ALBERT

Description: The nature of inter-group relations among prehistoric hunter-gatherers remains disputed, with arguments in favour and against the existence of warfare before the development of sedentary societies. Here we report on a case of inter-group violence towards a group of hunter-gatherers from Nataruk, west of Lake Turkana, which during the late Pleistocene/early Holocene period extended about 30 km beyond its present-day shore. Ten of the twelve articulated skeletons found at Nataruk show evidence of having died violently at the edge of a lagoon, into which some of the bodies fell. The remains from Nataruk are unique, preserved by the particular conditions of the lagoon with no evidence of deliberate burial. They offer a rare glimpse into the life and death of past foraging people, and evidence that warfare was part of the repertoire of inter-group relations among prehistoric hunter-gatherers.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Mirazon Lahr, M -- Rivera, F -- Power, R K -- Mounier, A -- Copsey, B -- Crivellaro, F -- Edung, J E -- Maillo Fernandez, J M -- Kiarie, C -- Lawrence, J -- Leakey, A -- Mbua, E -- Miller, H -- Muigai, A -- Mukhongo, D M -- Van Baelen, A -- Wood, R -- Schwenninger, J-L -- Grun, R -- Achyuthan, H -- Wilshaw, A -- Foley, R A -- England -- Nature. 2016 Jan 21;529(7586):394-8. doi: 10.1038/nature16477.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Leverhulme Centre for Human Evolutionary Studies, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Street, Cambridge CB2 1QH, UK. ; Turkana Basin Institute, Nairobi, Kenya. ; National Museums of Kenya, Jomo Kenyatta House, PO Box 152-30500, Lodwar, Kenya. ; Departamento de Prehistoria y Arqueologia, UNED, c/ Paseo Senda del Rey, 7, 28040 Madrid, Spain. ; National Museums of Kenya, PO Box 40658-00100, Nairobi, Kenya. ; Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, PO Box 62000-00200, Nairobi, Kenya. ; Research School of Earth Sciences, The Australian National University, Building 142, Mills Road, Acton, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia. ; Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art, University of Oxford, Dyson Perrins Building, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3QY, UK. ; Research Centre for Human Evolution, Environmental Futures Research Institute, Griffith University, 170 Kessels Road, Nathan, Queensland 4111, Australia. ; Department of Geology, Anna University, Chennai, Tamil Nadu 600025, India.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26791728" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉