is fine and regular, their patina buff. The populations of this time, arrived in the Sahara with the tank, used bronze and it is not necessary for their realization to eliminate, according to Lhote, the use of points of this metal. This period

4544-433: The same date. For example, bifacial leaf points are found widely across North Africa in assemblages that lack tanged tools and Levallois flakes and cores are near ubiquitous. Instead of elaborating discrete industries, the findings of the comparative study suggest that North Africa during the Last Interglacial comprised a network of related technologies whose similarities and differences correlated with geographical distance and

4615-478: The same date. Levallois reduction is widespread across the whole of North Africa throughout the Middle Stone Age, and scrapers and denticulates are ubiquitous. Bifacial foliates moreover represent a huge taxonomic category and the form and dimension of such foliates associated with tanged tools is extremely varied. There is also a significant variation of tanged tools themselves, with various forms representing both different tool types (e.g., knives, scrapers, points) and

4686-457: The sight of some of these images with zoomorphic heads, thought that they prefigured the zoomorphic gods of the Egyptian religion", reports Henri Lhote. "These relationships, unnatural in our eyes, could they not evoke certain myths in honor among African populations where animals play an essential role in the history of the creation of the world? And the human-animal relationships would not be at

4757-476: The time by the Lhote team (wetting with a wet sponge, scribbling with charcoal) have destroyed in some places the biological information that would have allowed them to be dated. Today, some paintings are falling apart because of the frequent wetting of the visitors. The Djerat wadi is a cañon dug in the Tassili siluro-devonian sandstones which runs between very steep cliffs. It flows into the valley of Illizi, about

4828-464: The women, whose breasts are often bare and whose hair is abundant, can be skirts which, tightened at the belt, go down a little above the ankle. Several figures have only a line on the belt (station XXIV), a band (station XXXVII) or a small triangular loincloth (station XXXI). At station L two diagonal bands cross the upper part of a female figure in the manner of suspenders. Several representations are particularly noteworthy. At station VIII (Ahana Rock),

4899-425: The zoomorphic heads, the same presence of sexual scenes, an analogy in the posture of women with spread legs. In Fezzan, however, the spirals are absent. "These few differences are insufficient not to recognize the common points between these two centers, which can be explained by their geographical proximity," observes Lhote. Comparing according to the same criteria the bubaline engravings of Oued Djerat and those of

4970-582: Was one of their activities. Finally, some twenty engravings, the oldest of which date back to the Bubaline period, show outlines of feet, sandals (more than 900 at station III, recent or perhaps from the Caballine period) and hands, without it being possible to interpret their meaning. Among the other cultural elements of Wadi Djerat, there are 125 spirals, very unevenly distributed in 18 stations (station XXVIII alone has 50). Of various designs, some are single or double spiral, others show more complex compositions. Some of them are linked to animals. For Henri Lhote,

5041-468: Was widespread, perhaps to maintain flexibility in the face of strongly seasonal environment with a pronounced dry season. Scrapers, knives and points all seem to have been hafted, suggesting a wide range of activities were facilitated by technological advances. It is probable that plant resources were also exploited. Although there is no direct evidence from the Aterian yet, plant processing is evidenced in North Africa from as much as 182,000 years ago. In 2012,

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