Persistence or Pastoralism: The Challenges of Studying Hunter-Gatherer Resilience in Africa

This chapter considers evidence for a dietary transition during the Middle Holocene climatic optimum in the central Sahara. Using data from the site of Gobero (Niger), data on dental health are compared between two occupation phases to determine if a dietary transition had occurred. These sites were associated with a once vibrant lake basin that was home to human populations from around 10, 000 to 4, 000 years ago, with an occupational hiatus coincident with the 8.2kya. Results indicate limited evidence for a change in dental disease patterns through time, which suggests that any dietary transition that occurred was relatively minor and not a complete restructuring of human lifeways. Comparing these data to a broader sample of pastoralist populations suggests the data from Gobero lack the signatures of the adoption of pastoralism and instead reflect the continuation of a hunter-gatherer lifeway during the Early and Middle Holocene of the central Sahara. Changes in mortuary practices and broader site level organization may indicate the emergence of incipient social complexity in the form of an ownership society.