At https://phys.org/news/2022-06-turkish-hilltop-civilisation-began.html … the name of Gobekli Tepe, in Turkish, has the meaning of ‘potbelly hill’, and is one of the most important archaeological sites of the Holocene, dating back to around 9500BC. A series of T-shaped megalithic pillars was created by people on the cusp of introducing farming as a way of life. They were still hunter-gatherers, it is claimed. Potbelly Hill was not inhabited it would seem but is regarded as a ritual site. It may even be part of a large sacred landscape that encompassed other nearby hills. Some of these may be earlier. German archaeologist Klaus Schmidt began to excavate the site in 1995. Turkish archaeologists are continuing the work, with a small German team. Some of the megaliths are inscribed with images of foxes, boars, ducks, lizards, and a leopard. Many of the finds are based in a museum in the town of Sunliurfa, nearby, which has become a big tourist attraction.
At https://phys.org/news/2022-06-millet-east-asia-central-europe.html … tracking the spread of millet from East Asia to Central Asia, and from there into eastern and central Europe. Millet has a short growing season in comparison with wheat, and is, to a degree, drought resistant. It is therefore a crop of interest to those convinced by the argument of global warming. The people of the Bronze Age, presumably via the Silk Road, grew millet as they appreciated its advantages. It quickly spread from the Black Sea region into eastern Europe. This followed many years of development in China.
At https://phys.org/news/2022-06-year-old-stone-swiss-army-knives.html … the idea a particular stone tool was the equivalent, in the Stone Age, of the Swiss army knife, with its multiple functions, has taken the archaeology fraternity by storm, it would seem. It is now firmly embedded in the literature. In this piece, it is seamlessly integrated into the Out of Africa theory even though there has been many articles that place the arrival of early humans much earlier than 50,000 years ago. Old ideas die hard. Especially if they have traction and are generated by politicos. This one has an added advantage as it involves ‘social networking’ – the use of modern idiom transposed into the ancient past. That phrase perhaps says it all. You can give up reading at this point or carry on reading the waffle. In Old Speak of course, social networking would have been described as trade and barter, one tribe interacting with the next tribe, and so on. New Speak is a distinct feature of this piece, which doesn’t really impart any new information for historians and archaeologists. Perhaps it is aimed at Joe Public, to keep the idea of Out of Africa alive. What is clear is that in southern Africa, or Africa south of the equator, the stone tool became very popular, and was replicated over a wide geographical area. Incidentally, Bushmen inhabited a similar geographical region, right down into the modern world. Presumably, they were a people that preceded the Bushmen as the toolset was especially common around 65,000 years ago. Out of Africa coincided with the Laschamp Event, a geomagnetic reversal that set in motion a lot of changes, including the disappearance of the Neanderthals in Europe, and massive die-offs of mammal fauna. It may be that groups did migrate out of Africa at this time but as modern humans were already in western Asia and further afield that hardly substantiates the basic premise behind Out of Africa, the movement of modern humans into the wider world. In fact, it all sounds a bit like shoring the decks after the ship has been holed. The end of Clovis First was a bit like that. People schooled in the Clovis First theory were unable to just switch to an earlier entry into the Americas as it was ingrained in them. They argued relentlessly until the evidence became overwhelming. It seems people schooled into Out of Africa just can’t let go either. Interesting read after all those articles on modern humans going back 300,000 years, and 100,000 years ago in the Levant. Or, underwhelming if you are a cynic.