Duinefontein 1 and 2 are early prehistoric

archaeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology an ...

s near

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They have produced

Acheulean Acheulean (; also Acheulian and Mode II), from the French ''acheuléen'' after the type site of Saint-Acheul, is an archaeological industry of stone tool manufacture characterized by the distinctive oval and pear-shaped " hand axes" associat ...

stone tools and animal bones dating between 200,000 and 400,000 years ago. It was not a settlement site, but instead seems to have been a waterside location where animals could be hunted or scavenged when they died by hominids. The hominids used the tools to butcher the animals, although many of the animal bones from the site represent killings by other carnivores. One

context Context may refer to: * Context (language use), the relevant constraints of the communicative situation that influence language use, language variation, and discourse summary Computing * Context (computing), the virtual environment required to s ...

, from Duinefontein 2, dated by optically stimulated luminescence dating to 270,000 BP contained

ochre Ochre ( ; , ), or ocher in American English, is a natural clay earth pigment, a mixture of ferric oxide and varying amounts of clay and sand. It ranges in colour from yellow to deep orange or brown. It is also the name of the colours produce ...

that must have been introduced to the site by people and which may have been used as body adornment. If so, it would represent some of the earliest evidence of an aesthetic sensibility in early peoples.

Sources

* Cruz-Uribe, K et al., 2003, Excavation of buried late Acheulean (mid-Quaternary) land surfaces at Duinefontein 2, West Cape Province, South Africa, Journal of Archaeological Science 30, 559–75, qtd in Scarre, C (ed.) (2005). The Human Past, London: Thames and Hudson. . Archaeological sites in South Africa Pleistocene Archaeological sites of Southern Africa {{Africa-archaeology-stub